copyright
Is it possible to &quot;fix&quot; copyright infringement by deleting the &quot;infringing&quot; part?
<p><a href="http://genius.com/2-live-crew-pretty-woman-lyrics" rel="nofollow">Two Live Crew</a> was sued by the holders of <a href="https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&amp;ion=1&amp;espv=2&amp;ie=UTF-8#q=pretty+woman+yrics" rel="nofollow">Roy Orbison's</a> copyright for their version of "Pretty Woman." Titles are not copyrightable, so the basis for this suit was the copied first line: "Pretty woman walking down the street." (The rest of the two songs were very different.)</p>

<p>"Crew" had a "parody" defense for using the first line. But suppose they didn't. Could they fix the problem by e.g. changing the infringing first line to something like "Pretty woman running through the park?"</p>

<p>There's existing copyright infringement and future copyright infringement. </p>

<p>Let's say you sold a million records with infringing contents. That's copyright infringement. It has happened, you can't undo it. Now you get sued. If you think you will lose, it would be a good idea to change the music to be not infringing, so the next million records are not infringing and add to the damages. </p>

<p>It doesn't fix the infringement that has already been done, but makes sure there is no further infringement. And infringement <em>after</em> you were told about it and asked to stop might be punished more harshly. </p>
