Copyright and Message Boards (including the SDMB)

Factual Questions
1

I have a question regarding copyright and message boards in particular, but not particularly the SDMB. There’s a specific General Question here - while I would be interested in the viewpoint of the Mods or Administration*, that’s not the primary reason for the post.

I’m a songwriter, and I frequently post segments of lyrics, or songs in their entirety, on various songwriting message boards for critique and criticism.

Almost every board has boilerplate at the bottom of the page, or on a page somewhere on the site, that is a disclaimer to the effect that all postings on the board become the property of the message board owners.

GQ #1: What implications does that have for me, as a copyright holder who intends to use the material for fiscal gain in the future?

Given that I already hold exclusive copyright (inherent in the authorship), I would assume that their lawyers could argue that by entering or using the site I implicitly agreed to the boilerplate and hence granted a limited license for the use of the material, even if it is the financial benefit of the MB owner and not to the owner of the work.

GQ# 2: Would the MB actually own a piece of the work, or would I be granting them a limited license to the use of the work?

Bonus Question - very music industry specific

GQ #3: *Were I to record a song to which I have posted the lyrics, would I still retain 100% of the publishing for the purposes of royalty assignment, mechanicals, etc? *

*The reason I mention this is that I have some new material that is a lot more political than my usual work and I wanted to post it on the SDMB for critiques by Dopers, who as we all know, tend to be a little more educated, a lot more cynical and overall more politically aware than most MB denizens.

2

IANAL, but from standard disclaimers I have seen on boards is that a limited license for the use of the material is granted by you. The board just has the right to keep your lyrics on the site to the end of time. Any disclaimer that stated you sacrificed all rights to your lyrics likely would be legally unenforceable.

3

Negative on that. The notice states “By posting on this board you grant the Chicago Reader, Inc., and its successors and assigns a nonexclusive irrevocable right to re-use your posting in any manner it or they see fit without notice or compensation to you.” In other words, if picker posts the lyrics to the next big top-40 hit on this board, Cecil and the Slugs have the legal right to record and release it.

The good news is “No material contained in this site may be republished or reposted without express written consent of the Chicago Reader, Inc., except that message board users retain the right to republish or repost their own work.” so nobody else can steal picker’s song and picker will be able to release his/her own version.

4

Not unless they wait until I’ve released it and they’ve recorded their version of my music themselves. I’m fairly certain they couldn’t write new music for the lyrics, regardless of their ownership, as that’s a different issue of publishing and copyright, and one that, legally, affords enormous protection to the original holder. Integrity of the original work (which in this case is lyrics & music) and all that.

Also, the original copyright owner, unless they specifically sign it away, always retains automatically the right to record a piece ** first**. After I’ve released a copy of it, anybody could record it, and there are statutory rates for the royalties that must be paid unless they negotiate specific terms with me.

But those are very specific instances. I’m honestly far more worried about other message boards, where there are many other (sometimes not so ethical) songwriters. Admittedly, all songwriting draws heavily on the influences of others’ works and phrasings that we rearrange and reinterpret to create something new. But I would be royally pissed if somebody lifted a complete line or verse of mine and put it in their song. Especially if it became a hit, although at least in that case I could actually have a chance at recovering some money.

5

BTW, I decided to throw caution to the wind in this instance and post one of my tunes for critique here.

6

No, as picker says, he has the right to release his version or an authorized version first.

Cecil Speaks.

After the song appears anyone can cover it under a compulsory license, after notifying the copyright holder. Which picker is. His lyrics were copyright, under current law, as soon as he wrote them, and became defendable as to time and date when he posted them.

But picker is also wrong when he writes:

Not at all. What we give to our posts is a limited use license. They most emphatically do not become anyone else’s property. The Chicago Reader can use them for commercial purposes in a compilation of messages such as the Straight Dope books. They could publish a Doper Songbook of lyrics posted on the Board. But they don’t own anything. The poster has full rights to all original material and retains complete rights to use it.

7

What about when you post excerpts of other people’s lyrics or literary works, etc? Let’s say I post an excerpt from Big Stone Gap? The Reader can’t reproduce that excerpt for commercial gain, can they? Or is it Fair Use?

8

A gray area. No post here should contain so much of another’s copyrighted words as to constitute a violation of Fair Use. That’s why the mods will edit posts that contain complete song lyrics or complete articles reposted.

If the posts are all within Fair Use, then publishing those posts in a message compilation should probably also constitute Fair Use. But what is considered Fair Use in one situation may or may not be considered Fair Use in a different context.

I assume the Chicago Reader has lawyers who are trained in this and would vet the book before publication. But Fair Use has no fixed definition or rules. It is all context-based and subjective.

9

For future lyrics, you might consider posting a link to your lyrics (maybe on your own webpage). That way you could solicit feedback without chance of compromising any rights.