How Copyright Law Became the Weapon Used Against the Artist It Was Meant to Protect

Murphy Campbell's case matters less as an individual injustice than as a schematic. The sequence Timeless Sounds IR followed — harvest public YouTube performances, clone the voice, distribute through a legitimate-seeming intermediary, file copyright claims against the original — requires no novel technology and no legal sophistication. It requires only the willingness to file paperwork and the knowledge that platforms will act on that paperwork before anyone verifies its basis. Campbell plays public domain ballads. The claims were filed against recordings of songs no one can own. YouTube accepted them…