The life of a Wisconsin tourism jingle was cut short by the Department of Tourism this week.

There had been controversy over the originality of the tune for the department's new slogan, "Wisconsin: Life's so good." The department announced Monday it would accept composer John Tanner's offer to write a new song.

A younger staff member at the Department of Tourism first pointed out that the song resembled a 1995 song called "Alright" by the British group Supergrass, according to Jerry Huffman, communications director for the Department of Tourism.

Huffman said all the discussion about the song was distracting from the message of the advertising campaign.

"The discussion was about the music," Huffman said. "We want people talking about Wisconsin as a travel destination."

Huffman said they had no reason to believe they were not on solid ground legally, and they had not heard from the band or record label.

"What we've been told and what our advice was, was that yes, the songs are similar in style but in the lyrics there are dramatic differences," Huffman said. "The simple thing is we were off message, and that's a bad thing in an advertising campaign."

Controversy over one song sounding like another is a frequent occurrence, according to Frank Evina, senior of copyright information at the Office of Public Information in the U.S. Copyright Office.

Part of copyright law says that the author has the right to derivative work, meaning anything based on the original work, Evina said.

"There's a common misconception that you can take one or two notes and switch them around and copyright laws don't apply, and that's not the case," he said.

The new jingle will be introduced at the Wisconsin Governor's Conference on Tourism, which will be held March 6 to 8 in Madison, Huffman said.

This jingle will be presented with the slogan, which is replacing "Stay just a little bit longer," the tourism slogan since March 2000, according to Huffman.

"The average life on a slogan seems to be about three to five years," he said.

Print and broadcast ads for the summer featuring the new slogan will start running in late April, Huffman said.

An informal, unscientific poll conducted by the Tribune on Tuesday which questioned 30 people found that most respondents thought the songs sounded similar. People in the Alumni Memorial Union and outside Campus Town West listened to samples of both songs and gave their opinions.

"It sounds similar," said Megan Hanke, a junior in the College of Health Sciences. "I think it's probably better that they (changed the song) because I can see some issues coming up."

Ninety percent of the respondents said they thought it was a good idea for the Wisconsin Department of Tourism to change to a different jingle. Two people thought they could have kept the song, and one person had no opinion.

"If there's a chance they're going to get in trouble, then it's probably a good idea to change," said Maggie Carmody, a senior in the College of Health Sciences.

Gerard Schumer, a senior in the College of Engineering, said that it is challenging to write new songs now.

"A million songs (are) out there," Schumer said, "you can't write an original anymore."

This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Feb. 17 2005.