Ed Sheeran has won a High Court copyright battle over his 2017 hit Shape of You.
A judge ruled on Wednesday that the singer-songwriter had not plagiarised the 2015 song Oh Why by Sami Chokri.
Chokri, a grime artist who performs under the name Sami Switch, had claimed the “Oh I” hook in Sheeran’s track was “strikingly similar” to an “Oh why” refrain in his own track.
After the ruling, Sheeran said such “baseless” claims “are way too common”.
In a video on social media, he said there was now a culture “where a claim is made with the idea that a settlement will be cheaper than taking it to court, even if there’s no basis for the claim”.
He added: “It’s really damaging to the songwriting industry. There’s only so many notes and very few chords used in pop music.
“Coincidence is bound to happen if 60,000 songs are being released every day on Spotify. That’s 22 million songs a year and there’s only 12 notes that are available.”
