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Music Industry Shaking Down Coffee Shops
realjd writes with news out of Florida that music licensing companies are now hitting small bars and coffee shops that offer live music, even if only occasionally and even if the musicians don't get paid. One coffee-shop owner told musicians they can only perform their own songs from now on. "A restaurant owner who doesn't even offer live music was approached for payment for having the TV on while the Monday Night Football theme played. And if the owners pay up to one licensing company, all of the others start harassing them, calling four times a day, demanding payment too. It sounds like they don't even check whether any copyright violations occurred, they're just sending bills to any business that may or may not have live music."
Disclaimer: I am not advocating this. Not! This is just an observation.
You know, I'm surprised we don't hear about anyone going on a shooting spree inside the offices of the MAFIAA or ASCAP, etc. It's kind of a testament to human goodness that so far, no one driven out of business by these terrorists (yeah, I said it) has freaked out and decided to take their antagonists with them. I mean, given how many hundreds of small businesses have been ruined be these shenanigans, not a single owner has been unstable enough to want revenge? Again, I'm not saying that's what should happen. I'm just kind of surprised that it hasn't.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Yep. This garbage has been going on for years and years. Here's a story from the SF Chronicle about a bar that quit having live music all together after constant threats from ASCAP. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/ 12/03/BUGL13CH5H26.DTL
I prefer to think of them as retarded security measures, rather than draconian. Bringing toothpaste or mouthwash on an aircraft makes people die, so they take it from you at a screening point = retarded. Stuffing the toothpaste tube into your urethra and impaling you in front of terminal B, as a warning to others tempted by oral hygiene = draconian. Or I guess that would be both retarded and draconian. Whatever.
Either way, it doesn't have much to do with copyright litigation.
Apathy; it does a body good.
Man, this is so harshly on target. Beatles played all old school rock'n'roll songs in Hamburg and for MONEY. My pick no one bothered to collect money from them then.
And word "abused" is totally wrong here. Every serious group claims that they got their talents in mastering of their instruments trough playing cover songs.
I think it is time for serious peaceful revolt against so called "copyright collectors".
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Even if I moved to another country (and I probably will live in Switzerland (CERN) for at least several years of my life at the end of and after grad school), I would still come back and visit the US pretty frequently (about as frequently as money would allow). All of my family would still be here (except for my wife, of course), and I love them. That's reason enough to put up with an awful lot of crap.
SIGSEGV caught, terminating
wait... not that kind of sig.
Posting anonymously because I'm offtopic 3 levels deep...
...but I can't let that pass. It's the wide-open immigration policy that *gives* us our good GDP. Especially when we can't educate our own workers well enough to fill all the tech jobs our economy generates. The hardest-working people in the U.S. are, almost without fail, immigrants. Fucking knee-jerk xenophobia is what will lead to our downfall, just as it has every other society that's engaged in it.
First of all: IAAL, but this ain't legal advice.
1. This is nothing new. Public performances have had to be licensed since right around 1900, and ASCAP has been collecting fees for blanket licenses since 1914. This is not a new campaign designed to squelch independent musicians, as some comments have intimated.
2. This isn't controversial or surprising. It's not an issue of free speech or fair use, at least as far as public performances in profit-making business establishments are concerned. The EFF and the ACLU, I suspect, wouldn't be interested -- and neither would some random Congressman be shocked to have to pay ASCAP/BMI/SESAC fees, as one comment suggested. Maybe it would be good to allow unlicensed performances of music in business establishments, but that hasn't been the law for a very long time.
3. My sense is that around a dozen businesses decide to "fight" blanket license fees each year, thinking that somehow they won't end up having to pay or that the licenses aren't needed in order to play copyrighted songs in their establishments. They always lose.
4. ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC have occasionally been accused of "shaking down" businesses that really don't play any music for which they need a license -- like, say, bars that only play traditional Irish songs that are in the public domain. If those stories are true, the shakedowns are bad, wrong, and potentially liability-producing. (See also 17 USC 110.)
If you still want to be mad at somebody (and there may be good reason to be mad about some of this, just not most of it), at least be mad at the right people: ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC, who work as the agents of owners of copyright in musical works (not sound recordings). The RIAA is a group of copyright owners in sound recordings, and has nothing to do with this (except that some of the music publishers and some of the record labels are commonly owned).
This last Christmas I joined my family for service and noticed a copyright notice at the bottom of the page, for one of the songs.
Turns out they pay a yearly fee for the right to sing hymnals.
You got to love it
0100001001100101011010010110111001100111 0100100001110101011011010110000101101110
maybe yes, but only if the song is sung. Copyright law is inane - if the street musician is singing the song and people hear it, they've violated copyright, but if they just play the music, it's a performance and no fees are due. Heck, if you sing a copyrighted song for a voice teacher, you're probably violating copyright, too. It's sad that the majore copyright holders have come to this - when I was playing, I never heard of such fees unless the song was recorded.
If you're just playing the music, you really can't get in trouble. If I recall correctly, you can even record it, note-for-note and not have to pay a penny to the original artist as long as the performance was original and includes no lyrics (if you print credits, you can't claim it was written by you).
The solution is parody - write a parody of every song including note-for-note performances and rip on the assholes at ASCAP, BMI, etc. for why you can't sing their songs (but make sure it's parody to avoid libel). Legally, you don't even have to get permission from anyone to do this.
"That all works for me. Where's the issue? People who want to run businesses and get free use of somebody else's work? Musicians who don't want to get paid for their efforts, which doesn't do any favours to musicians trying to make a living (or in my case, help with the rent)?"
I'm sorry to say this, but this does appear to be the sentiment. Far too many Slashdotters to believe this to be the case:
I wish I were exaggerating, but I am not. We all claim to be for musician's rights, but as we can see from the majority of comments here, this is simply lip service.
"I'd have some sympathy for an argument whereby businesses pay a smaller fee if their revenues are small enough, although is you can't afford $20 a week as a coffee shop I'd say there's more fundamental challenges to be faced. If the live musicians can't pull in a few cups of coffee from customers should they be playing at all?"
License are indeed on a sliding scale system. The issue here is that there are businesses that understand that it's a benefit to have have music performed for their customers (that is, it makes them money), but quite frankly they'd rather keep that money in their cash register than pay artists. The businesses are looking after their bottom line and hoping they do not get caught.
You know how we're always railing against the record companies for cheating the artists out of money? Seems that if you're a coffee house and you do the same thing, you're actually one of the good guys.
Sitting in my day care, the art is decopainted.
That a songwriter gets paid when you play her song?
I've been the poor musician, the DJ and the radio station. No, the songwriter doesn't get paid when you play their song in fact. The RIAA "guesses" what songs you would have played, and pays the songwritters according to these guesses. The system is far from exact.
And if you worked in a "sucky little coffee shop" is so bad to work for, why did you work at one for a dozen or so years? It couldn't have paid THAT good that you would have put up with it, could it?
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
I see many dimes -- no enough to pay the rent, but enough to pay the electric bill. I get 90% of what ASCAP collects from my performances, and every one they miss for which I have evidence (a program, recording, poster, etc.), they confirm and collect for. They're right downtown across from Lincoln Center, easy to find. Go upstairs and make an appointment with the ASCAP rep for your region.
Dennis
Hence any city that allows buskers owes ASCAP money, and back fees and interest.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
with classical music this is even wierder. you can get fined in germany for playing bach in public if you don't pay the gema (the german version of the riaa) lots of money. i mean bach? he died in 1750. apparently you have to pay if you're using or ever used sheetmusic printed by one of the companies which have signed up with the gema. so basically, if you start learning the piano at age 5 and have once looked at an edition peters printing of the piece you are now playing in public, you are liable to pay the gema money. as if the publishing houses don't get enough money by selling the music for ridiculous prices. and with this pointless urtext craze, it isn't as if the editions are any good, but that's another rant.
A 12%-14% overhead is not extremely low. For some charities, I have seen overhead at 1% and up.
In fact, I'm not sure I have ever given money to a charity that was above 10%.
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