Hit the Woah* That’s My Dance: The Case for Choreographic Compulsory Licensing
* 1 Picture this: you are about fourteen years old; you have never known a world without the Internet, and social media is the first thing that comes to your mind when you contemplate putting creative works out into the world. You take dance classes after school and love collaborating with your friends to make choreographic works—though you call them “TikTok dances.”2
Many creative adolescents across the country fit within this archetype.3 I, as an elder member of Generation Z,4 almost did when I was younger. I spent most of my adolescence and undergraduate years in dance studios. I spent late nights and weekends creating choreography with my friends and posting much of it on YouTube. I knew very little about copyright law during my years studying dance, but I knew enough to know that dance was treated differently than other creative works. When I entered law school, I vowed to the dance communities I was a part of to make sense of why no choreography appears to be protected on TikTok and beyond, and how choreography seems to migrate across platforms and into others’ works without anyone ever batting an eye. This Note is my attempt to deliver some answers and solutions to the dance communities that impacted my young adult life and continue to inspire me.
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Olivia Roche
Senior Notes Editor, Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law; Staff Editor, Georgetown Law Technology Review; Georgetown Law, J.D. expected 2023; Barnard College of Columbia University, B.A. 2020.