It recently came to my attention that our friend Timbaland (the man responsible for the awesome recent release by Justin Timberlake, as well as the less awesome but still good recent release by Nelly Furtado) is under suspicion for music thievery.
Aparently Timbo used a song produced by Finnish composer Janne Suni, which was created and posted in 2000. The song in question is Nelly Furtado's "Do It"
As a music producer myself, I am very familiar with "borrowing" from other musicians. I taught myself audio production by sampling bits and pieces of songs that I liked and mashed them together to make new/derivative works. I sometimes still do this, but I primarily compose or assemble my own sounds as to avoid any copyright infringement.
The main difference between myself and Timbaland, is that I make music as a hobby and share it with my friends and family, and Timbo makes music for a career and sells it to the world.
I'm not sure exactly where I stand but there are some serious similarities between the two songs in question. I think at the very least Timbaland should admit the similarities between his song and Janne's, and explain how this all happened.
Check out these YouTube links to learn more about the ongoing debate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4KX7SkDe4Qhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV2fTEeP6GM
(props to Mizo for telling me about this issue)