We consider a legal defense for Fortnite that its dances are not copyright infringement because they are parody.
When Congress made dance choreography copyrightable in 1976, they definitely had in mind things like ballet choreography. We therefore consider, what if Fortnite had instead provided copyrighted ballet choreography as a dance that characters in the game can do to celebrate killing their opponents?
It seems to me this would be pretty obviously a parody of ballet, poking fun at choreographed dance by putting it in a situation in which it is incongruous. Therefore, such use would be fair use and not copyright infringement.
If a dance is serious enough (like ballet) for its choreography to be considered copyrightable, then its incongruous use in a work like Fortnite is parody.
If a dance is not serious, then it is a social dance, so not copyrightable according to the law.
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