BBC In Trouble Over Free Music

Take a Byte Out of Crime writes "According to this article, British classical labels are claiming that the BBC giving away the these symphonies, which were performed by the BBC Orchestra for free, constitutes unfair government competition. Apparently all free music really is illegal these days, or soon will be, public domain be damned."

Comments

Proving once again

[Anonymous Coward]

That no good deed goes unpunished.

Fuck the record execs.

[James A. D. Joyce]

From the article: "There is the obvious issue that it is devaluing the perceived value of music. You are also leading the public to think that it is fine to download and own these files for nothing."

Gee, maybe I'm wrong, but aren't Beethoven's symphonies public domain? How dare the BBC introduce a great composer's copyright-free works to a larger audience! They're devaluing it! And by "devaluing the music", you mean "devaluing your stock value", right?

Re:Fuck the record execs.

[failure-man]

And if the BBC paid for the performance and did the recording they can do whatever they want with it right?

Re:Fuck the record execs.

[RedWizzard]

Yes, exactly. Which is why this record exec is just mouthing off and is not suing.

It's not "free music"

[Eric Smith]

The people of the UK have already paid for it! Thus it isn't "unfair competition" either, unless the initial production of the music (not its later distribution) is unfair.

The complaint that this is unfair strikes me as being very nearly as absurd as the situation in the US where there are private companies complaining that only they should be allowed to have the data collected and generated by the taxpayer-funded National Weather Service, and that taxpayers should not be able to get the data directly from the government.

Re:It's not "free music"

[einstienbc]

but dont you remember? you're infringing on the rights of the corporations to make money as well as own everything!

Re:It's not "free music"

[mc6809e]

The people of the UK have already paid for it! Thus it isn't "unfair competition" either

Of course it's unfair. One group gets to force the citizens to pay for what it has produced while another group must rely on their voluntary purchase.

I doubt you would like to compete against a government that can simply take whatever money it needs from it's "customers".

Re:It's not "free music"

[Kadin2048]

Fine, if you want to debate that, then go to your government representative and ask them to disband the BBC, if you think it's so parasitical.

What the corporations are arguing isn't that the BBC shouldn't exist--which is a defensible assertion, and one I might even be tempted to agree with--but that now, after that organization has been bought and paid for (we can only hope at the behest of the taxpaying public), and the recorded symphonies are to society a sunk cost, that the public who paid for them to be created should pay for them again.

The public HAS ALREADY paid for those symphonies. They have paid for them in their tax dollars, which their elected representatives chose to spend, via the BBC, on their creation via recording. That this payment is vastly more indirect than the payment a customer is used to making for a sound recording is obvious, but it doesn't mean that people who download the symphonies in question are in any way 'stealing' them.

Re:It's not "free music"

[GlassHeart]

Of course it's unfair. One group gets to force the citizens to pay for what it has produced while another group must rely on their voluntary purchase.

So the US Postal Service is in unfair competition against FedEx and UPS? Or perhaps the police are in unfair competition against security guards? How about public schools putting private schools out of business? (Note that there are examples of successful businesses in every one of the above.)

Like it or not, there will always be some overlap between the public and private sectors, and in a democracy, voters decide where that overlap ends. Perhaps you would like to rephrase your objections.

I doubt you would like to compete against a government that can simply take whatever money it needs from it's "customers".

What I don't assume to have is a God-given right to make a profit doing any particular thing. I think a pay-per-extinguish service instead of a public fire department might be profitable (especially when several neighbors bid for my services while the houses burn). That doesn't mean the government's fire department is unfairly competing against me, does it?

Music as a commodity

[iamdrscience]

At first I thought this was ridiculous because music isn't a commodity, it's not like the government is selling the same thing as the music companies. But when I thought about it some more, in ways, most classical music is a commodity. I mean, when you're looking for Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody #2, for the most part people don't care about who plays it, the just care that it's a recording of the piece they're looking for. That said, it's not entirely commoditized, I mean, there are differences between recordings, there are different arrangements, different qualities of recording, etc.

It seems very odd though that record companies dealing in classic music would be of the opinion that classical recordings are commodities or that even if they weren't of that opinion, that they would encourage people to think of it that way. It just seems like bad business.

Then they'd better not broadcast any music either

[newandyh-r]

Is there any intrinsic difference between making the performances available for download and broadcasting the performances on digital radio.
If you have the right equipment (such as a Psion Wavefinder) and a reliable signal (not so easy for digital) you can record all the Proms at MP3 equivalent quality.

Re:So I guess....

[Breakfast Pants]

The difference is the governments aren't funding those people! Oh wait, Governments around the world routinely do things like that. In fact local governments often put a lot of money into funding symphonies etc.--without that funding the "Classical Labels" who are complaining in this case would have a much crappier talent pool to pick from. This same issue came up when some town was releasing its GIS data a while back... I don't see how it is even an issue if it has already been paid for (as with that data and these performances).

Re:similar trends

[mc6809e]

Not only the music industry, even the UK newspaper's are facing tough competition from the BBC's news website.

The interesting thing about this is that the UK newspapers are being forced to support their competition through taxes.

They're forced to pay the government to dig their own economic graves.

Put up or shut up...

[advocate_one]

well, if they're objecting so much about this, perhaps they should launch a court case and see just how far they get

or could it be because they haven't got a leg to stand on and the BBC is perfectly within it's rights to have done this... having copyright anyway in the performance that they did, and therefore, they could dispose of it exactly as they wished, including making it available for free download so nya... nya...

Kind of ambiguous... added questions (for anyone)

[mister_llah]

Quoth that source:
WHAT IS NOT PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT?

Works consisting entirely of information that is common property and containing no original authorship (for example: standard calendars, height and weight charts, tape measures and rulers, and lists or tables taken from public documents or other common sources)
===

Technically those symphonies DO have original authorship but are now public domain, correct? ... so which one takes precedence?

Is that original authorship a registered copyright, or is that just that it was created by a human and would have been protected by copyright (if they had applied)?

Re:Whiners

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely. May I elaborate? The belief that music companies cannot compete because of the economics of filesharing/free music is misleading. A better reason record companies cannot compete is because their products are mostly rubbish. For almost a decade we have seen
movement towards cheap machine produced music propelled by marketing alone. During that time the industry has underinvested in its essential resources, local music culture, educating composers and performers, the prerequisite lifeblood of a healthy arts culture. Meanwhile technology has empowered the individual to create works of an equal or superior quality to that of the record companies. That is what these people want to stop. They dont care about filesharing of _their_ music, legally they think that's cut and dried, what really puts the shits up them is the idea of a healthy independent music culture with artists managing their own distribution. [disclaimer/context - I worked at the BBC as a producer for several years]

Buy/Share Independent music, don't support the crap.

Re:I hate the BBC for this

[Master of Transhuman]

"it smacks a little bit of unfairness if my US based cousins can enjoy what is arguably the best part of the BBC (BBC Online) without having to contribute a penny."

Well, last week's Live 8 concert was limited to the UK - except that some people managed to put up proxy servers that allowed people outside the UK to see it. So I got my fix of the Corrs - especially Andrea being very sexy (again) with Bono (again) on "When The Stars Go Blue". (Actually I didn't get it online myself, but other people did and recorded it, converted it to MPG and I downloaded it within 24 hours of the show.)

Personally I think if you don't like paying your government a license fee to listen to commercial-free radio, overthrow your government. Then you can pay Bill Gates and the music labels fees to listen to commercial-FULL radio. And I suspect you'll pay more than $220 a year on it once they get cranked up with DRM and the like.

As an aside, do you oppose BBC World Service on shortwave?

Re:Intellectual Property terms

[toddbu]

not anti-competitive behaviour

I hope that you were just repeating what the record execs said and don't really believe this crap. It's just like the big stink recently over the US government putting out weather data in XML format. Apparently, it's *always* anti-competitive for citizens to compete against industry as far as some folks are concerned.

Don't get me wrong - there's tons of stuff that's better left to private industry. It's tough to know where to draw the line sometimes. In a case like this it's pretty clear though - the government is just giving back to the public what it already owns. Nothing wrong with that.

While I don't agree with them in this case

[Sycraft-fu]

Lawsuits of this type aren't always without merit. The idea is that in a capatalism, the government isn't allowed to unfairly compete with private corperations. I mean the government can basically always win out in a price war if they want since they can cover costs through taxes, which people don't count in the price since they aren't a direct charge. Since in a capatalism it is undesirable to have the government run everything (wouldn't be a capatalism if they did) it is generally illegal for them to unfairly compete with the private sector.

Now I see this as very differnet. The government isn't competing, they are doing a public service. They aren't trying to have CDs put in stores next to other classical works but for a lower price, they are just releasing some electronic music to the masses. Private entities aren't precluded form competing, they can produce different/better versions of these symphonies (like a DVD-A or DTS CD or something). This is just record companies being whiny.

Personally I say distribute more classical music, or shut the fuck up. It's truly pathetic the selection of classical available. Record labels don't like it very much since it's fairly expensive to produce (an orchestra has a lot of musicians, all who need to be paid, usually up front) and it doesn't sell nearly as much as pop music.

Re:The next logical step

[aussersterne]

Governments are put in place to do the things that private citizens and corporations can't do on their own: enforce order, build roads, provide for the common defense, etc.

Says who? You deftly slide this by as though it's a statement of fact. How about:

Governments are put in place to do things that private citizens or corproations won't do, but that most private citizens wish somebody would do.

or:

Governments are put in place to make golf courses.

Just what "governments are put in place to do" is a central debate of modernity that has shaped much of the history of the twentieth century. It is what this entire story is about, and why it is so controversial.

I'd be just as happy with:

Governments are put in place to do whatever it is they do and to encourage and facilitate the near-free distribution of valuable works by long-dead people that can benefit the public at large.

Re:Unfair Competition?

[chefren]

They're not giving it away for free. The government charges taxpayers for the music and they have no choice but to pay.

So in fact the whole existance of the BBC is unfair competition, then? It probably is. And in my oppinion the commercial companies will just have to manage anyway. The BBC has been giving away music over radio and tv for decades but now when its over the Internet is suddenly a problem?

A disease on capitalism?

[CyricZ]

I fear we are beginning to see the problems of diseases on capitalism really rearing their heads these days. The greed recently is overwhelming! Perhaps it is because most Western nations have lost their tangible manufacturing base to countries like India, Taiwan and China. Now instead of manufacturing goods, all that Western companies can do is manufacture "intellectual property". Since such "property", be it movies or music, isn't tangible in any way, it is often quite easy to reproduce and distribute. As such, these corporations and groups must resort to legalities to make a living.

Indeed, what we are seeing is a disease on capitalism and the free market. Our capitalism has been infected with intangible goods that are being treated as if they were tangible by the forces of law. The free market is not being allowed to work, and trouble is the result. Indeed, one cannot have an effective capitalistic society without a free market. Our free market has become diseased with intellectual property legalities, and as such fails to work to the benefit of society.

Re:Lets ask Beethoven

[Anonymous Coward]

someone who has a sense of humour, all first posts should be that good. It stops the other idiots.

Re:I hate the BBC for this

[Derling Whirvish]

I'm sure many of us understand how the BBC works, it's funded in majority by the license fee we Brits have to pay per household every year. I think I paid 130UKP last year (220USD).

Likewise, I'm sure you are aware that the Global Positioning System is funded wholly by an income tax levyed on my personal income and paid to the Department of Defense.

it smacks a little bit of unfairness if my US based cousins can enjoy what is arguably the best part of the BBC (BBC Online) without having to contribute a penny.

And likewise unfair that you can enjoy a precision navigation system paid for entirely on the dime of the U.S. taxpayer.

BBC Online should be protected in-line with the rest of the BBC, the content should be un-lockable via entry of my license number.

And you should have to use a smart card with a paid-up subscription to activate any GPS receiver you may want to use -- oh wait, isn't that what you have in mind for the Galileo system?

Well, It would be fair, except. . .

[mosb1000]

Except that all British Citizens have paid for this music whether they chose to or not. That would be the same as if the government charged everyone $15,000 and then gave everyone a "free" car. It's not exactly fair to the competition.

Re:Well, It would be fair, except. . .

[Flyboy Connor]

Except that all British Citizens have paid for this music whether they chose to or not. That would be the same as if the government charged everyone $15,000 and then gave everyone a "free" car. It's not exactly fair to the competition.

That's not the same thing. I think car manufacturers would be very happy because the government has to buy those cars from someone -- it's good for business, it's good for economy. It's not good for the environment or for the ability to get to work on time, but that's another matter.

Now, what happened with the BBC music, is also good for the economy. First, the BBC pays the orchestra, so about 150 people have work. Second, people get in touch with classical music, and may be stimulated to listen to or even BUY more of it. Since buying music is good for business, companies profit here too.

Government is in the hair of companies ALL THE TIME. If the government provides railroads, it's bad for car manufacturers. If government lays a new road, it is bad for toll roads. If government abolishes software patents, it's bad for the lawyers who specialised in sueing programmers.

The difference between the government and companies is that the government should be in it for the good of the people, while the companies are in it for the good of themselves. They are not really competing, although they might cover some common area.

Granted, companies have rights too, but they do not have the right that the government should completely avoid their business. They chose their own business, and if that business overlaps some of the government's responsibilities, it's their own problem if their business is hurt by that.

Re:The next logical step

[whoever57]

There's a big difference between the government giving something away, and a private citizen. The private citizen is spending his own money; the government is spending taxpayer dollars.

But in this case, the BBC is not really "giving something away" -- since the BBC will still have the recordings and will still be able to broadcast them. It's more like a government entity sharing its ownership with people, in a manner that causes no loss to the government (except a very minor bandwidth cost).

Re:Unfair Competition?

[amliebsch]

I don't understand how giving something away for free could be seen as competition.

Here's an analogy for the Slashdot crowd:

The BBC is like Microsoft, except its power to force consumers to pay up comes not from sleazy deals and market penetration but the well-polished heel of a bobby's boot. The classical recordings, then, are like Internet Explorer, which they are giving away for "free" (though in reality subsidized by the rents created from their power position), and this record industry exec is like Netscape, trying to protect a stagnant, failing product space while whining about how consumers are harmed by delivery of a free product.

So the question for you is: are you consistent in your application of principles in these cases? Because I have a feeling that if you said:

I still take the side of Microsoft on this one, though. They created the browser with their own in-house programmers and therefore should be able to distribute it any way they like. Period.

...well, you might get some more vocal disagreement!

Re:The next logical step

[MightyMartian]

Most of those classical composers that the BBC is giving performances of away were themselves funded by various princes, kings and emperors. The value that Mozart, Beethoven or Bach produced, and continue to produce through performances is such that I can only nasty thoughts of those who think that the free distribution of this grandest of Western music is wrong, or that taxpayers of the present, like those of the past, should have to bear the the thought of actually putting a little culture into a world dominated by monosyllabic athletes and "singers" whose performances are possible only by sound engineers and computers.

My goodness, but what a small, greedy, mean-spirited world we've become if the BBC is attacked for giving to the public its performances of the great musical masters. Perhaps we should weed through university computers to make sure that there are no copies of Shakespeare or Chaucer (ala Project Gutenberg), because heaven forbid that a government-funded institution should ever compete with a bookseller.

Re:Unfair Competition?

[JohnsonWax]

It's pretty hard to compete against a group that forces everyone to buy its performance while you have to hope someone volutarily buys yours.

No, it's not. All over the nation there are paid orchestras and choirs singing public-domain works and doing just fine because the *performance* is what most people are interested in. My wife has several recordings of certain works, she herself regularly sings those same works, and she regularly pays to attend performances of the very same works.

The problem with the business model is that the orchestras, rather than *perform* want to *record* and still be viable. That's the failure. The money is in the performance and BBC isn't competing in that space.

Re:I hate the BBC for this

[Funksaw]

As one of those Americans, I would like to point out that the BBC has programming on both the radio and the television worth watching/listening. Your 220USD is less than you'd pay for a cable service and you still wouldn't get any good stuff. So cram it. The minute the BBC starts charging overseas customers for a H.264 video stream over the Internet, I'm converting to pounds and paying them what they ask. There's so much government waste and stupidity in the world and you want to complain about government efficiency and service?

Re:I'm confused, what exactly does copyright mean?

[quarkscat]

"And then there was a great disturbance in the
force, as though a billion souls were suddenly
extinguished..."

That "Happy Birthday" song (you know the one I
mean) is protected, copyrighted material. It
cannot be commercially reproduced without pay-
ment of royalties to the copyright holder.
One may take this to mean that the song may not
be sung for profit (eg. singing telegram), nor
can it be written down (eg. birthday card).
This whole situation seems pretty ludicrous.

This is not merely a UK copyright issue, but
also a USA issue. Remember the Disney-sponsored
"Mickey Mouse" copyright legislation that
passed with flying colors? No doubt, this same
situation also exists elsewhere. (So, Mickey
has been enslaved for yet another 30 years!)

AFAIK, copyright was established in order to
reward the original artist/writer/composer
during his/her lifetime, and not a revenue
stream for the next 3 generations. Doesn't
the term "public domain" and "fair use" mean
anything anymore? It's a damn good thing that
these onerous copyright laws were not around
before the advent of the Gutenburg press -- we
would all still be in the Dark Ages, thinking
the world is flat. Each hand-copied manuscript
would have had to be paid for with a pound of
monk's flesh...

Re:Whiners

[deetsay]

If you not good enough to compete with the public domain, then it's time to rethink your career.

Indeed. I don't think the exec in TFA is being short-sighted at all. These works are in the public domain, and now these performances are in the public domain, and they're online. If this starts happening more, we could soon have good quality public domain performances of all classical works. This could lead to classical orchestras over the world competing on who can create the best performance. People would rate their recorded and live performances, which will get the best of these orchestras free fame and gigs. Unfair!

What if some rock & pop musicians find that these online channels based on free distribution might be a better way than going to a record company for a haircut and dance lessons, and to be told exactly what to do? Slipperysloping some more, soon the record company exec's only business will be to sell artists back their rights to their own music, so they can publish it online. The question is WTF, besides whining, are they going to do about it?

Extend copyrights, implement DRM's, sue kids...? How much time will that buy them?

Re:Sorry, bollocks

[mc6809e]

News International (part of the Murdoch empire) avoids UK taxes and has done for many years. In fact, they are effectively being subsidised by the UK taxpayer.

Really? I'd like to know how it is they avoid paying UK taxes. Some proof would be nice.

And how are they being subsidised by the UK taxpayer? Do they collect tax money? Again, some proof would be nice.

And are they representative of all the newpapers in the UK? Even if they don't pay taxes, do all newspapers not pay taxes? It seems like you're providing what may be a single exception to suggest something in general. Again, how about some proof?

Re:Lets ask Beethoven

[fr0dicus]

Just one look at the article submitter's e-mail address should tell you what's behind this. Lies and FUD.

There is lots of free music out there

[Alain Williams]

For instance Donald Betts has put up his own recordings of music by Chopin. Now that these are out there - no one need ever pay for those pieces again; unless they don't like his interpretation.

All that it takes is people like him and, over time, more and more music becomes unencumbered.

I am surprised that the large corporations have not cottoned onto the idea of free music as an inducement to advertising. Think of the vast sums that they spend just to have their name put in front of people's eyes (think: adverts in football or formula 1 racing). Those cost a lot of money.

What would it cost to commission an orchestra to play Mozart/Beethoven/... and release the MP3s with a short message of the form: ''Beethoven's Moonlight sonata brought to you by XXX, purveyors of fine YYY'' ? If it isn't too intrusive most people would not skip it or edit it from the MP3. The licence could be personal use, no redistribution which means that everyone who wants it should go to their web site and see more adverts for YYY.

1. Pay an orchestra a few thousand pounds to play some classical music
2. Put it up on a web site as a free personal download
3. Lots of people visit the web site
4. Lots of people listen to the name XXX when they listen to the music
5. Those people are more likely to buy XXX's YYY
6. Profit !!!

Re:Lets ask Beethoven

[sg_oneill]

Then he said "SYKE! I never got paid royalties. Like most composers, the government (the king) paid me to do what I do, and my music was performed for the paeons to keep them happy. My music was passed around for free for generations after that through the earliest form of open source P2P , music lessons and badly copied versions of sheet music"

It ain't free

[AgeOfUnreason]

Err Its not actually free. We (Brits) pay a license fee and therefore we have a right to access those performances since we paid from them. If this case wins then ITV and other non-license fee channels could argue that all free t.v is illegal!

Re:Groklaw called it

[Ngwenya]

It's these sort of frivolous cases that make me believe that something stronger than tossing the case out is needed. This company should permanently be prevented from ever suing anybody for any reason, no matter the merits.

In the UK, (and many parts of the USA and elsewhere), this can actually happen. If you are declared a vexatious litigant (ie, someone who issues spurious lawsuits), you can not begin proceedings in a court without specifically applying to the High Court for permission (and you pay the costs of the application, whereas your potential defendant pays none).

Clearly, this is an extreme case. Denying or hindering someone's quick access to justice is not a step that the courts take lightly. Hence the relatively few people on the VL list. It's viewable here

--Ng

Re:Unfair Competition?

[TheRaven64]

Except that they are not encouraging vendor lock-in. Nothing that the BBC is doing is going to force people to use their service. The BBC symphonies don't include special features that speaker manufacturers will use that will prevent me from listening to other symphonies on them. In short, I am completely free to buy the Herbert von Karajan recordings of the symphonies (get a Mac?) without any interference from the BBC and without suffering any ill effects.

You should be glad, I call it civilization...

[vhogemann]

There are a lot of silly lawsuits these days, but sure they're a lot better than agression, murder, corruption or robbery cases.

Also it seems that the common citzen has easy access to the justice, and this is a wonderfull thing. And even better, it shows that the common people can relly on the public defensors when they're accused.

Here at Brasil justice is a thing for the elites, and the commom man, the poor one, don't really has access to it. Also, there is a lot of corruption in our judiciary system... since the judges are indicated, and not elected, and has all sorts of privileges and imunities.

So I for one, think that the amount of silly, or even stupid, lawsuits are a indication of how democracy, and the citzen rights, are respected and valued. Since even this kind of nonsense has it's place before justice... at least it means that everyone has a chance to be listen.

Re:Lets ask Beethoven

[Anonymous Coward]

If the BBC was independent, then they wouldn't accept tax money.

So what you're saying is that McDonnel-Douglas, Smith & Wesson, American railroads, and farmrs (not to mention most other companies) are actually government entities, right?

After all, if they accept tax money then they're not independant.

So, logically, that makes the USA a communist haven!

Re:Unfair Competition?

[meringuoid]

The BBC is like Microsoft, except its power to force consumers to pay up comes not from sleazy deals and market penetration but the well-polished heel of a bobby's boot. The classical recordings, then, are like Internet Explorer, which they are giving away for "free" (though in reality subsidized by the rents created from their power position), and this record industry exec is like Netscape, trying to protect a stagnant, failing product space while whining about how consumers are harmed by delivery of a free product.

-1, Missed the Point

The problem with IE wasn't that it was given away free. I don't think you'll find anyone on /. who has a problem with free software per se. The problem with IE was that Microsoft bundled it with Windows.

A nearer analogy would be if Apple had an orchestra record a bunch of classical music, and bundled that music with every iPod sold. Then the guys selling CDs of classical music might have a case. The problem was about abuse of a monopoly position, not about giving away a product for free.

Re:Lets ask Beethoven

[sconeu]

Can I then be sued by Toyota because I chose to buy a Ford car instead?

Quite possibly, since a bus company is suing people who carpool.

Re:Lets ask Beethoven

[cHiphead]

To the arrogant assholes who spend time bashing freeloaders and determines everyone commenting is not an artist: God forbid an artist has to have a JOB to live on. And you simply HAVE to be a tradesman to live, whether you are living AND being creative, or not. Btw, Beethoven was a whacked out nutjob that happened to be very skilled in music, much like a large number of the successful music artists of today.

Maybe you're lost in the bullshit of an art marketplace, but don't assume the rest of us are. It takes a lot of hard work and insane self sacrifice to become a remotely successful artist (with a grain of salt set aside for the unusually lucky people) and even then it can all crumble in the end. Look at Big Sky Band from Gainesville, FL, those hardworking crazy fools, they spent years and years touring and doing live gigs trying to make it big, even came close a few times, even got signed, even had their song in rotation in certain cities, but in the end, they had to move on in life, despite pouring the blood and tears into it and giving it their all. Now they give away all their live shows for free. It takes insane luck to actually make a good living being an artist, and without a 'tradesman' ability, you don't exist beyond small gigs.

Cheers.

OT: Moderation

[Anonymous Coward]

Sometimes I think we need a (+1, Sarcasm) moderation that is a blend of funny & insightful ...

If the byteme email address wasn't obvious enough, I fear lest the sarcasm be lost on grandparent otherwise.