It might be worth pointing out that for some small shops there is an exemption if the store is just playing the radio or TV.
https://www.ascap.com/help/ascap-licensing
Rights and ownership of audio and video works are often thought to be one and the same. On a video site I frequent, posters often say, “I bough the DVD, so I own the rights to do whatever I want with it!”. Nope, you bought the rights* to view it in your own home and display it to small groups within your home. You don’t have the right to display it in a public place or modify it and claim it as your own.\
*Thinking about it. Rights is probably too strong. More like you paid for the privilege that can be revoked at any time.
This is not actually an issue with the vast majority of works under US law. Copyright law very rarely has anything to do with “claiming a work as your own.” For the most part, you can go claiming music or literature as your own without infringing a copyright holder’s rights. (The exception is visual works, which have a right of attribution.) The Copyright Act doesn’t really care if you claim something as your own unless you infringe one of the copyright holder’s exclusive rights, which are things like making copies, distributing copies, publicly performing a dramatic or musical work, etc.
Yes, I’m thinking mostly of movies that people recut and rearrange and post it on Youtube with a logo to keep others from “stealing” their work, claiming ownership of the original video because they bought a DVD or Blu-Ray. Recently there was a somewhat heated debate on a video forum I frequent where the poster wanted to do a fanedit of a movie “for his own use”. On one side were purists like me who believe that movies should be seen as the creators intended and his purchase didn’t allow editing of any kind and those that view fanedits as okay as long as they’re not publicly released, which of course would violate copyright laws.
I have a local major chain business that frequently puts products out on the parking lot in front of the store and has “parking lot sales”. To attract customers they also have two giant speakers outside and they use it to blare a local FM 80’s hits station at full blast.
I’m wondering how this system works since they music they play is coming from a local FM station, and since they are now broadcasting over the entire parking lot and not just their store. This has been going on for years so is it actually legal?
Simply showing them on a screen requires a license as well.
I was at a local bar last night that hosted three bands (metal, hard rock, and punk) that do only their own music, no covers. In between the first and second sets, the sound guy played music from his tablet. The bar owner came running over, told him to stop, and explained why.
This bar is a tiny shithole place in a decrepit little town. They have a band maybe once a month. I guess some dude from ASCAP could pay his salary stopping at places like this and then hitting them with a fine.
Yep. Every copyright infringement complaint I’ve read filed by ASCAP or BMI against a bar it restaurant includes evidence from an investigator who visited and noted down specific songs he or she heard. They’re usually freelance investigators, though. I don’t think they’re on staff.
Maybe they have a license to cover that. Or maybe they just haven’t been caught yet.
That implicates yet another right—the right to display a work—separate from the rights of reproduction, distribution, or public performance.
Section 106 of the Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. §106—
True, but it doesn’t prevent YouTube from accepting a claim from someone who says a specific performance needs to be paid. I think it’s because YT doesn’t check any claims unless it is challenged.
I had a claim made about a performance by the Moscow Symphony that I used for a video once even though it was a 100 year-old composition. They were correct that it was the Moscow dudes performing, but the rights had been leased by my music source. A challenge was all it took to remove the claim.
They may be doing that with the cooperation of the radio station. Sometimes radio stations will even do remote broadcasts from such events.
I got a mild (no warning) reminder when I posted the full lyrics of a song on a thread on this forum. It was truncated to the first stanza.
The music rights don’t belong to the radio station, therefore they can’t give them away. The rights belong to the publishers of the music. The owners of the music have to be paid, even if the music was indirectly acquired from a radio station broadcast, even with the cooperation of the radio station.
Here’s a twist. If I go to a open karaoke bar (not a room), and sing my favorite JPop or KPop song, would the Japanese or Korean equivalent of ASCAP, BMI, etc. come to ensure the proper rights have been obtained.
What about songs in which the music arrangement or lyrics are changed. If I sing Layla to the music arrangement of Stairway to Heaven (OMG, the horror!) is that counted as two songs or one. What if the song is the licensed karaoke version of Layla is playing and I substitute my own lyrics. Does that become my composition?
True, but I assume if a radio station is doing a remote broadcast, station management is taking care of the licensing issues rather than store management.
If the Korean composers and publishers are interested in enforcing their rights in the American market, they’ll likely sign up with ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, or GMR. They don’t have to but it’s easier that way
Karaoke bars needs licenses too, as do the producers of the Karaoke software and discs.
It will likely be both.
It’s a derivative work, and preparing a derivative work is one of the exclusive rights of the author.
Just reciting your own lyrics during a karaoke session isn’t going to trigger anything more than the normal licensing requirements for the underlying song.
I worked one summer in college between semesters for ASCAP. I’d go to a bar and note the number of seats and whether they had the correct license.
BMI and SESAC are the two other main performance rights organizations you need a license for.
And its possible for a composer not to belong and you’d need his express permission, though this would be very rare indeed.
There is also Global Rights Music and Soundexchange and I’m sure a few other smaller ones too.
there was a big change in the copyright law just this year. It mainly impacts streaming services like Spotify.
The coffee shop next to my business used to let the high school jazz band come and “practice” there on Sunday nights. It didn’t really draw a crowd, but there were some parents and other interested parties that would show up.
I was talking to the owner one day, after I had noted that they hadn’t been playing for a few weeks (I personally wasn’t a fan, they were audible throughout my establishment as well, and they really weren’t very good), and apparently, they had had a visit and a threat by a BMI representative who told them that they would have to pay lots of money if they kept doing these performances. Obviously, they stopped.