Photo-illustration: Nadia Mendez/ WIRED Middle East

Earlier this month, Jojo Siwa, the former Dance Moms and Nickelodeon star, released her new single, Karma. And to no one’s surprise, it blew up on the internet, with TikTok as its speculating epicenter. Siwa envisioned “Karma” as the perfect sound for her “rebranding towards more adult music” after her 11-year streak as a “child-friendly” artist. But the internet had other plans for the artist. Shortly after Karma debuted on April 5, an obscure music video starring 2012 pop artist Brit Smith singing the same track emerged on TikTok. The sheer outpour of support for Smith and the consequent trolling of Siwa on the internet encouraged Brit Smith to later release the original track for the world to stream. And stream they did. In the midst of this trending showdown under the hashtag #karmassbitch on TikTok, Smith’s version of Karma out-charted Siwa’s on iTunes.

Although it’s safe to say Brit Smith’s pop track received far more praise than her former label, Interscope Records, anticipated back in the day, this is not an isolated event. It’s a norm that the music industry has practiced for decades.

Music publishing is also a legal remaking business

Before calling out Jojo Siwa for ripping off the lyrical genius of a lesser-known artist, it’s essential to understand the facts. The businesses of writing and recording a track are very separate facets of the same $28.6 billion music industry. For starters, publishers like Universal Music Group and Sony Music are legally responsible for representing and compensating musical talent across the board. This includes everyone, from the singer to the composer. It is the publisher or record label that often holds the copyright to the original sound recording of a piece of music. Thus giving the record label master rights to any original recordings of the artists they sign for some time.

In the case of the Karma scandal, Brit Smith owns the master rights to the song ‘Karma’s A Bitch’. This means the 38-year-old artist pockets all the royalties from the song’s success. But if that’s the case, how did Jojo Siwa remix and release this pop track from the 2010s? In Jojo’s words, “what happens is that people write songs, and then they don’t do anything with them. Then, a few years later, it makes sense for another artist.” Though the business model behind this statement is a little more nuanced than simply rummaging through recording archives, the act itself is just that.

Karma by Jojo Siwa was written by Desmond Child and the songwriting duo Rock Mafia in 2024. In 2012, the same trio wrote Brit Smith’s version, Karma’s A Bitch. In an interview with Page Six, Smith also revealed that the original track was written “with Miley Cyrus in mind, but she passed it on.” Days after the scandal, Jojo Siwa did acknowledge that the song was bought by her, making it a legal remake as its rights were bought for her to release. Smith’s version of the song never hit the charts or streaming platforms, as her record label at the time, Interscope Records, chose to release her single, Provocative, featuring will.i.am and produced by Timbaland.

Miley Cyrus’ 2012 tweet confirms that Rock Mafia had originally pitched ‘Karma’s A Bitch’ to her before it went to Brit Smith, who went on to record the single.

If what Jojo Siwa did is legal, why the scandal?

Despite clearing the air on not writing the song herself, Jojo Siwa’s skewed understanding of the songwriting process is what seems to have gotten fans enraged. In an interview with Billboard, she detailed how the song was recorded “six different times. If you listen to the first version of Karma, it’s a whole different song, with a whole different bridge.” However, aside from the single edit in the 2024 remark’s chorus, both songs are lyrically identical. To further the madness, Jojo Siwa’s desire to put “Gay Pop” on the map as an” official genre” with her new music translated as an arrogant stance for an amateur artist.

The recycling or revamping of old music is no crime. Copyright laws will always reserve the rights and credits of a recording to its legal owner. But even copyright can’t stop certain Nickelodeon stars’ music from trending for all the wrong reasons.

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