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Finnish Taxi Drivers Must Pay Music Royalties
jonerik writes "According to this story from Ananova, Finland's Supreme Court has ruled that taxi drivers must pay royalty fees of about $20 annually if they play music in their car while a customer is in the backseat. According to the article, 'Lauri Luotonen, chairman of the Helsinki Taxi Drivers' Association, says the ruling is likely to force most drivers to keep their radios off.'" This includes if they play the radio, which ostensibly already pays such fees.
Now, this just in. If you listen to music, while someone other than the person who bought the CD is in the room, you must pay $20 annually to RIAA.
That is all.
"Martha Stewart can lick my Scrotum......do i have a scrotum?" -- Sharon Osbourne
That's almost more outrageous than the tarrifs you have to pay when entering and exiting San Fransisco in a taxi. Sheesh!
...they sing to the customer in the backseat? Would they still have to pay royalty fees?
"the fax machine is nothing but a waffle iron with a phone attached to it." - Grandpa Simpson
They are playing their own recording of finnish folk songs they taped in their basement. Would they have to pay royalties to play their own music?
I guesse this could ruin the careers of many finnish taxi drivers/musicians.
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
this is something that people _joke_ about please tell me this isn't for real?
at least this isn't in america... but what is this world coming to? What's with all these fee's tacked on to everything?!!
One thing I've noticed is that a "$35/mo" cell phone plan isn't even questioned when the bill arrives for $40.83... That's $5.83 in taxes and fees! 17% taxes/fees... plus you pay a sales tax on the phone in most states... and an income tax on the money you used to buy the phone...
At least in Sweden when you pay the 90% income tax up front you know you're getting hosed.
How will the authorities know if the taxi driver had the radio turned on or off? Will they have a sting operation where an undercover officer hails a taxi, gets in, and then busts the the driver if they turn on the radio but haven't payed the fee?
The slashdot editors owe me a buck for everybody that reads this comment.
Man, this is getting to a level of stupidity that makes me wonder if I should go back home to Pluto ...
I mean, is there a trust fund for starving Finnish Artists?
This borders on the most absurd story I have ever heard.
What about elevators? Is that a separate suit?
We tax the tips waiters & waitresses make. Next up... Elevator music royaltie fees for large building owners.
"It is essential that justice be done
Or do music interests in Finland not care about their 'art' and only profit? Does anyone know how music in Finland is copyrighted with such vehemence? What's the deal?
What if the music played is their own music that they made? Do they still have to pay? i kinda doubt it.
What if they are playing soem Pakastanky or Afganisy moanign and winning music? Do the drivers have to pay $20 to the customers who are forced to listen to that crap? Doubt it, but would be cool tho.
NO! NO! Please don't mod me, I'm too young to die a troll. *click* Oh the pain, the pain...
Radio stations already pay a hefty fee so the music is free for everyone to hear. Maybe in the future when RIAA pays off congress i'll have to turn down the music in my "pimpin" car because someone might overhear it.
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Go canucks, habs, and sens!
Is there some way I can filter out news about Finland's music industry? Before it too gets front page news, I would like to preemtively filter out all news of the music industry in Bolivia, Greenland, the Ukraine, and Poland. Thank you.
Well then they can ask the passenger if they want to listen to the radio, then charge them a minimal fee for the royalty. As long as it is REPORTED.
or add 1 cent/passenger.
That shouldn't be too expensive.
But IMHO, it's ridiculous to impose this ordinance.
This is getting out of hand. Will someone please punish these people and send them to bed without their royalties?
My god! What happened to fair use! This is the most disgusting and blatant consumer rights violation since not labeling copy crippled cd's.
/. crown and a handful of taxi drivers are outraged at this atrocity!
Let us hope that more than just the
Help I'm a rock.
If you use copyrighted materials for public performance for benefit of the business, you have to pay extra.
It's the same thing as running a TV or radio in the waiting room of a business. The business is getting a benefit from the music, so they have to pay a cut.
There's also a group of old ladies who go to restraunts and pretend that one of them is having a birthday. If one of the employees sings "Happy Birthday" a copywrited song, they sue. This apparently keeps them in bingo money.
I hate it too, but that's the law. If you don't like it, get filthy stinking rich, and buy new ones.
********* sig: If you don't like the law, get filthy stinking rich, and buy a better one.
RADIO listens to you!
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Go canucks, habs, and sens!
The JUDANS in the RIAA Need to be burned at the stake. In soviet finland..you must pay 20$ if you sing a copyrighted song in public.
"Comedy's a dead art form. Now tragedy, that's funny."
I don't know how the airwaves work in Finland, but in the US I would assume that's why they are called public airwaves. The stations pay royalties and in turn collect advertising revenue. Whatever.
Anyway does this apply to only music stations? What if they listen to the Finnish equivalent of NPR? Or the BBC?
sig
More proof that the RIAA is ripping off artists. When Napster was required to remove all songs under RIAA copyright, the RIAA was supposed to provide a list. They couldn't. IIRC, they just insisted that Napster should somehow *know* which ones were and which ones weren't.
Perhaps this will be used as an argument for DRM, Hollings Style!
for me, I drive a taxi thats not quite done.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Party A buys or leases a commodity from Party B. Party B charges a fee to Party C for just looking at (or listening to)the commodity purchased by Party A.
Are the economic conditions in Finland so bad that the judiciary can be bought off this way?
Is bjork finnish? she seems to be the only recording artist making money internationally (and that was a few years ago). I guess teh artists need this, except that they'll never see a penny.
"Martha Stewart can lick my Scrotum......do i have a scrotum?" -- Sharon Osbourne
ha-ha -M@
This is friggin rediculous. Pretty soon someones gonna come up with taxes to breathe in some country somewhere. These corporate guys need to get a life!
but it's still stupid
In the USA if you so much as play the radio over your office's intercom, then you also have to play royalties since it's considered "commercial space".
The court is merely saying that the taxi cab is a "commercial space" as well.
I used to think it would be cool to live in Finland. I thought they were a mellow, friendly, low-key kinda country. They are hard asses. Check out this link about traffic some fines in Finland... HARDCORE. Looks like they base their fines on a percentage of your YEARLY income... doh!
"It is essential that justice be done
Songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, responsible for such hits as "Hound Dog" and "Jailhouse Rock," are among the plaintiffs and were in the courtroom Monday. The song writing duo said illegal copying of music and movies was costing artists millions and would ultimately stifle creativity.
Oh yeah, like anyone'd pay money for these songs otherwise... If anything, these guys are stifling the creativity of brand new artists by locking up the business of music in the name of the labels.
That sounds dumb.... aren't these stations making money off advertisers? Wouldn't a captive audience in a taxi mean more people hearing the commercials? That's the logic behind the annoying radio stations they play in dentists' offices.
This makes me wonder how the taxi driver fits into this picture at all, economically speaking. Are the taxi drivers making money off of the radio? Do they charge people extra to listen to the radio? Do people frequent taxi services that play the radio more often than those who don't? Probably not, so why are they being forced to pay up? It just seems wrong.
is who do they pay these royalties to? Are they divided up equally among all artists? FUBAR -M@
Link was messed up... HARDCORE
"It is essential that justice be done
Phew... that's a load off my mind... cause I'm sure the RIAA or their equivalent in Finland (unlike cab drivers) are *really* hurting for money... and I hope this serves as a precedent for anybody that plays music in their workplace... because God forbid, when I go see my accountant, and he's got the radio playing in the background, that filthy pirate is stealing the fruits of hard labor by the record executives...
-jag
http://starboard.flowtheory.net/
This includes the radio too? If this were satellite radio (that requires a subscription) that would sort of make sense. (Note: I'm not saying I endorse it, I'm only saying it makes sense.) Open air radio, though, is paid for by listening to the ads. Unless Finnish Taxis have some magic radio-ad-filtering technology I don't know about, then a passenger listening to the radio is paying for it by listening to the ads.
That has to be a joke otherwise the world can forget about the hand basket because it's already in hell.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
NOT RIAA
probably the RIAF or RIFA (recording industry association of AMERICA)
"Martha Stewart can lick my Scrotum......do i have a scrotum?" -- Sharon Osbourne
no problem, just have a station on with nothing but talk radio. Might give a chatty cab driver more reason to talk to the passengers too.
Submitted under the wrong article. Sorry folks.
Bjork is from Iceland.
This comment is brought to you by Dr Pepper.
I'd love to know just how they plan on enforcing this. Secret Taxi riders checking on them? This is where the world is headed. Hope you're all ready for it.
ok, i'm trying to use the search to find the first occurance of the "soviet russia reversals" but can't seem to find it. anybody feel like helping?
Okay, say you're in a carpool to and fro work. Everyone chips in for gas and whatnot while you listen to your latest mix CD, you're travelling for business - but not as a business. Probably, no - you won't pay. But what about a business trip?
But what if you're using a company car to go pick up Vinnie The Venture Capitalist at the airport and you play a mix of his favorite music. Do you have to pay then?
What about a birthday party for little Alex? Do I have to pay for playing his favorite mp3 playlist over my home stereo?
go fsck itself already.
Bleed to the last drop.
why don't you pay us to listen?
I believe they want to charge cab drivers because taxi services are businesses that make money. By playing the radio, you are "enhancing" the taxi ride experience, and the music industry thinks they should be compensated. I don't necessarily agree with this philosophy, so don't flame me please. Just thought I'd point out what the issue is really about.
Vote for Pedro
Any business establishment that plays music (retail stores especially) in earshot of all customers must pay royalties (figure unknown to me). Not everyone pays, it mostly is enforced against large retail and department store chains. The upshot of the law is a clerk can have a small radio at their station, but if you broadcast music over the store speaker system, then you must pay.
Theres roughly a 0.00003% chance of me getting into a taxi in finland and the driver playing a cd of his own band. Get real. You have a better chance of winning the powerball lottery. This is nothing more than a socialist government wanting a cut of something.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Now imagine if the taxi driver is listening to Metallica...
Not that I'm not concerned for the social implications and rights and such, but:
So, they can't afford $20 a year? I think the other part of this story is why do Finnish cab driver's make such a crappy salary?
Well, yes they get divided equally based on a Byzantine formula ensuring that (a) the label won't have to pay anyone anything because of the tiny fractions and (b) that the administrative fees and other overhead accumulated in simply processing the payment, keeping track, etc. results in a small charge against each artist's account - deducted from royalties due.
Extraordinary Vacations. Exceptional Prices
If you sing well, you'll only get sued by RIAA for stealing their copyrighted words.
If you sing badly you'll still get sued by RIAA, but then your customer will probably sue you as well for emotional duress.
Maybe if you just humm the music out-loud... no, thats probably patented somewhere.
Do not spread "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0" over the internet, thank you.
Now, if the taxi driver drives past some kids in the street with their portable stereo thumping, do the kids have to pay the fee too? This would really quiet down my neighborhood at night.
The taxi driver needs to start billing the artists for the advertising he's providing for them.
You rape record label!
Anytime you use music (that you don't own the rights to) in a business environment, you have to pay. This includes if you play the radio in a retail store or other business, or if you have music on hold, etc.
This is because it's considered a public performance.
In the US, most businesses are using music services like Muzak, AEI (now part of DMX) or others which include the royalty fees as part of their service fees.
Should cab drivers be allowed to show movies in their cabs? What about a bar? If you think they should be allowed to without paying any royalties, then why shouldn't I be allowed to open my own second run movie house with a video projector and lots of DVDs?
since nobody here ever reads the article anyway :P
As fscking absurd as it is, if you did that you'd already be paying if you burnt your music on CD-Rs you bought here. The Finnish equivalent of RIAA gets a certain fee from each sale of a recordable media - CD-Rs, tapes, possibly even harddrives. Fortunately I don't know how big that percentage is - I'd probably go insane if I did... It really pisses me off since the money is supposed to go to Finnish artists (probably just the RIAA equivalent) to compensate for illegal copying of their works and I don't even listen to Finnish "artists" (yes the quotation marks imply what I think of 99.9% of Finnish music...)
Karma. Moderation. Is my
Billboards, my friend. Billboards.
There has to be about a billion different business where there's radio playing quietly in the lobby, or in the elevators, or just from a sterio under the counter in a gas station (like where I work ;).
Is everybody who plays a radio like this expected to fork over royalties?
Winston Churchill: THE WAR SITUATION: HOUSE OF MANY MANSIONS, broadcast, London, January 20, 1940
So, here we are back at the Dark Ages!
If you play music at your place of business you pay for the license anyways, so why should a taxi be any different?
The UN has just welcomed its newest member, the Recording Industry Assosciation (formerly known as Finland). The RIA spokesman stated "We are so glad to be here, and by the way we have evidence that Saddam Hussien is illegally listening to Britney Spears in his bath tub and as such have ordered a preemptive first strike".
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A limo is a kind of a taxi, right Robin? Do limo drivers in Finland have to pay this also??
The truth about Scientology, Xenu, and you: Operation Clambake
Don't let the America part of their name fool you. Every other recording industry association in the world is extremely influenced by the RIAA, hell they're more than likely run by the RIAA. The RIAA seems to have this feeling that they can control the world and everything that happens in it, but ten years from now when music is completely free and their business model is shot, they'll be sorry they imposed all these stupid fines, fees and taxes.
The article also says "Recently, two Finnish churches refused to pay royalties to the country's copyright society for the performance of Christmas hymns. The congregations won their case in a district court, but the society has appealed.".
/. story, but is was in the article and is just as much an issue.
Surely most hymns are written by long dead classical composers, so any copyright would have expired?
I know this wasn't the
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
What a wonderful way for the music industry to continue the "War on Listeners" and also rebuild its public image in the process...
If it were me I'd just pay the $20 and then pirate two CDs to make up for it.
It's a fair trade, isn't it?
Recently, two Finnish churches refused to pay royalties to the country's copyright society for the performance of Christmas hymns. The congregations won their case in a district court, but the society has appealed.
OOps... must pay Milton Bradley $30,000 for the right to say "Monopoly".Sex - Find It
When commercial radio plays, the radio station usually pays whatever fees are associated with the music they are playing. Those fees are often paid by the sponsors who also have their advertisements played on those same airwaves.
The fees are already paid whether or not someone listens to it. This is double taxation... paying for something that has already been paid for. What kind of moronic nonsense is this?
Take the basic service fee amount of $14 and compare it to the taxes amount of $10. Which is bigger? Which amount will be over 50% of the total?
It doesn't take a calculator to figure out the taxes make up less than half the total.
Do I have to charge my carpool passengers when I turn on a Clearchannel station? Meaning, do I have to pay CC as well as the RIAA? Do I have to collect fees every time I grab someone and toss in a new disc I like and have them listen to it?
"Hey, you gotta listen to this. It's great!"
"Well, it's not really my thing, but thanks, AC."
"OK, no biggie. That'll be $2.95, please. I have to pay the RIAA now since you didn't pay for that track you just heard. I'd hate to have to turn you in to the Music Corps."
Is anyone else continually perplexed by the rampant absurdity of our world lately?
.. can't John Cage then sue, since we are playing 4'33 on repeat?
Okay this is just stupid... Radio Stations pay royalties for the music they play... They must be getting pretty desperate over there.
And you have eyes so you should pay the MPAA.
Gee... Maybe the art of conversation will return to cab drivers. And for more than what re-run wasn't watched on TV last night.
The reaction NOT seems to be the one expected, quiet acceptance while the pockets are being picked, but one of "Fuck 'em I'll read a book and talk to you instead...
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
it's:
"da derp dee derp da teetley derpee derpee dumb," you m0r0n.
Great joke, but unfortunately I don't think anyone got it.
I first heard it at a restaurant while on vacation in Denmark (I'm from the US.) There was a group of Danes at the next table who overheard our plans to visit Finland later in our trip.
"Hey, do you know why people from Finland are so thin? Because the waitress asks, Are you finished? and so they say, yes I am Finnish, and she takes away the food!"
It was especially funny being told from a non-English speaker. I guess you had to be there.
What I should have said was nothing.
So that's the news in Finland, or as I refer to it...Nazi Germany.
please come to Houston and wage this battle...if I have to listen to N'Sync or Nellie one more time while some asshole cabbie tells me "In my country, we not have music like this, the (insert fanatical religious dictatorship of choice here) do not let listen." I will grease up my rifle and go water-tower hunting.
PC moderators can suck my White pierced, tattooed dick. If you think pride == hate, s/dick/Aryan meat mallet/g.
.. could taxi drivers lease portable radios with headphones instead?
If I have my own portable radio with headphones, can I use it in a taxi without the driver having to pay?
I've got a few laying around if they need any.
could you give me proof? i would believe this, except that i like concrete proof of a conspiracy theroy.
"Martha Stewart can lick my Scrotum......do i have a scrotum?" -- Sharon Osbourne
if you have then you would know this is a good thing(tm)
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Stop Whistling!
Or pay, uh, $20 annually!
Yeah, that's right, that's the ticket!
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
And better yet, to the taxi drivers get any money for playing radio commercials to their captive audience? The radio stations get paid...
Of course, this could get very ugly very quickly - Ads plastered on the insides of cabs, $nack tray$ (a la hotel refrigerators) on the back of the seat, and do you get a reduced fare if you agree to watch/listen to an "informercial" during your ride?
"Well it's not Victory - but then it's not Death either."
So the Finns think they can just make ridiculous legal decisions like this and get away with it? Only the U.S. court system is allowed to make rulings as cockeyed as this. What is going to happen when just any old roomful of judges can sit down and issue rulings as hilarious as this one? Why it's just not right I tell you! Here's hoping that the U.S. Supreme Court doesn't let this one slip by and gets in touch with the folks at The Hague, ASAP. I mean, after all, this is a matter of national pride.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Ok, my mistake. When I read your original post, I thought you said that the $10 in tax was roughly 80% of the total. Like this:
:^)
Of the $24, taxes account for $10...What you said
Of the $24, taxes account for 80%...How I read it
Thankfully, I didn't further embarrass myself by calling you names, or belittling your family tree.
Okay this is actually a really good thing.
Hear me out on this.
The idea that we can win the battle for things like fair use and sane and non-abusive copyright legislation on the back of digital music is a pipe dream and nothing more.
Bottom line: The public believes that mp3's are stealing, that the artists are not getting paid and that the RIAA should be allowed to do everything in there power to protect themselves. After all... we are pirates!
We cannot win that particular battle.
What needs to happen is the RIAA needs to begin to extend there reach to common people who don't know the first thing about digital music.
Once your parents start to feal the pointy end of the RIAA's stick then, and only then, can this war be won.
And that is why I like this taxi driver thing.
Yes it does suck to be a taxi driver in, where is this guy, Finnland?
But his plight is something that common people can easily grasp. And if it comes to the states, where ultimatly this battle needs to be fought, then people will begin to listen to us.
Right now people think we are crying because our music isn't free. It is only when the common person is not free to listen to his music that they will begin to understand what is really going on.
Now maybe if this goes a little farther, I won't have to listen to people crank up rap on the stereos when I'm shopping in BestBuy.
So how do they go about tracking radio usage? the same way they go and track how many miles you drive??
*huh* Sig? WTF?
If a taxi driver plays the radio, and noone from the RIAA is around to hear it, does it make a sound? Hmmm
Unfortunately, no one can be told what my sig is...
Those things have been here too for a long time. RIA is just too greedy, it isn't enough yet and it won't be for a long time.
We also have to pay "tape license's" from every blank cd tape or anything where fits music. They tried to get royalties to HDD's also, but luckily it didn't get through (I wonder why)
2 cab companies, 1 charges the extra .01 and lets you listen to music (or whatever the extra monatary charge will be) the second offers no radio in the cab for a cheaper fare. Add's to competition. Now I know on that busy NY day I'm looking to see what taxi I'm hailing.
Finland's 9500 cab drivers should band together, generate some tapes or CD's of independent artists (or get the artists to submit them) and play those for their customers' listening pleasure. They could have a menu of artist names and song titles posted in their cabs. There would be no royalties to pay and free captive audience promotion for the independent artists. Sounds like a win-win to me. Oh and a middle-finger salute to the music business. Make that a win-win-win.
The harder the entertainment industry make it, the faster they will expire.
Yeah, that's the ticket. (© Jon Lovitz, SNL Entertainment and NBC Broadway Video).
Sigs are bad for your health.
As long as the money goes towards deoderant, I support this tariff for NYC cabbies...
Now in the US we could only get CONGRESS listen to us too!
From the article:Recently, two Finnish churches refused to pay royalties to the country's copyright society for the performance of Christmas hymns. The congregations won their case in a district court, but the society has appealed.
There should be some minimal compensation, but this is just stupid. Is there no such thing as common sense anymore?
Your lightbulb goes on, you have an idea, you develop it, sell it, get a little money, everyone's happy right? When the hell is someone's ancestor going to claim rights to the Roman alphabet? What ever happened to "The Greater Good" ... nevermind.
Please deposit $2 or have your civil liberties revoked. Thank you. Have a nice day.
"I wanna disconnect myself, pull my brain stem out and unplug myself." -- Rollins
I make money off of driving kids to school and I listen to cds while I'm in the car. The kids would ask to ride with someone else if I listened to death metal or country. Should I pay some of my money I got from their parents to the RIAA, even though I already paid waaay too much for the CD?
I think my principles are reachin' an all time low
If the passenger plays his OWN radio, is the driver still liable?
Maybe the passenger has to buy a licence!
Here in the USA the copyright laws regarding the radio are quite a bit more liberal. They state that you may play a radio in your place of business without paying a royalty if the radio is: "self contained and unmodified". In other words, it must be a standard radio without extension speakers such as a boom box that uses it's own internal speakers. I would assume that a factory installed car radio would also qualify though an aftermarket one would probably fall into a gray area. The court case (what else?) that decided this is known as the "Gap" case, after the clothing chain of the same name. They had installed component stereos with multiple speakers in all their stores and got pinched for playing the radio through them. They were found liable because they were using multiple extension speakers. These days, many retail establishments and restaurants don't play the radio. Instead they sign up for a service such as Digital Music Express (DMXmusic.com)that pay blanklet rates to Ascap, BIM and Sesac. A side to this story is that yesterday two commonly owned radio stations in Pittsburgh got pinched for infringing on Sesac's copyright to the tune of 1.5 million dollars.
20$... That's less than 2$ a month, hardly an outrageous fee.
Does this mean those kids with the loud bass now have to pay as well? After all if you can hear it for two blocks it must be a public performance!
From article:
Recently, two Finnish churches refused to pay royalties to the country's copyright society for the performance of Christmas hymns. The congregations won their case in a district court, but the society has appealed.
They sued churches. This blows my mind. What do they want as punishment, to get to kick the old ladies in the congregation? Or maybe conjugal visits with the church nuns? Surely payment for the right to carol isn't enough to deter these Christian fiends from violating copyright law again...
My head hurts. I'm going back to watching Buffy. Her world makes more sense.
"Now gluttony and exploitation serves eight!" - TV's Frank
This logic already exists in the US, but it's not the territory of the RIAA, it's the territory of ASCAP/BMI.
This is the toll-master of the music publishing business. Whenever a song by the artist formerly known as Prince (but now again known as Prince) has a song played, he gets a clink in the bank. If Tom Jones remakes another one of his songs (God please no), then Prince gets more money as his music is published through ASCAP/BMI.
ASCAP/BMI assures that those who write music are paid for it when it is used, regardless who sings it. It's actually not a bad system because it assures that song writers like Burt Bacharach keep churning out music, and bad singers keep recording them.
Where it goes horribly wrong is that the record companies themselves seem to be pretty much exempt from the ASCAP/BMI fees. ASCAP/BMI seems to concentrate on radio stations, the music-on-hold for businesses, bars, Muzak and now, Finish taxicabs.
Now and again, when you walk into a dance club or bar, you'll see a yellow sticker proudly displayed with the letters ASCAP. It means that this bar owner actually paid his yearly fees.
Finland is the country were you might get a $103,600 speeding ticket for driving 25 km/h over the speed limit, so $20 for some music... no problem...
it's fucking Finland, who gives a rats ass. And if you are from Finland please don't send me rats' asses.
The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education. - Paul Feyerabend
I had to destroy a recording of Handel's Messiah. I handled the recording and also played in the bass section. Our orchestra scores were clear, but the choir sung from sheets that were "arranged" after the end of copy rights, 1922.
Go to the Harry Fox Agency and you will find dozens of people claiming copyright on Handel's Messiah one way or another.
It was for a small run, fund raising CD and the licensing hassles outweighed the benefits so we destroyed the recording. Still its great fun to perform it. If anyone asks you, you should accept.
Hymns have similar problems. You need to work from a pre-1922 hymnal to be clear, but you can't buy those.
I have a similar problem with traditional folk music. Everyone and their dog that ever published an album for a label with a traditional song claims ownership. I have to find documentation that the song predates 1922 to use it royalty free.
The law is not written in C. Unless you used the C to write a fuzzy logic processor and then used.... well never mind. It's not simply black and white. Remember that next time lament that all is lost.
-malakai
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
Everytime I got out in public, shouldn't people be charged money for my presence? I believe they should. If the music industry can do something like that, why can't I?
The church where I go pays an annual fee so that we can sing copyrighted praises to God. I tell the deacon we should sing open source music only (as I think the new stuff is mediocre anyway). Now ain't that a hoot?
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
WTF are the commericals for. Most of them relly suck as it is. How much do they relly think they can get there grubby hands on? Do they not have enough already?
Looks like Rush Limbamaki will have a huge aduience among Finish cabbies, unless they have to pay for talk and sports as well as music.
...in a very general way: http://www.bmi.com/licensing/business/groupc/faq/b owling_answers.asp
Perhaps those cabbies should install a bowling lane, they'd get reduced rates.
In any case, the theory is that playing music in an establishment enhances the music making ability of the business, and it is not being used for strict personal enjoyment, and thus the business must pay up.
Does this mean the cabbies can charge the advertisers who play commercials on the radio station? After all, the advertisers pay the radio stations. If playing music in the cab is a re-broadcast, or public performance, then the adverts have to pay again too, don't they?
Heh. And let's apply the same heavy-handedness -- since you can't tell which station is playing in which cab, ALL advertisers have to pay ALL the cabbies.
PS.
This was ripped from an Arstechnica thread on the very same subject.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
Cabbies, dentists, barbers, corner stores, businesses with waiting rooms or elevators, the guy with the boombox on the subway, the guy at work in the adjacent cubicle...take no prisoners!!!
Any volunteers for the neighborhood RIAA "enforcers"?
Taft
Most cab drivers play the radio for their pleasure, not the passenger's. I can't remember the last time a driver asked me what I'd like to hear; and their tastes always differ from mine. So we already know that they aren't "adding value" to their facilities.
Intellectual property is self-maximizing: if something can be charged for, it will be charged for; and property holders will always seek out more opportunities for extortion (e.g., Licensing 6).
What the media cartels are trying to do here is look for every venue where licensing could conceivably apply, regardless of how absurd. Cafés, I'm sure, will be next (Starbucks already licenses the tracks on their playlists, then redistribute/resell them as compilations; other coffeehouses subscribe to satellite radio. The way I see it, every place of business that plays something other than Muzak will be charged for the privilege of advertising the cartel's content.
Should Avis have to pay royalties to RIAA because they allow me to listen to their radio? And would Hertz be elligible for a waiver?
... like the cost of bribing a politician, which seems to be much lower these days.
-lj
"I love my job, but I hate talking to people like you" (Freddie Mercury)
I won't figure. And that isn't a question, you fucker.
With this logic then restaurants, offices, and department stores should have to pay to play music off the radio. After all aren't these "businesses that make money" and isn't the "radio enhacning the experience"? The entire idea is ridiculous, it's on the radio, anyone with an antenna should be able to hear it. We already "pay" for the radio by the advertisements. Unless it's something like XFM that doesn't have commericals and is a service there's no way any business should have to pay. Aren't the airwaves (at least in the US) suppose to be public? It makes more sense to charge broadcast stations for use of a public medium for profit.
Bottom line, if you're boardcasting an open signal you're giving it away.
Slashdot comments can be accurate, highly modded, or posted quickly. Pick two.
That you Elvis?
Everybody's comments read YOU.
This is great! I'm going to get a taxi and play music all the time, because that means sponsors will also pay me for playing their ads to people, right? right?? Seriously, I remember they tried something similar here (Argentina) a while ago, but it covered ANYONE listening to the radio, at first they even included anyone who had music loud enough inside their houses that could be heard from the street, later they said just businesses, I think they finally dropped it, claiming they had 'misintrerpreted' the law or something similar.
The geek shall inherit the Earth.
hums a tune?
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
I didn't say that it was from Fark. I said that it was a tired, old Fark cliche.
Yes. And if I were advertising a product on the radio, I'd be pissed as hell. I'm not going to see a dime of the money collected from the taxicab drivers, and I've got fewer people who are going to hear my ad. I've stopped being surprised when the little guy gets screwed by a dumb government decision, but in this case, business is getting screwed too.
the increased use of "royalty free music".
(see "BAD" music or "muzak", videographers know what I'm talking about...)
If you're currently in a band, stop shopping for labels (if you already haven't)
and put out an enormous ammount of instrumental ballads and up-beat pop shit.
Charge $10 a song for unlimited/unrestricted use of these throw-away/forgetable "songs to shop to".
"Suburbia is where the developer bulldozes out the trees, then names the streets after them."
Also from the article: An ASCAP spokesman says "Kumbaya" isn't on its list, but "God Bless America" is.
You know, seeing the U.S. Congress struggle through a spontaneous rendition of 'God Bless America' on TV while downtown Manhattan went up in flames outside my window last September really disturbed me. the idea of ASCAP suing Congress for royalties actually gives me a strange sense of justice.
is if they start a royalty rate for all people present in the car during a car pool. Everytime you buy a CD, you must fill out a form stating how many friends you have and how often they drive with you while listening to music. ...RIAA is just getting out of hand... when is someone going to stop them??
+1 Interesting
to listen to the radio inna cab?
4 per year.
Thats a finny joke, no?
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
In the near future, our world has become unlivable because of the fleet of lawyers unleashed by the music industry. Ever since ASCAP published the sheet music for the aleatoric masterpiece "Circadian Rhythms," every man, woman, and child...heck, every multicellular organism on Earth has been subject to paying royalties.
Earth cries out for a savior...
...and finds one in the Church of Latter Day Saints, who raises up an elite force of commandos from within their priesthood. These LDS clergy, later referred to as the Clerics, wage a holy war to wrest control of humanity from the minions of the music industry, and, against overwhelming odds, succeeds!
In the aftermath, it is agreed than not only must lawyers be banished from the earth, so must artists, musicians, authors, and scupltors. Enforcement of the prohibition is handed over to the Clerics. Any form of art deemed to promote the the practice of law is to be purged. Humanity achieves an...equilibrium...that it had long thought lost forever.
What happens next? Wait until December 6th to find out! Oh, wait...I'm in Cleveland. Goddam! Well, move to LA, New York, or one of the top 20 markets and find out on December 6th.
Fermat's other theorem: "I have a simple proof, but I can't write it down as I fear it's a DMCA violation to discuss it"
Stores already pay for playing the radio. In fact MUZAK was born from this.
Think of the music as artwork that a store buys to enhance shoppers experience.
Did you ever notice that Muzak is crappy renditions of songs? Hence Muzak owns the copyright from the musicians playing the wordless songs.
Just thought I should point out, the RIAA is an american organization, and this is happening in finland. Although I wouldn't be surprised to see the RIAA try and pull something like this, we still shouldn't attribute these evils to them until they actually are guilty of them.
I always hate having to ask the cabbie to turn off the damn radio. I feel bad because I've already asked him to get off the cell phone, and I'm lowering the tip by a dollar for every request I'm forced to make. This makes absolutely no sense since the radio is obviously only for the drivers benefit, it being in the front of the cab after all. I could see some people paying an extra 25 cents for turning on a back seat radio, but the cabbie's radio is just a nuisance for the rider.
DEAD HORSE beats YOU!
What if the cab drivers started charging for the "ears" of the passenger?
How about charging the radio stations for allowing them to advertise to the passengers? Say, $20 per year, per cab?
I mean, if the radio station can charge the advertiser for the ear of the listener, why can't the cabbie charge the radio station for the ear of the passenger (and the driver!!)?
Any takers?
Cab drivers don't get a set wage. They have "gate fees" to pay and until they make that during their shift they are in the red the whole time. Once the gate fee is passed everything above that is what they keep. The only reason they can't charge more to get more is because of local fare laws.
Cab drivers have to be pretty good to make a living doing it.
--- I do not moderate.
Humm it with me, "God Bless America, my home sweet home!" Now pay up, sucker.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
that, not only did they go after the taxi drivers, but they even went after churches. You know, I'm not terribly religious, but I did go to Catholic school once:
1. I am the Lord thy God; thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Theese record execs are clearly worshipping MONEY. I mean...Jesus! The word AVARICE doesn't even come close! It's things like this that make he hope and pray that a place as Hell realy exists (though having had a Jesuit "don't take it literally" education I'm woefully unsure of that fact). If anyone has it coming, these record execs do.
Excuse me while I go throw up.
I could try and summarize what I managed to learn from this communivations forum at MIT concerning the clashes between copyright and culture, and I'd probably talk about how law dictates that whenever you play music for your friends, you should pay a liscense fee and charge your friends, but reality dictates that you do nothing of the sort.
however, the two speakers at the forum did a much much better job, and subsequently I strongly suggest going and listening to the audiocast (2hrs, perhaps some jumping around if you don't have the time).
Unless one of them happens to be the owner of said copyright, the business can tell them to shove off.
The Warner Chappell division of AOL Time Warner owns the copyright on "Happy Birthday to You".
There are quite a few movies that have birthdays in them where that song is sung.
Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema don't have to pay royalties for that song because they share revenue with Warner Chappell.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Well, maybe it's time for an anti-RIAA hit.
Cab drivers, elevator-music providers, Wall-Mart background music providers and who knows who else could just play this song, instead of the usual music.
Not only it could create public awareness, all royalties from the hit could be used to finance anti-RIAA actions.
Any independent takers?
Even random is random. My nick, too.
After finishing the Macarena at the Diablo sing-along, one mother whispers that today is the sixth birthday of David Warneke, a camp volunteer's son. "We're not allowed to sing 'Happy Birthday,' " warns a codirector. Huddling with the Elves, the directors come up with a plan: Sing a modified "Happy Birthday" to the tune of "Ninety-Nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall." But Jansen is worried. "I hope that's not copyrighted, too," she frets.
They can't sing f***ing "Happy Birthday"!!!
WTF? at that rate I owe ASCAP like a million dollars..
mother f***ers... I'm so f***ing mad..
then again.. i have been studing for exams for 5 days straight...
it's still bloody outragious though..
?Who controls the past now, controls the future.
Who controls the present now controls the past.?
The federal copyright act allows composers and music publishers to demand payments for any public performance of copyrighted material. The law defines a public performance as "where a substantial number of persons outside of a normal circle of a family and its social acquaintances is gathered."
I thought this kind of things could only happen in the US...
I wish to sue the living crap out of the music industry for producing utter garbage and *constantly* forcing me to listen to it in malls, music stores *clothing stores* (do they pay a royalty? they should).
I want to charge them for personally offending my taste on a daily basis.
... and if you quote me, that's $5 a quote.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
So if you have a really loud stereo system in your car, do you have to pay the fee as well, since it is also a "public performance" given for a public that, like taxi passengers, has no choice over what they are listening to?
So, it is illegal for a taxi driver and passenger to listen to the car's stereo unless the driver has paid a fee.
What if the driver & passenger both use walkmans and headphones to listen to the same radio station?
What about people who blast their stereo while driving down the street. Sure it is annoying, but should they have to pay royalties?
What if the driver plays a CD that contains music that he has permission to play (i.e. a friend's band made him a CD). Would the cops still bust him for not paying the fee?
What about the fact that these same radio waves that the taxi driver is not allowed to play for you are traveling through your body right now?
Taken a step further, it is illegal to "steal" DirectTV, but any time you go outside the signals are radiating through your head. It is illegal for you to actually use your TV & DirectTV box to watch those signals without paying.
Copyright law is getting more and more twisted. It is high time the laws were changed to take into account the fact that the world has changed.
here in balmy canada we pay the record labels 27c on every CD-R we buy to cover losses caused by illicit copying of music.
sort of like randomly putting everyone in the country in prison for a couple of days a year as a penalty for all the crime that's commited.
for the supreme court this week!
I couldn't have made up something this good. And when I see the advertisement on this page is for Microsoft Visual Studio .net, I have to wonder if some local hoodlum spiked my coolaid with acid.
Don't worry, folks. I'm in the process of securing trademarks for "Copyright" and "Trademark" .. and the patent office is about to approve my requests for patents on "method for obtaining compensation for others' transgressions" (lawsuits), and "method for securing rights of use for a model, practice, or invention" (obtaining patents).
/.-reading lawyers wanna get rich with me?
By mid 2003, I'll be ready to sue the bejesus out of the RIAA and MPAA and any other abusive company that's been pissing us off along the way. On that note, any
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
And this ruling will do nothing to stop them from listening to news programming, or other non-music programming.
And the ruling will not prevent musician taxi drivers from playing the music that they themselves own the copyright to.
Royalty fees for public performance of radio and TV broadcasts go way way back, this is nothing new. The only thing new is that this ruling states that taxis are indeed public spaces, just like bars, restaurants, and stores.
By the way, if you think you can show commercial TV in a public place without permission, call DirecTV or your local cable company, and try to get it installed into your bar, restaurant or store. You'll find it costs a whole lot more than installing into your home, and the prices vary by the size of your establishment.
PS- I wasn't arguing what was ethical, just what was the law.
I think this is great for the taxi drivers because now they can actually turn this around and profit from it. All they have to do now is get the radio stations to pay THEM for choosing their radio station to play for the taxi customers. Nice!
What if as a taxi driver, I have the radio on for my OWN enjoyment, and don't give a flip if the customer listens or not? What if I put the customer in a soundproofed rear compartment? What if I only listen to "talk radio" that never plays any music?
Given this decision, it follows that if I have a business of ANY sort, and if I ever have the radio on, I must pay royalties because after all a customer MIGHT come in and hear the radio.
In fact, this absurd decision might plausibly extend to charging royalties to people who work at home and are self-employed (with NO customers who can EVER hear their radio): "You use the radio to increase your productivity -- therefore you owe us royalties!!"
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Shwitching off the radio would not help since Silence has been copyrighted as well.
I don't know which is more sad. The fact that you find an honest spontanious emotional outburst to be disturbing, or yet another totally unrelated 9-11 comment was posted. Oh wait... the answer is whoever modded up the parent as 'funny'.
The Finnish equivalent of RIAA gets a certain fee from each sale of a recordable media
The same happens in the United States and much of the world--sad, but true. On the other hand, when you copy a friend's CD, you don't have to worry that the RIAA didn't get paid. The artist is another story, though.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
In our nearby city, many of the cabbies tend to listen to the talk radio station for the whole day, mostly because they give out traffic reports and accidents as they happen.
So if these ones are all listening to talk radio all day long, how can the RIAA (or whatever body governs in place of the RIAA) waltz in and charge them anything?
nt
somebody mod this fucker up.
I'm going to start a band and play with the volume really loud -- anyone within earshot owes me money.
;)
If you start screaming noise polution then obviously you heard it, now pay up
Shouldn't the cab drivers be paid for playing the music? After all, isn't it advertising of sorts?
If I hear a song I like in a cab, in a club, in a restaurant, or anywhere, I will make an effort to find out who it is and possibly purchase the cd. Seems to me like they deserve a commission not a fine.
Well....living in San Francisco I've never seen nor heard of any sort of "Tarrif" when taking a cab into or out of a city. Before you mod someone up as "informative" do some fact checking. This guy is completely wrong. The only thing that might be construed as a tarrif is the Airport Exit fee (which applies regardless of destination, san francisco or not), and perhaps the bridge tolls, but that'll happen whether you're in a taxi or not.
What a dumb post.
So everybody in the cab cannot listen to other radios. The driver should also stick a paper somewhere that explains clearly - in foreign language too - why s/he is forced to do that.
Imagine that a customer walks out of a record store, having bought the latest Britney Spears CD and jumps in the cab.
The radio is playing one of the very tracks that feature on the CD in the passenger's hand.
Now the recording company is scoring three times:
Once when the radio pays its public performance fee
Again when they charge the cabby his annual fee.
And once more when they sold the passenger his Britney Spears CD.
Boy, talk about tripple-dipping!
We also have to pay "tape license's" from every blank cd tape or anything where fits music.
Cool, so if they haul your ass off to court and charge you with copying a mate's CD you can tell them to get stuffed because you've paid a royalty tax on the blank CDR you used right?
I strongly suspect that this would not be a viable defense eh? More double dipping then from the recording industry.
Don't you just know that any industry that is allowed to extort money in this way, with the protection of legislation, must be dishing out a heap of back-handers to their favorite politicians.
If I had my way about it, any taxi I rode in would only play Free (i.e., "copyleft") music. No need to travel down the corporate music road...
No Laughing Allowed!
Slashdot actually already touched on this a long while ago. I think this is an idea that has matured... the DRM Helmet!
I don't get it...what's so funny? Anyone want to explain plz?
In Afghanistan, disallowing all music as they did, this would make them happy. A drab, grey city like Helsinki, with not even music in the taxis is like some Stalinesque vision of the future.
I can see the RIAA and the MIAA going bankrupt in the next 10 years with their continual pushing of court cases against people who play music. People in the future will simply not economically be able to afford to play music as it seems that the fucking greedy bastards of the big music companies are stupid enough to push it far enough that you will have to pay a licence to even play your own instrument, because "you could possibly play a copyright protected song, and we wouldn't want that, now would we?"
Fuck them and may they burn in hell for their greed.
I did try to read most of the comments, but didn't see any mentioning of the tunes in NOKIA phones. They are payed already by the manufacturer, but if you change them, then you are responsible for the possible new costs.
Also the churches pay for all music that is presented. Even when the audience is singing Christmas carols, they must be payed. This was quite hot subject some 5 years ago, but it was silenced quite fast when some agreement was made. I don't remember the details.
I think I am going to start a movement to go on strike against the big record labels. This has got to stop somewhere and where best by starting a music-hunger strike against them.
Think about it. A week in the western world where no music is played in bars,restaurants,businesses (even Finish taxis) or on the streets. A movement like this would bring the record labels to their knees, although you can bet that they would try a Microsoft type of action of trying to legally enforce you to pay for and listen to their music.
May they burn in hell for their greed
you have to pay about 200 EUR / yr. for TV and radio (of course for a couple of state own stations). But wait, there is more ! You have to pay the tax if you have a pc and a modem ! Because you could, in principle listen to radio / watch TV with your PC (is, TV over a dial up line).
And, starting with 2003 the companies will have to pay the fee for each PC connected to internet !
www.teosto.fi
Please, Slashdot them!
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
Sadam is playing the macarena to boost soldier morale. Time for the RIAA and ASCAP to take action. I think we all win with this one.
... Are Teosto, the , Finnish Composers' Copyright Society. /.ers and show em our outrage by /.ing their server:
http://www.teosto.fi/teosto/webpages.nsf/Frames?Re adForm&English :)
Now go be good
Yes it's true. The case has been in court since 1997 and now the Supreme Court made the final decision. Actually it lowered the price (ruled by Court of Appeal) from 40 (about $40) to 22 because the music doesn't help getting customers, usual rides are short and carry only few passengers.
Surely, the RIAA will argue that this is required as it "protects artists and ensures creativity for generations to come". And, they are right---surely every taxi driver in Finland will start recording thier own home grown tunes just so they can listen to music (thier own) in thier cabs! Many of them will then become famous, and not have to drive taxis anymore. The RIAA is just brilliant I tell you!!!
Real men don't need signitures!!!
In a previous life I was a taxi driver here in .au, I took the time to speak to the relevent authorities here (apra) who informed me that because the passenger could ask for the radio to be changed that there is no performance therefore no fees to be paid.
The money goes to non-profit organization called Teosto ry, which is quite equal to RIAA. Some of the money then goes to artists. Threre's a brief summary in english on their homepage: www.teosto.fi
Charging a fee to listen to the radio is RIDICULOUS! I've always seen radio as free, but to charge for it is going a little to far. Next you know the RIAA will find ways to make everybody pay for each time they listen to a song.
How the hell could the judge make cabbies pay for this? Look, radio broadcast like this are free to intercept and play, because the broadcaster is paying the royalties. It does not matter how many people listen to it or whatnot, does it. They figure that 20 dollars is just not enough to fight about, and most people will pay it.
Learning that stores in the US have to pay these royalities as well, you'd think they could play something better, sometimes makes me wonder why they just don't input to something free like a mp3.com station where (I believe) everything is free and you can go by genre as well. It's not like people actually listen to the music in stores actively, but rather need a decent background beat.
This is a topic that has already been beat to death, but I feel I must go on the record. (No pun intended).
The RIAA and its memeber companies are fighting a battle they can not win. Bottom line. Their product is not worth paying for. People will (as the quoted person says) ride around in silence before they will be bullied into buying something that the majority of true artists in the world are willing to give away for free. I personally give'em less than 5 years and we will see airline style chapter 11s in the recording industry. Plenty of honest work out there entertaining the public for the employees so I say..."Hasta La Vista Baby"...
(Ooops that is a quote...now the MPAA will get me.)
Teosto is the Finnish equivalent to RIAA.
They collect these music payments - but as well so called 'kasettimaksu' - aging back from C-tapes. This means that every digital storage what you purchase, you pay for Finnish artists. Even harddrives,CDROM, FLASH cards for digital cameras,cell phones etc - no matter what you store there. You pay.
The second bunch of assholes in Finland is Kopiosto which charges oranizations (companies,schools,etc) for having a paper copy machine. Fees are relative to the amount of copied paper - not the content. For example, you're a teacher who makes his/her own lecture material and let's people to copy that. Kopiosto then gives you a fee claming that you copied certain amount of commercial books - based on estimation.
And like in real communism, you cannot complain, just pay to 'common pool' and shut the **** up.
Well, my advice is:
SINCE YOU ALREADY PAID,
FEEL FREE TO COPY COMMERCIAL MATERIAL
if the music is payed for by the radio stations... what the hell is the extra twenty dollers is for.....
music.. is for public enjoyment..
we should enslave anyone who is able to make music.. and put them in jails and force them.. to make music..
they should be grateful that we give them trillion
dollers by just buying their outragously over priced CD's and atttending there stage shows..
(Dr Dre says we are snatching away food from his children's mouth(something like that).. i wonder what Dr Dre feeds to his children)
The music industry is being lazy.. they are trying to make money off anyone who they sign up.. even they suck..
if we enjoy a song.. hell we'll give them money(if thts wht they are onto it)..
"Yakov Smirnoff said it."
"Oppression and harassment is a small price to pay to live in the land of the free." -- Montgomery Burns.
What if the passenger listens to his radio so that the driver can hear it? What if the driver says "Hey, you can use my radio, serve yourself!"?
Using a tired, old Fark cliche...
You mean there are other kinds of Fark cliches?
Maybe they can pay in EURO to avoid currency instabilities.
Anytime your neighbor keeps you up with the radio, what do you do, call the police, yes. And the police should charge the RIAA with $200 bucks for it, since its their system, their fault. Same with television. But don't stop there, get a lawyer, and sue them for sleep deprivation, and get workmanship compensation, payment for psychologist visits, etc.
Hear a song you hate, drive you crazy, and can't get what you need done? Do the same damn thing.
Your children listening to music with cussing and violence, and they start it to, it the RIAA's fault! Get yourself a lawyer, these are the people promoting it and making money, why should you be the parent. The RIAA should have been the ones there to make sure kids aren't listening to it, like they monitor everything else.
The point of all this is the golden rule, Do unto others as they do unto you, the RIAA should not have it both ways when they start slithering this low.
Teosto isn't similar to the RIAA, it's an equivalent of ASCAP.
AFAIK the money doesn't go to Finnish artists exclusively, or even primarily, but to companies like Warner/Chappel Music Finland...so don't worry, everything you do is guaranteed to benefit the big, American record companies.
You should know that here in Finland, we pay royalties in every cd-r, dvd-r (and other format medias), video cassette or whatever media we buy. Yes, if your company provides you with a signed certificate saying that you are going to use the media you buy for storing only work-related material, you get a discount but still the system sucks. Teosto, our trustee for supervising the interests of artists, is trying to get this royalty for hard disks also. Also, if you broadcast music legally via radio and stream your broadcast via internet also, you have to pay a "media conversion fee" of some sort.
The secret to a successful
- according to the ruling, that specific taxi driver had to pay 22 euros, because
e usneuvosto/neuv_lausunnot/1997/tn9705.htm
a) there weren't many people travelling at one time
b) because the trips had been short
c) because of the number of fares he'd had that year
d) Taxi is a public place because anyone can get in one, meaning that the taxi driver and the passenger(s) are not listening to music but the taxi driver is _performing_ music.
The ruling doesn't mean that all drivers will have to pay 22 euros but that now they know how to calculate it. So as the taxi driver tried to convince the judges that he hadn't "performed" that much, it might actually hurt the other taxi drivers as the fee will be much higher for them.
Link to the ruling(Finnish): http://www.kko.fi/ennakkoratkaisut/2002-101.htm
And to make this more fun for all you non-Finnish, previous rulings in Finland include
a) if a prisoner watches TV it is a public performance
b) performances in a teaching situation are public performances
c) playing music in physical care institutions are a public performance
and finally my favourite...
d) showing a photograph in a meeting of the local "club" for retired people (10 grannies gathered around to drink coffee) is a public performance of the photo. No joking here.
Source: http://www.minedu.fi/opm/asiantuntijat/tekijanoik
In Italy, the probably-worst ruling regarding these matters is in force.
Anybody who simply owns any device capable of playing music (or displaying TV content) must pay a tax, which is higher in case he does it in a public place. Presumably, cabs are considered to be public places.
This tax is mainly destined to the Ministry of Telecoms. Also, any music station and singer are required to pay relatively high fees to the SIAE when playing a piece. SIAE is a structure that should defend music right owners... but I let you imagine how it actually is an instrument to reduce the possibilities of independents... and music is not getting anything better!
just play RIAA protected songs, and you'll soon have a roof over your head...
for a similar project to Project Gutenberg, to provide access to untainted versions of classical music (scores and lyrics) so that some megacorp can't claim that they actually wrote Bach's toccata&fugue in d minor etc.
Another ``piss off your customers, shoot yourself in the foot'' policy. Next week they'll take me to court because someone heard my music through these thin walls here, and next year they'll sue me because someone was able to tap my music with a hidden microphone. Then when I'm in jail, they'll sue me for listening to the music of a street artist performing without their permission. All in the interests of artists, of course. Do those artists actually have any real influence on what their association does in their name?
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Maybe I need to pay a fee if I sing a song while walking down the street. (``demand payments for any public performance of copyrighted material'')
... and be sued for siging Bob Dylan songs.
Maybe I should invoice the song writer for promoting the meme that is his song.
Maybe I could point this out to the next obnoxious git that sits next to me on a train with a zzz zzzz zzzzz coming out of his walkman -- peace at last.
Maybe this isn't in the long term interest of the song writers. If guides/scouts don't sing the songs, then the kids won't learn them but will learn other ones. These are the ones that they will remember in later life and want to buy the records/....
Maybe we ought to organise a public rally/demonstration
Maybe we ought to write Open songs and publicise them.
Maybe we ought to get RMS to write the GNU Public Song Licence.
Maybe this could lead to a resurgance in classical music, most of which is out of copyright. There are performers who allow their interpretation to be played without fee.
Maybe cab drivers should include a 'hire of radio' as part of their fee. It is then up to the passenger to choose to play the radio that is (for a few minutes) theirs.
Maybe cab drivers should invoice the local radio station for increasing their audience figures and thus what they can charge their advertisers.
Maybe this sort of thing is a good thing. People will become so fed up with it that the politicians will see lost votes in it.
If they sing "Happy Birthday" (*), they will have to pay. Many restaurants learned this fact, to their chagrin.
*- Or any Copyrighted song.
The Happy Birthday song is copyrighted and, if laws stay the way they are, won't expire till 2030 even though it was originally copyrighted in 1935. What if groups of people all over the US started singing the HB song in restaurants--an illegal public performance unless that restaurant has paid their ASCAP rent. Announce to the crowd that you have just committed a crime because of the Sonny Bono CTEA. That will piss people off. If enough people did this across the US, it wouldn't be long before it got national press. I think it'd be a great way to make something happen!
Maybe the directors of scouts can ask the sons and
daughters of ACAP personel
to pay an extra for being accepted into camps...
You seem to be missing an important part of how cabbies make money, i.e., tipping. A cabbie who has the benefit of nice music may make a modest amount more than a cabbie who doesn't, by virtue of tips. A cabbie who asks you what station or genre of music you want to listen to may make even more.
Did you just miss this, are you intentionally ignoring it because it doesn't support your position, or are you one of those jerks who always stiffs the poor sap who's driving the cab 16 hours a day to feed the family?
I have friends who have driven cabs here in Chicago while getting their businesses off the ground and you couldn't be more correct. Letting the passengers choose their genre of music brings in significantly more tips than inflicting upon them silence or, worse, whatever it is you happen to be listening to. Why you were moderated down is beyond me (the moderator in question needs to put the crack pipe down and learn to think coherently). In any event, I have a +1 so hopefully those browsing at +2 will see my quote of your post despite the aforementioned idiots.
(Don't mod me up, mod the insightful parent post back up to where it belongs.)
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
So the RIA could just put the song MP3s on their websites because they are already getting payments from the CD-Rs and tapes and stuff...
As a Finn, I am shamed by this court decission!
...and it was the last one in the World that I trusted...
...maybe the next step is to ban people from listening radio in any public space, unless the owner of that space has paid royalty fees to the music industry?
It just goes to prove that the Finnish court system has failed!
The point being: The radio station broadcasting the music has to pay royalty for the music they play. This I understand, and think is reasonable. But what I don't understand is that the taxi owner has to pay again for the same music that was already paid by the radio station. AND The court even noted that the reason they lowered the earlier decission of 40 Euros/year to 22 Euros/year, was because "the music has no significan value in forming of the customer-service provider relationship."
So, even the court admitted that people actually don't choose a taxi by the music they play. (Shockingly I actually take the first one available!) So, why would they have to pay again for the music that's already been paid for?
On an other note: If the taxi has no radio installed (or the one preinstalled is ripped out) they don't naturally have to pay. Even if all the passangers would listen to the radio with their mobile phones or walkmans...
Yet another note: This may not after all be such a shocking news in Finland. We actually have to pay royalty for each empty CD-R we buy, just because it MAY be used to copy music! So, we actually pay royalty for an act that would be criminal to do...
If all else fails, pull the plug and get out...
The Life is out there...
According to the article, 'Lauri Luotonen, chairman of the Helsinki Taxi Drivers' Association, says the ruling is likely to force most drivers to keep their radios off.'"
So, are there no news or talk radio stations in Helsinki,then?
Is it just me? But has the world just lost it.. Taxing on everything jesus this is getting to the point by visiting slashdot your gonna have to pay tax ... just my two cents
We can't have Christmas Carolers either I suppose.
This is attune to wearing perfume to impress a buisness client, the perfume scent is copyrighted.
Yep, the greed is endless.
.fi afaik) royalties for broadcasting the stuff, and then the one, whose speakers emit the broadcast in a public place, has to pay for the same music a second time.
First the radio station has to pay Teosto (basically the equivalent of Ascap in
-Jope
Another news alert.... It's been decided that if you think, move, breath, talk, listen, or other such bodily actions, you must):
1). Pay fines and restitution to RIAA for talking or listening
2). Pay fines and restituions to the MPAA for seeing and imagination
3). And pay fines and restituions to the Government for thinking-- I mean, going to the bathroom
4). If at any time you are caught doing anything at all in the audience of others you must surrender your entire paycheck to both the RIAA and MPAA
And I always thought that only in USA can government make choices as bad as this , but now there's someone competing with us :)
Monty Python: Finland
Finland, Finland, Finland,
The country where I want to be,
Pony trekking or camping,
Or just watching TV.
Finland, Finland, Finland.
It's the country for me.
You're so near to Russia,
So far from Japan,
Quite a long way from Cairo,
Lots of miles from Vietnam.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
The country where I want to be,
Eating breakfast or dinner,
Or snack lunch in the hall.
Finland, Finland, Finland.
Finland has it all.
You're so sadly neglected
And often ignored,
A poor second to Belgium,
When going abroad.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
The country where I quite want to be,
Your mountains so lofty,
Your treetops so tall.
Finland, Finland, Finland.
Finland has it all.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
The country where I quite want to be,
Your mountains so lofty,
Your treetops so tall.
Finland, Finland, Finland.
Finland has it all.
Finland has it all(Unless you want free radio).
Choose your allies carefully, it is highly unlikely you will be held accountable for the actions of your enemies
Its to bad someone can't patent B O, you'd make a fortune from those roylaties
This
Next thing you know... the recording industry will be hooking up little filters over our ears. Everytime we hear a song we will be billed 25 cents. This is getting completely out of control!
What can we do to hasten the demise of the recording industry? *stroking beard* Hmmmmmmm....
I guess I'll go download another Gig of MP3s.
Mwuahahahahahahahahaha!
Wouldn't it have been sweet if they had sold to Ted Nugent?
The article just says that cabbies have to pay royalties for playing music. I take this to mean that they have to pay royalties for playing cds or tapes of (C) music, not for playing the radio. The article says that this may cause people to simply shut off their radios altogether. This might only be out of frustration or confusion over the royalty issue, not that playing the radio requires royalty payments.
0xfeedface
Actually the percentage is fairly small. But I do agree that in principle it's pretty stupid to have to pay Teosto and Kopiosto (Finnish copyright organisations) for media which I use to save my own work.
However the cassette fees are actually mostly not given to artists (the royalties go there and in Finland most of them even make it all the way to the artists), but used on grants for young artists and awards. For example the Finlandia (the most important Finnish literature award) is funded by Kopiosto.
It's easy enough to criticise the organisations without using FUD, so let's keep our facts straight.
Totally OT, but that whole "Yahoo: Internet that logs on to you!" thing is just ... weird.
Brings a whole new meaning to "port scanning".
Ick!
I had one, but the wheel fell off.
Related to the story about taxis is the news that playing radio in Finnish police cars is allowed.
The reasoning behind this is that the police cars are not about business like taxis.
--
More events like this nonsense may show us the need of destruction of these inane laws and corporations through any means nessecary.
Yes, I am a US citizen. Yes, we're losing our Miranda rights.
Yes, I am willing to die to win back our freedom; many before our generation have died (civil war, war w/ Britan, ... on and on) to win thier freedoms.
If you are the artist, and you are playing your own CD via the radio/cdplayer do you still pay to listen to your own music.
The snopes debunking is shallow and weak. It presents evidence that contradicts its conclusion. And its interpretive stance is unsophisticated: For example, it reads "Either 'ashes' was a corruption of an earlier form or a deliberate use; it can't be both." That is so like gradeschool. Polysemy, multiple meanings and divergent interpretations are a fact of language.
"Don't believe everything you read"--what does that mean to you in this context? An example of how the context of an utterance can suggest alternative meanings?
The plague interpretation or "Ring around the Rosie" entails making certain assumptions about and exploring certain aspects of language and folklore--in its own right interesting and valid.
Before you accept the snopes view as fact, you should ask yourself about the reasons people have for creating lyrics, what role children play in the life of language, the functions of genre, the rhetorical value of the nonsensical, how crisis figures into cultural processes, yada yada yada. Do you really believe there is absolutely no reason children today still sing "Ring around the Rosie" while "I am the Walrus" is not a campfire favorite? Think about it.
Radio is a form of advertising -- when you hear songs playing on the radio, what you're hearing is an advertisement for the album (or single) the song is on, and is also an advertisement for the band's tours ("Listen to this great music! Isn't it great? Now come buy our album and watch our performances!"). (It's not necessarily paid advertising, of course, although as I understand it, quite a lot of radio airtime is indirectly paid for by the labels.) A taxi driver plays music while driving around fares? That's free advertising, kids! The passenger is listening to your music, which (if the music does its job) will cause him to go buy it. And you want to CHARGE for the privilege of advertising to people? What the fuck is wrong with these chimps?
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Hrm, ok, I'll give it a go. 'Plz' is an abbreviation used by lazy idiots like you who can't be bothered to use the more polite, full version of 'please'.
Anyone who can't be bothered to put some effort and courtesy into their questions doesn't deserve an answer. So you can just sit there and wonder what that whole IN SOVIET RUSSIA thing is until you fucking puke, you fucking puke.
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
Children are not so dumb as to think Finland is in Russia!
Simple. Just move the radio to the back seat, and lend it to the client for the time of the ride, and let them listen to it. The customer is the one paying, so no commercial activity there in that sense.
Marxist evolution is just N generations away!
Slightly off topic, but if this happened in New York, do you think it would finally provide a "Stern Free" cab ride?
*Enters cab*
Wonk... So, Candi... do you like small penises?... Heh heh... belch... Heh heh... Call in Gass, we need some Walken & Gene Simmons impersonations! Wow, look at those hooters... Heh heh*
*jumps out of cab w/ an extreme sense of nausea*
(All heh hehs provided by Robin McMann, er... Ed Quivers... er, you know what I mean.)
----
#SickNotWeak
have never found the music played by cab drivers to be enjoyable. Generally they make the cab ride even less enjoyable... I mean, does pounding Reggae music really make flying around a city in a '91 Caprice held together with baling wire and duct tape more enjoyable, or scarier?
I have blog like everyone else
So does this mean that when I get the latest Britney Spears song (or its equivalent) stuck in my head in Finland I have to pay for that too?
If I were a cab driver in Finland and I played a CD of music of my own composition, i'd scare my passengers away!
My local bar had to pay big $$$ to the NFL for the "right" to turn the tv on to the games.
An uniformed post being modded up by the moderators? NOOOOOOO! I don't know what to believe in anymore.
All right, then I will ask for him. Would you please explain what it means? I do not know either.
This could Hel-sink-i the whole industry. They'll be Finnish-ed!
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
Latest update of the situation: Due to pressure from France, Russia and China, the country formerly known as Finland temporarily agreed to a "music-for-oil-program" while inspectors determine exact locations and magnitude of copyright violations.
Meanwhile, the U.N. security council is considering amending its resolution on Iraq to include copyright violations alongside biological, chemical, and long range ballistic missiles. The spokesperson clearly pointed out to the press that "copyright violations rank in the same area, if not higher than any of the weapons stuff."
While these discussions continue, the inspectors are hard at work, and will soon be equipped with the new "piracy detectors" jointly manufactured by the country formerly known as Finland and the RIAA.
Yeah, they should burn it annually!
I would assume that the people at work are listening on 'standard radios' BUT your post made me ask myself..what about thise companies that put a radio station as their telephone hold music. Are THEY liable for copyright payments?
You are simply wrong. The RIAA indeed extorts businesses which play broadcast radio stations on their premises. They consider it "public performance."
ASCAP, BMI and SESAC are orginizations that represent the composers of music. They collect performance royalties for music and distribute them to their members.
...In Mexico starting next year. But, since the kidnappers most of the time are cops/former cops, soon will be the jails full of Kazaa users, and the streets full of kidnappers.
Somehow the ""lawmakers"" came to the conclusion that depriving a man of is freedom an his familly of all their money is equivalent to let Sony without US $100 of revenue.
Mexico: 100% conservative's America now!
What we need is a larger, more comprehensive public domain. If I were an artist, I would seriously consider charging for public performances (where I am *actually* performing, not legal bullshit), and placing all recordings of my music into the public domain. Copyright is just a form of licence, and when the "business" practices of licence granters become too ornerous, an open-source model can be applied to public benefit.
So, what would it look like in the music industry ? Well for starters, we could have free music. Not just royalty free. If something is recorded, it would be put into the public domain. This could possibly include the separate tracks (typically for various instruments) which comprise a typical recording. Public performances are one-time events, and they could (and usually should) be charged for. Artists would make money primarily from actual public performances, not from the playing of recorded music, like it was before the "recording industry" existed. The recordings of performances, both live and possibly studio, would be distributed WIDELY. The main reason for this would be to raise the artist's profile.
So what is stopping this model right now ? Money. Oligarchy. Technology will overcome these things, which is why the copyright industries are feeling threatened. We will have a Richard Stallman for "content", just like for "code". Maybe one which doesn't insist on it being called GNU/Britney Spears. It will happen, it is only a matter of time. When enough talented people get sick of being force-fed crappy, lackluster product from arrogant, greedy companies (or company), shit hits the fan. No "business practices" can overcome the open source model once it gets enough momentum. I'll be ready when the first shot is fired. Music, books, and eventually even movies will fall under the open-source model. Us geeks simply have less patience for mediocrity, which is why we've seen it here first.
In Soviet America the banks rob you!
To nitpick, an office doesn't count, because the people being entertained are not clients, but employees, so the causal effect from listening to music and making money is harder to show. Restaurants and dept. stores, however, would be liable. Most restaurants and dept. stores don't broadcast public radio stations. They probably already pay royalties for their music loop tapes.
Vote for Pedro
The most advantageous, pre-eminent thing thou canst do is not to exhibit
nor display thyself within the limits of our galaxy, but rather depart
instantaneously whence thou even now standest and flee to yet another rotten
planet in the universe, if thou canst have the good fortune to find one.
-- Carlyle
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fck ff y stpd nl-rtntv mrn