Jackson had a 50% stake in a media company that bought Eminem's "back catalogue" in 2007.
Jackson did comment after the song "Just Lose It" was released and reportedly threatened legal action against Eminem.
It's a subjective call on whether Eminem "dissed" Jackson in the 2004 song "Just Lose It." Additionally, there's no evidence to assess whether the song had anything to do with the media-rights acquisition.
In January and February 2024, a rumor circulated on social media involving Eminem and Michael Jackson, who died in 2009. According to the claim, Eminem "dissed" Jackson in a song in the mid-2000s, when Jackson was defending himself against child-molestation accusations in court, and Jackson did not comment immediately. Then, supposedly to get back at the rapper, Jackson allegedly purchased the rights to Eminem's "whole catalogue" so Jackson would receive money whenever Eminem performed.
The rumor was shared on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and Reddit. One popular version featured images of the two performers with the text, "When Eminem did a diss on Michael Jackson in 2005, Michael made no comments. He went and bought Eminem's whole catalogue and then got paid every time Eminem performed."
In short, the claim had significant elements of both truth and falsity, so we rate this as a "Mixture."
First of all, it's a subjective call about whether Eminem "dissed" Jackson in the song "Just Lose It" from his album "Encore," which was released in late 2004. Moreover, Jackson had a 50% stake in the Sony/ATV media company, which bought Eminem's "back catalogue" in 2007, but there's no evidence to assess whether the purchase was made as revenge for the song. Finally, contrary to what social media posts claimed, Jackson did comment after "Just Lose It" was released and reportedly threatened legal action against Eminem.
Jackson faced child sexual abuse accusations twice. First, in 1993, the parents of 13-year-old Jordy Chandler filed a civil lawsuit accusing him of molestation. Jackson settled the case by paying $22 million; no criminal charges were filed. In 2003, Jackson was charged with felony child molestation involving another young boy, Gavin Arvizo. The five-month trial in that case in 2005, which was scrutinized by the global media, ended with Jackson's acquittal on all counts.
The rumor in question centers on the song "Just Lose It" from Eminem's "Encore" album, in which Eminem raps, "I done touched on everything but little boys, and that's not a stab at Michael." The lyrics include:
Come here, little kiddies, on my lap
Guess who's back with a brand new rap?
And I don't mean "rap" as in a new case
Of child molestation accusations
Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah, no worries
Papa's got a brand new bag of toys
What else could I possibly do to make noise?
I done touched on everything but little boys
And that's not a stab at Michael
That's just a metaphor, I'm just psycho
I go a little bit crazy sometimes
I get a little bit out of control with my rhymes
Those lines appear to reference Jackson, and the music video for the song also contains clues. In the video, Eminem dressed in outfits that highly resembled those worn by Jackson, with scenes that seemingly parodied Jackson's personal and professional life. For instance, Eminem acted out the 1984 incident in which Jackson's hair caught fire during a Pepsi commercial shoot.
Whether the music video and song lyrics constitute a "diss" toward Jackson could be a subjective call based on one's thoughts about the musicians and parody art.
But here's where the viral rumor contains a factual inaccuracy. Contrary to the claim that Jackson "made no comments" after the song's release, The Guardian reported in October 2004, two weeks after it was released, that Jackson threatened to sue Eminem and "demanded that all US cable music video channels cease showing the video for 'Just Lose It.'" The article included quotes from Jackson in which he said the music video was disrespectful:
"I am very angry at Eminem's depiction of me in his video," Jackson said in an interview with a Los Angeles radio station. "I feel that it is outrageous and disrespectful. It is one thing to spoof, but it is another to be demeaning and insensitive."
The singer continued: "I've admired Eminem as an artist, and was shocked by this. The video was inappropriate and disrespectful to me, my children, my family and the community at large."
So, was it true that, as revenge, Jackson "bought Eminem's whole catalogue and then got paid every time Eminem performed"?
Not quite. It was true that a media company in which Jackson held a 50% stake bought Famous Music, a publishing company with the rights to roughly 125,000 songs, in 2007. According to The New York Times, Jackson bought the ATV publishing catalogue in 1985 and a decade later he "sold a 50% share of ATV to Sony for about $100 million, creating the Sony/ATV joint venture."
The 2007 purchase of Famous Music gave Sony/ATV the rights to songs by Eminem, as well as artists such as Shakira and Christina Aguilera, and several popular movies.
In other words, it was misleading to claim Jackson, on his own, purchased the rights to Eminem's music. Rather, a company he had a 50% stake in made a deal to acquire a large amount of media — including, The Guardian reported, "the rights to Eminem's back catalogue." (A back catalogue is, as Oxford Dictionary explains, "a list of the books, music, etc. that a person or company has produced, which can be made available for sale.")
However, there was no evidence to connect the deal between Sony/ATV and Famous Music to Eminem's "Just Lose It" or Jackson's feelings about the song.
Furthermore, we lack details of the 2007 purchase and cannot ascertain whether Sony/ATV benefited from live performance royalties, and therefore cannot confirm or deny whether Jackson earned money from Eminem's live performances.
Jackson's relationship with the rights to Eminem's back catalogue proved to be temporary. Following his death, Sony paid $750 million in 2016 to buy out the Jackson estate's half of Sony/ATV.
This is not the first rumor we've fact-checked about Jackson supposedly owning the rights to other artists' work. In 2001, we investigated the claim that he owned the rights to the Beatles' songs.