ARIA Sells a Licence for DJs to Format Shift Music

lucas writes "The Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) has set up a new licence to let DJs format shift their music to use at gigs. DJs will need to pay a licence fee to copy music they already own legally from one format to another for ease of use, and as a back-up in case originals get lost or stolen. Criminal penalties for DJs involved in "music piracy" are up to sixty thousand dollars and 5 years imprisonment. There are also on-the-spot fines of over one thousand dollars."

Comments

No "fair use" in Australia

[QuantumG]

Copyright.. copy right.

The owner has the exclusive right to make copies and sells "licenses" which permit you to make copies for specific purposes.

Why is this surprising?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[jd]

I curse the ARIA with a plague of Rolf Harrises! And may they never guess what it is!

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[XaXXon]

Because certain types of copies are allowed. For instance, you're allowed to have a copy of a program on your hard drive and in RAM. You can have a copy sitting in a hard drive cache. The intent behind copyright is that you purchase it for a purpose (and likely the DJs had to purchase a more expensive version that allows public performance) and you can use it for that purpose.

I've always thought the music industry should have to pick. Either they can sell you a physical media with which you can do whatever you want (public performances or personal use) or sell you a license to use the music in a certain way (private use only, but you have the right to the music in any format you want for that purpose).

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Because a DJ is ALREADY paying royalties to ARIA for the right to spin those songs at a gig. ARIA is proposing to make DJs pay an *additional* fee on top of what they're already paying in order to format shift their music for convenience (i.e. playing tunes as MP3s out of a laptop, or creating compilation CDs to reduce the number of CDs that need to be taken to a gig). This is wrong because it makes absolutely no difference to the listeners. They just hear music coming out of the speakers regardless of what format it's in on the DJ's side.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[evanbd]

They should also have to choose between legal and technological protection. If they want to use DRM to enforce policies that aren't based in copyright law (and there's no way for a piece of software to distinguish what's legal fair use), then I see no reason to grant them copyright protection. The purpose of copyright is to promote creation and enrich society. Fair use is a necessary part of that, as is the ability to use the work after the copyright period expires. They should not be allowed to renege on half of the bargain and expect the other half to continue to hold.

If they want DRM, fine. But pick one. They shouldn't be allowed to lock up our culture and expect legal assistance in doing so.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

What's wrong with my logic? I'm starting to suspect a troll here but I'll keep going just in case...

A DJ, as part of spinning songs for a crowd, is already paying royalties to ARIA for the right to play those songs in public. I want you to explain to me exactly why he should be required to pay additional royalties on top of what he is already paying for the right to play those songs out of a laptop or off a compilation CD instead of the original CD.

Bear in mind that copyright does not make it illegal to copy *any* music. It only makes it illegal to copy to music that you do not have a license to copy. DJs have that license because they pay royalties.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Pressing a bunch of copies of a CD and selling them/giving them away is a completely different matter than format shifting music for your own personal convenience and not giving anything away except as part of a performance for which you are paying royalties.

You also failed to answer the question I specifically asked. Tell me why, in a fair and just world, should ARIA be allowed to charge extra for the convenience of format shifting when no sales are lost and no person hears the music except the DJ who purchased it and his audience who are covered by the peformance royalty that the DJ is paying. No copyright holder is in any way harmed by allowing DJs for format shift. Charging DJs an extra royalty harms the DJs by forcing them to haul their entire physical CD collection to gigs (and risk them getting lost, stolen, or damaged) instead of a hard drive or compilation CDs.

Your argument seems to be based on the "letter of the law." Tell me why that law should be interpreted in that way instead of in a way that allows DJs more convenience without harming copyright holders in any way.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Linker3000]

You don't 'get it' do you?

Music industry - Check

Brainstorming meeting at Music Industry meeting - Check

Pathetic way to screw more money out of music-playing customers in the guise of a 'benefit' - Check

There's nothing wrong with your logic - you are just incorrect in assuming that logic and common sense applies at the corporate level of the music sector.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Anpheus]

They're not giving away those CDs, they are just making sure their original CD doesn't get damaged by using a digital version (from laptop, burned CD in different format, whatever.) They aren't giving that away to anyone.

Their license to copy ends when it involves other people. As they were given a license to distribute aurally the music in question, then does it matter whether or not the exact, same, identical bits of data came from one CD or another? Heck, if you never saw the CD that the DJ used, how do you have -any proof at all- that it isn't the original? You don't. You -can't-. What's more, it doesn't matter.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[QuantumG]

Dude, in a fair and just world there wouldn't be copyright, period. If you frequent this site, you've probably seen me rant about this before.

We're not having a discussion about how great the world would be without copyright, we're having a discussion about what ARIA is doing in the real world.

In the real world the license granted by a copyright owner can be as strict or as lax as they like. It can authorize the public performance of a work but not the time shifting of a work. It can say that you're only allowed to play any song an album or just the acoustic ones.

Is this absurd? Yes.

Does this put too much power into the hands over the copyright owners? Yes.

That's the way the copyright system is.. fucked..

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[daBass]

They do? In most countries, the venue pays. DJs just show up and play what they've got, without direct payment from them to the record companies.

The same goes for live music, on which royalties are payable too.

The way this is done is by fixed fee. The royalties agency determining what songs generally statistically get played and divides the revenue.

Of course that mean that lesser known artists get nothing and 90% of royalties paid goes to 10% of the artists. Nice.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[QuantumG]

Just to make it clear, I don't agree with copyright law, I don't like copyright law, but what you are saying is just non-sense. There's no provision in law to make backup copies of CDs for commercial use. You need a license or you are in violation of copyright law. Sucks, but that's the way it is. Burying your head in the sand will not change it. If you want to change it, go become a politician.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have to go the length of equating format shift (where nothing is distributed to third parties) to distribution (the CD press) for your argument to stand, the argument is over already.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Ahh, I see where you're getting at. You could have made your position a little more clear. As a musician who owns a few copyrights of my own, I disagree that copyright shouldn't exist. Someone who creates a work should be allowed to have a say in how it can be distributed, and nobody should be allowed to make money off of somebody else's work without compensating them. I license my work under a Creative Commons license that allows it to be freely distributed, but if someone wants to make money off it they have to make their own licensing deal with me, which would involve compensating me. I believe that this is perfectly fair, and this could only happen with some sort of copyright law in place.

I do agree, however, that copyright law should be significantly overhauled. For starters, durations should be shortened (20 years or less), and copyright ownership should not be transferable.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Bert64]

I know a few DJs, and have often helped them set up for gigs...
Having to carry around trunks full of CDs, and having to flick through them manually to find the song you want is a huge pain in the backside. Also having to keep popping them in and out of the players is a pain... You have to carry a large selection, because listeners will request songs to be played, and you have no control over what they might want to hear.
The idea of taking a large hard drive containing thousands of songs that can be electronically searched makes a LOT of sense. Also having all the songs available at once lets you queue up a larger set of songs in advance, some DJs want to go and dance with some of the girls that show up!

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Anonymous Coward]

Contradict yourself much? ... You can't say people should have some right for 20 years and then it should magically go away. You can, and it makes sense. YOU ARE contradicting yourself:

The traditional justification for copyright law is that it benefits society And that's just what these time-limited copyrights are all about! You want to give the creator a chance to make money off his work, but you want to limit it in order to benefit society. If you want to argue that's a bad system, go ahead, I'm actually interested in hearing that, but don't just imply it is a bad system without explaining why.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[QuantumG]

The law in Australia makes no distinction..

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[mrvan]

The analogy is flawed: they block off something I have the right do do.

To extend your analogy: suppose you own property next to mine and I have legal right-of-way. Now, you're not allowed to build a gate and not give me the key, since I have the right to pass over your property to mine. That is what DRM is trying to do: they 'guard' their property in a way that also blocks my legal rights (ie fair use copying, distribution after copyright ends).

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[gnoshi]

Regardless of whether the venue pays or the D.J. plays, the point remains valid. The D.J. has already paid for a license to the music in purchasing the original media, and *someone* is paying for the right to have the music played publicly.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Would Lord of the Rings, at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars, have been made if there had been no way to recoup the costs of production? Somebody has to pay for these things to get made, and people generally don't give away millions of dollars without a way to get it back. Without at least a temporary monopoly on their work so they can earn back the cost of making it, it wouldn't get made in the first place, that is how copyright benefits society. Copyright makes it financially viable to make art for society to enjoy.

On the other hand, copyrights need to expire to encourage people to keep creating new works all the time rather than being able to sit back and cash in on one work for the rest of their lives. Copyright expiration benefits society by allowing timeless works that have become part of our culture (i.e. anything that people still remember 20 years later) to enter the public domain.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[peragrin]

Question though define making money off of your work?

I fI create a compilation CD and sell that does that count as making money?
What if I am a DJ, and the format you distribute your work under isn't compatible with my systems, So I change your copy to MP6 so that it plays better on my system, is this a change? While I am getting paid for your music if we remove your music I am still getting paid.
define distribute as well. is listening to music out loud at a park considered distribution? The music industry thinks so.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drspliff]

On a few occasions friends have had these royalty auditing people round at gigs and other events asking for set lists, and I know my local record shop also shares their sales stats with them.

So the smaller artists get a slightly bigger chunk than you'd have thought even if they sell only 1000 records, but get played out reguarly.

But yeah - the big ones get far too much play and a far bigger chunk unfortunately :(

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[QuantumG]

That's great, but if I wanted to read that argument I'd go to the library. I wanted to hear your argument. You said you thought people had a right to control how their work is distributed and that no-one has a right to profit from someone else's work without compensation. This is contrary to what you just said. If copyrights expire then they don't have a "right", they have a temporary granted monopoly. If things fall into the public domain then others can profit from the work without compensating the creator. So which is it?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[ACDChook]

Bear in mind that copyright does not make it illegal to copy *any* music. It does here in Australia. It is illegal to copy anything from one format to another. If you buy a CD, you are only allowed to listen to it on that CD. If you want to keep it as an mp3, you have to purchase it online (which you could not do legally here until about 2 years ago). The previous government here made no effort to modernise our laws. Hopefully the new one does.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Question though define making money off of your work? If I create a compilation CD and sell that does that count as making money? Yes. Any time you incorporate my work into a product that you are selling, you're making money off my work. What if I am a DJ, and the format you distribute your work under isn't compatible with my systems, So I change your copy to MP6 so that it plays better on my system, is this a change? While I am getting paid for your music if we remove your music I am still getting paid. If you're a DJ the venue you play at is playing an ASCAP fee and I'm getting my cut of that. I really couldn't care less how you get the tunes onto the dance floor as long as ASCAP knows you spun my tune so they can give me my cut. define distribute as well. is listening to music out loud at a park considered distribution? The music industry thinks so. I'd chalk that up under fair use.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

According to my research the same law that made it legal to buy MP3s online also made it legal to format shift for personal use.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[v1]

I wonder why no one has challenged them on this? While of course it's never a good idea to expect the courts to make sensible decisions in such cases, you'd think someone would at least try for a "suddenotbreakofcommonsense" tag here?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

You said you thought people had a right to control how their work is distributed and that no-one has a right to profit from someone else's work without compensation.

Well the exact quote would be "should be allowed," not "has a right," but that's all semantics. I'm not a lawyer or debate major so I'm not used to having to phrase everything precisely lest my words be twisted so bear with me a bit. I do mean a temporary granted monopoly, not an unalienable right. I hope you'll see that I'm trying to argue to the spirit of the argument, not the semantics and that you'll do the same.

If things fall into the public domain then others can profit from the work without compensating the creator. So which is it? If a work is in the public domain, there's not much money to be made off it. Why would someone buy a copy of a public domain work when they can grab it off Project Gutenberg? How many people are getting rich selling copies of Shakespeare and Dickens? This is exactly how it should be IMHO. Shakespeare and Dickens are part of the fabric of our culture and people should be able to have access to them cheaply and easily.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[zehaeva]

so all "rights" are permanent things forever inalienable and sacrosanct? then i put forth that as, i am at least, an american we have no rights. there is no specified time limit on the constitution however it can be suspended by instituting martial law or dissolved by the citizens of the us. the current eroding of our "rights" by the administration should show you that a "right" is neither permanent nor is it inalienable.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[neomunk]

What's with the chip on your shoulder? Your attitude has gone beyond your normal obnoxiously egotistical straight into egomaniacal douchebaggery.

A BACKUP for COMMERCIAL USE? I don't think there -IS- such a thing. A backup is a backup, a copy of some data that you have a license to do something with. In case your working copy of that data is destroyed, you still have the data to exercise your purchased rights with. The backup isn't for commercial use, the license that you have to DISTRIBUTE (by playing publicly) is.

And you know this. Stop arguing in favor of things you know are incorrect, and stop stomping your feet on the floor while doing so.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[electrictroy]

Copyright law should be rewritten so it's "per user". In other words you pay for a song once, and that's it. If you want to move your CD over to an MP3 file, you can, as long as you keep the original CD as "proof of purchase". (And if you don't have the original, then you can be prosecuted.)

It's ridiculous that I have to buy the same song multiple times (first cassette, then CD, now Itunes download) just because I switch formats.

Either that or "greed" on the part of money-hungry companies desiring to sell the same song again-and-again-and-again.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Corwn of Amber]

Well, that's "Maximizing Shareholder Value" for you.

It's only logical.

Now go watch DJ Tiesto's DVD, he's only using CD-Rs. Has he paid for "shifting" them? NO. No one will ever do that. Or maybe a couple of Darwin Awards.

Is there a law that says I have to pay for shifting formats? Or is it a unenforceable private law, like "this DVD only plays in Europe", that everyone and their dog ignores?

Rewrite copyright law so that it's per user... ridiculous. Deregulate copy rights and that'll be it.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[zotz]

First, If I am on any side here, it is yours on this issue.

So you are right, but you are wrong if you are in their twisted world.

You say:

"No copyright holder is in any way harmed by allowing DJs for format shift."

Right, but not in their world. In their world a copyright holder is harmed because if he wasn't allowed to format shift legally, they could charge him more for doing so and so they are harmed by the format shifting. I say if we go this far, bring back legal payola. Give the DJ's back some of the power they have in the game.

You want your songs spun at parties I DJ? That's gonna cost you. The musical equivalent of shelf space perhaps?

(I am being daft here in this last bit for a reason.)

all the best,

drew

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Ash Vince]

As someone who used to own decks and mix a bit myself I would like to make another point:

DJ are probably the single largest consumers of Music. I probably spent an average of £20 per week on vinyl alone, and this was then average 12 inch single cost £5. I have not bought any in years so do not know how much it costs now, I would imagine it has certainly gone up a bit. Without buying that much new music DJing becomes too dull. I managed to keep it up for a year or two never getting any money back as I was not famous (or that good) but then gave up.

Over that time I amassed quite a large volume of records that form a pile 1 metre deep. My friends often asked me how much they thought I had spent, and on the odd occasion someone would estimate how many records I had and work it out. At that point I usually stopped paying attention in case I had a heard attack.

I suppose the point I am trying to make is that very few DJ's actually make a profit from DJing. It is a hobby, or a loss leader that leads a small minority into a music career producing albums of their own. Even people who make it big and actually get signed to a label to produce their own music usually do it for the love or to keep up their image in clubland so they can sell their own music.

The people who really be hit by this are aspiring DJ's who need to produce mixtapes in order to get any sort of gig. They then hand the mix tapes out for free as a marketing tool and 90% of them go straight in the bin. Are they also expecting these people who are usually young and skint anyway to cough up £500. The irony is that the main people they intend to listen to the tapes / mp3s are the very same record executives and talent scouts who are lining their pocket with the fee the DJ paid to produce them.

If you want to turn your hobby into a career you are better of playing with computers or going outside and playing football, now thats where the real money is. Let the music industry choke to death through lack of new talent then we can reinvent it afterwards when all these stupid laws have been repealed. If you want to listen to music in the meantime, go to your local venue that has a jam session for the evening, maybe even try and take part yourself.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Omnedon]

Creating a compilation CD and selling it is directly making money.

If a DJ has already paid royalties for public performance, then format shifting is not making money. His paycheck as DJ does not change due to what he sources his music from.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[bkr1_2k]

Is he selling those CDs? Then he's doing a "performance", which may or may not require a special performance license, but usually doesn't, in the US, at least. That may be slightly different since a DJ's performance isn't anything more than playback for a lot of them, but for those actually mixing the music, live or otherwise, it is most definitely their own artistic performance of the music.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[tepples]

Someone who creates a work should be allowed to have a say in how it can be distributed In the words of another country's constitution, how does it "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts" when the owner of copyright in a work takes the work out of print?

and nobody should be allowed to make money off of somebody else's work without compensating them. Once every possible melody is copyrighted, how can anybody else make money?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Eivind]

Because sane copyright-laws have an exception where NORMAL copies that are needed for NORMAL usage of the work are exempt, as are temporary copies arising as a natural side-effect of the use.

To run a computer-program, for example, you MUST copy the bits from CD-rom to hard-disc, from hard-disc to RAM, from RAM to CPU, some parts of the program end up in CPU-cache. Parts of the artwork end up in RAM on the graphics-card. Temporary copies exist as electrical signals traveling towards screen and speakers, as soundwaves in the air and as photons of various frequencies between your screen and your eyes.

Similarily, just listening to a CD creates (more or less temporary) copies in wires, buffers, DACs and assorted cabling.

Even just reading a book creates short-lived copies. There's a continous stream of photons containing the page you're on traveling outwards in all directions from the page. Fragments of the work will stick more or less permanently in various neural structures in your head and so on.

Nevertheless, doing these things are not equivalent, in a practical sense, to COPYING the work. Rather they are nessecary and natural consequences of USING the work in the ordinary way.

As I said, in sane copyright-law, such copies are explicitly allowed. In Norway, for example, copying a CD to a different format like a mp3-player, or to a backup-tape is explicitly allowed.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[QuantumG]

I know the law in Australia asshole, I live here. Can you say the same?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Just Some Guy]

The intent behind copyright is that you purchase it for a purpose (and likely the DJs had to purchase a more expensive version that allows public performance) and you can use it for that purpose.

Which country are you speaking for - Australia? That's certainly untrue anywhere I've heard the law described.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Lumpy]

The fun part is most DJ's here in the states do not pay ASCAP and BMI fees to play the music in public. But most DJ's if you add up all their gear, car, trailer and what they own at home... it dont add up to $60,000.00 so why the hell license the music. Most bar bands dont do it so why should they.

Also most of the time a DJ get's less than $250.00 a night, they cant make enough to cover the fees if they worked every friday and saturday night.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Lobster Quadrille]

Contradict yourself much? Either people should have these rights or they shouldn't. You can't say people should have some right for 20 years and then it should magically go away. The right is magically granted, why not have it magically go away?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[monxrtr]

Any time you incorporate my work into a product that you are selling, you're making money off my work. Any time you claim ownership over something you say in public, you are attempting to claim ownership of the ears of others. Your copyright claims are making ownership claims on the physical property and Persons of others, by prohibiting the property of others from being similarly or exactly shaped to your property. This is done without compensation, and is a wholly offensive trespass.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[russotto]

Burying your head in the sand will not change it. If you want to change it, go become a politician.

Even that doesn't help. First of all, because you're likely to be a poor one. If you've got the talent, though, you're going to need money and allies. To obtain this money and allies, you are going to need to promise things, and keep many of those promises (not to be confused with campaign promises). By the time you're in a position to affect copyright law, you will be owned by those interested in keeping things the way they are or making them worse.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Mister Whirly]

"DJs" spin records (or CDs) - hence the name "disc jockeys". Playing tracks off a hard drive (or a MP3 player) is not "DJing". Any iPod can be set to random shuffle. Does that make the iPod a "DJ"? I would also imagine it is a little harder to know the DJ has a license to play the tracks off a hard drive. It is a little easier to verify when the DJ has actual records or CDs.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

In the words of another country's constitution, how does it "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts" when the owner of copyright in a work takes the work out of print?

It doesn't. That's why copyrights should expire. One of the overhauls I would like to see in copyright law is some kind of provision about works being taken out of print. Let's say, if a work is out of print for 5 years it automatically enters the public domain unless it is renewed. I haven't thought it through all that deeply but it seems on the surface at least that it might work. This would solve the "abandonware" issue.

Once every possible melody is copyrighted, how can anybody else make money?

Oh, we ran out of melodies a loooong time ago. You just say your work was "inspired" by so-and-so whose parts you're lifting. As long as you're "inspired" by enough different people at the same time it all ends up being original enough that nobody can really complain.

It sounds a little tongue in cheek, but really, there is a lot of truth to it.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Your post is so irrational and paranoia-laden it barely deserves a response, but here goes...

All I ask is that if you profit off of my hard work, I want to be compensated in return for your use of my work. If you have a job, you are doing exactly the same thing! You are performing work for the company which helps it make money, and in return you are compensated. Yet when I want to do EXACTLY THE SAME THING with my music, I'm doing something "offensive"? That's complete BS.

I agree that copyright should be much, much weaker, but not eliminated entirely.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Bert64]

While playing music is the basic core, it doesn't really matter where that music comes from...
A DJ typically does other things too, like produce his own remixes of songs, sometimes doing so live.
Technology changes, and the way things are done change as a result. Sometimes the job title changes to reflect the new technology, sometimes it doesn't.

And there's no reason he can't keep a garage full of physical media, while carrying it around on a hard drive.

It makes transportation a lot easier.
It discourages theft (its easy to keep track of a single HD, and keep it locked down. its hard to keep track of one in a thousand cds)
It lessens the impact of theft/damage/etc, if the HD gets destroyed you still have the original media, and you could easily have 2 or more copies of the HD.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Technician]

The legal soup is the big reason I never became a DJ. You buy CDs, records and tapes. The say for private home use only. Buying the license and music for a public performance is prohibitive for the family reception, BBQ, event. You either go full time, risk legal action, or forget it.

Due to the restrictions on purchased music, it has little value to me as I can't use it for anything, including a wedding reception (the wedding itself) family party, school reunion, powerpoint slide show, or other weekend gig. It's only useful for private home use only. This is one of the reasons I don't buy CDs. You can't use them.

I have since become a weekend light jockey. The equipment is about the same price and there is no license headaches for the weekend warrior. A few pieces of truss, a couple crank up towers, a few fun lights, some extension cords and a good console (laptop!) and you are ready to set the ambiance. If you know the DJ's playlist, you can even match the beat to sync the lights very easily or sync to the sound.

Even brightly colored LED Christmas lights jazz up a truss at little cost with the right dimmer. (Not all dimmers and LED's work together)

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Anonymous Coward]

Would Lord of the Rings, at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars, have been made if there had been no way to recoup the costs of production? If all it takes to prevent another "Lord of the Rings" is abolition of copyright law, then I am all for abolishing copyright laws immediately!

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[mikee805]

How is this any different than software licenses in this regard? or copy protection on games?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[evanbd]

Licenses by themselves are a legal protection. If copyright does not restrict what you plan to do with the software, then there is no need for you to agree to the license. I have no objection to software creators using copyright to control their creations, so long as they do not restrict fair use or use after the copyright expires.

Copy prevention on games is no different from any other form of DRM. The same logic applies. Copy protection is a feature I have yet to see on a game. The mechanisms that go by that name do not attempt to protect copies, but rather prevent them from working -- quite the opposite effect, I think.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[mblase]

suppose you own property next to mine and I have legal right-of-way. Now, you're not allowed to build a gate and not give me the key, since I have the right to pass over your property to mine.

If course I can, if the gate's on my own property. You're confusing "right" with "entitlement."

Example: I have the right to photograph celebrities doing stupid stuff in public. This does not entitle me to do so. If the celebrity in question wants to wear large sunglasses, hooded sweatshirts, prosthetic ears and nose, etc. in order to make it harder to photograph him or her successfully, that's the celebrity's right. He or she is under no legal obligation to make it easy to exercise my rights.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[TheGratefulNet]

disobey all UNJUST laws.

just say no.

it may be hard (or risky) but by ALLOWING yourselves to be abused, you will continue to be reamed again and again.

simply don't follow this. are they going to arrest all dj's? will this make the music business MORE endearing to the general population?

call their bluff. don't follow this. rebel.

you must.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[bzipitidoo]

This whole thread illustrates the basic problem with copyright. We as a society feel that you deserve compensation for artistic and scientific work, and that only to give extra incentive for you to do it. Scientific advance can be quite rewarding even without any special legal encouragements. Intellectual property law is only a means of encouragement, and as it turns out, a rather bad means, treating ideas as property. You shouldn't be able to dictate in any way what others can and cannot do with information. You shouldn't think of information you created as solely yours either, as if no one else could have come up with similar entertainment or insight. And that kind of presumption conveniently forgets the great debt owed to societies for millennia of advancements and our education thereof that all gives us fantastic tools to create and communicate. I'm talking things like the alphabet, the 12 tone musical scale, musical notation systems, musical instruments, great music compositions of the past recorded on sheets of paper (itself an advance over clay tablets) and the more recent advances in radically different styles and genres and now recordings of the actual sounds of the instruments as they are played, and radio and the Internet that allow works to reach far wider audiences than could ever have been possible centuries ago.

Restricting copyright holders' ability to dictate terms by removing copyright entirely would NOT mean others may plagiarize. That problem is covered separately-- plagiarism is a form of fraud. You shouldn't have to police work you did for that kind of fraud, we have or should have specialists for that.

That's where copyright goes wrong. It does grant rights along those lines-- a monopoly on copying-- but only for the sake of giving authors a mechanism to make a profit. Many people get the impression they have even more such rights because any use whatever of some information could in some way impact the actual or potential and theoretical profits of the authors. We need a better mechanism of compensation, one that is not so often misconstrued into total control of "your" "property" and where copying is not equated with theft in the same ways things would be over your material possessions.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[kocsonya]

> Someone who creates a work should be allowed to have a say in how it can be distributed,
> and nobody should be allowed to make money off of somebody else's work without compensating
> them.

That is fine, but most "intellectual property" creators are compensated in lump-sum. I think there is a lot more IP created by scientists and engineers than by musicians. Yet, the overwhelming majority of the scientists and engineers are paid a wage and if they create someting that allows you, say, to record 50 hours of music in a thingy smaller than a matchbox or something other that allows you to recover from nasty bacterial disease, at most they get a little fame and appreciation from their peers. Yet Paul McCarthy recently complained that it was ridiculous that copyright expired and you would not get compensated for a song you had written half a century before.

I agree with you that copyright should not be transferable but imagine the havoc it would make in the software world... Like Linux, Windows would be owned by the programmers who wrote it, not by Microsoft... If Bill doesn't treat them right, well, bye bye Vista.

So, while I agree with you on a non-transferrable copyright, I'd also limit it: you got a temporary monopoly of copying your work. However, if you get a fair compensation, you MUST copy the work and can not ban or hinder its use or performance in any way.

With all that, we could just abolish the whole copyright thing and work out how we shall compensate the artists (note: artists, not entertainment industry fatcats and lawyers).

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sr180]

No. In Australia they buy the vinal or cd as normal, but must be covered by a performance license.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

The purpose of copyright is to promote creation and enrich society.

The purpose of Copyright is to create artificial scarcity and, hence, "value".

Everything else said about it is just marketing fluff.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

Would Lord of the Rings, at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars, have been made if there had been no way to recoup the costs of production?

What makes you think Lord of the Rings wouldn't have turned a profit without copyright ? Are you seriously suggesting the millions of people who saw it in the cinema would have just watched a dodgy handycam recording of it at home on their TV ?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[Pseudonym]

If I had a +1, I would give it to you for the Goodies reference alone.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

What makes you think Lord of the Rings wouldn't have turned a profit without copyright ? Are you seriously suggesting the millions of people who saw it in the cinema would have just watched a dodgy handycam recording of it at home on their TV ?

The entire reason movie studios make money off of box office revenue is because they have a licensing deal with the theaters. That licensing deal requires a notion of copyright and intellectual property to be valid. Otherwise the studio would only be able to charge the theater for a physical movie print, which a theater chain could duplicate amongst all their theaters rather than having to buy more than one print from the studio.

The only way a studio could take a cut of box office revenue without copyright would be to own the entire vertical distribution chain. Every movie studio would have to build and maintain an entire theater chain, and consumers would have to go to separate theaters to see a 20th Century Fox movie as opposed to a Disney movie. Even then DVD distribution would be nearly impossible to make profitable if people could just press their own copies of the DVDs.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[pbhj]

as long as you keep the original CD as "proof of purchase" So I wouldn't get sued for copyright infringement because I format shift, but because I have a bad memory and lost a CD. Hmm, might have to think about that a little more. Why should the onus be on me, the innocent party to prove my innocence, surely the plaintif should have some evidence to support their "injury" claim.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

Yet when I want to do EXACTLY THE SAME THING with my music,

But you don't want to do "exactly the same thing". You want to get paid over and over and over and over and over again FOR THE SAME BIT OF WORK. The employee going to work does not have this luxury. He has to show up every day, not just the once.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[evanbd]

The purpose of copyright is to promote creation and enrich society.

The purpose of Copyright is to create artificial scarcity and, hence, "value".

Everything else said about it is just marketing fluff.

On the contrary, that is the marketing fluff. To the extent that is true (it's largely true, but not completely so -- yet), it's because powerful interests have distorted the original intent. At a fundamental level, that is still the justification that everyone uses -- "without copyright, there would be no [music|movies|books|etc]" is hyperbole, but there is truth to it.

As any economist will be happy to tell you, wealth is diminished by scarcity, not created by it. Monopolies, including copyright, concentrate wealth and diminish it -- see consumer surplus for the basics. The economic argument for copyright is not that scarcity creates wealth directly, but rather the incentive provided by that monopoly power motivates people to create copyrightable works, which is where the wealth comes from. The distinction is somewhat subtle, but important. When copyright is examined from first principles, it becomes obvious why limited terms and fair use are important -- we need to enforce enough scarcity to stimulate creation, but not have so much that it diminishes the overall value of the works created. The fact that the value to society of having creative works be freely available is difficult to compute directly in dollars does not mean that value is zero, or even small.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

Well it would still require either the same provisions for "works made for hire" we have now, or if multiple people contribute to one thing like a piece of software, that multitude of people corporately own the copyright so if just a couple people withdraw their license it's no big deal because the majority of the people who worked on it are still okay.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

The entire reason movie studios make money off of box office revenue is because they have a licensing deal with the theaters. That licensing deal requires a notion of copyright and intellectual property to be valid. Otherwise the studio would only be able to charge the theater for a physical movie print, which a theater chain could duplicate amongst all their theaters rather than having to buy more than one print from the studio.

The solution there is pretty simple. The first print is sold for an appropriate cost under the assumption it will be duplicated to all the chain's cinemas.

The only way a studio could take a cut of box office revenue without copyright would be to own the entire vertical distribution chain. Every movie studio would have to build and maintain an entire theater chain, and consumers would have to go to separate theaters to see a 20th Century Fox movie as opposed to a Disney movie. Even then DVD distribution would be nearly impossible to make profitable if people could just press their own copies of the DVDs.

No, they just need a way of making sure their prints can only be shown in approved cinemas who have paid. Ie: DRM. Given the relatively miniscule number and variability of customers, setting up an effective system would be child's play.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

On the contrary, that is the marketing fluff. To the extent that is true (it's largely true, but not completely so -- yet), it's because powerful interests have distorted the original intent. At a fundamental level, that is still the justification that everyone uses -- "without copyright, there would be no [music|movies|books|etc]" is hyperbole, but there is truth to it.

No, there's not. Music/movies/books/etc were around long, long, long before Copyright ever existed.

As any economist will be happy to tell you, wealth is diminished by scarcity, not created by it.

We're not talking about wealth, we're talking about value. Copyright imposes artificial scarcity to lend value to something whose infinite supply would otherwise render it valueless - copies of information.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

The solution there is pretty simple. The first print is sold for an appropriate cost under the assumption it will be duplicated to all the chain's cinemas.

That's asking the theater to assume the risk that the movie will make money. It would encourage theaters to only purchase bland, inoffensive movies that are guaranteed to appeal to the lowest common denominator, or at least edit the movies they receive until they are. Remember without copyright there would be no reason a theater could not edit or censor the movies, so on top of the layer of suits at the studio ruining movies you also have a layer of suits at the theaters! And if another theater chain doesn't want to pay the studio the full amount for a print, they can go to another theater chain who will be only happy to sell one of their copies for, say, half the price the studio is demanding.

No, they just need a way of making sure their prints can only be shown in approved cinemas who have paid. Ie: DRM. Given the relatively miniscule number and variability of customers, setting up an effective system would be child's play.

Haha, I never thought I'd see someone on Slashdot actually advocate DRM. No, DRM doesn't work. All it would do is create a market for DRM-bypassing projectors, which there would be a huge financial incentive to manufacture.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

We need a better mechanism of compensation,

I'm all ears. Any suggestions?

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[sahonen]

I agree, it's not fair to get paid over and over again for the same bit of work, but I really don't see a better way to fairly determine how to compensate an artist except by how popular their work is. Honestly the last thing I'm advocating is some kind of system that extracts every last cent by looking for every possible place that a song is entering someone's ears. That's not my intention at all. I just want the big pictures to line up, how rich an artist is should roughly correspond with how much of a cultural impact they have made. I also want to make sure that nobody can get rich using an artist's work while the artist him/herself makes nothing or very little. If your livelihood is made using the artistic works of others, the people who created those works deserve at least something for creating the works that you're making money off of. This isn't unfair, at least not in my opinion.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

That's asking the theater to assume the risk that the movie will make money.

No more so than they do now.

It would encourage theaters to only purchase bland, inoffensive movies that are guaranteed to appeal to the lowest common denominator, or at least edit the movies they receive until they are.

Again, no different to the situation now.

And if another theater chain doesn't want to pay the studio the full amount for a print, they can go to another theater chain who will be only happy to sell one of their copies for, say, half the price the studio is demanding.

Ie: the studios have to price reasonably. I'm not seeing a downside here.

Haha, I never thought I'd see someone on Slashdot actually advocate DRM.

I would _vastly_ prefer DRM to copyright law. DRM sucks, to be sure, but if it were the only protection, at least when it is broken you wouldn't have to worry about the government coming after you.

No, DRM doesn't work.

"DRM" works fine in certain circumstances (you trust your SSH and SSL connections don't you ?).

All it would do is create a market for DRM-bypassing projectors, which there would be a huge financial incentive to manufacture.

A DRM-bypassing projector is worthless without anything to project.

The main reasons DRM has failed so far is because a) the hardware you sell today needs to be able to work with the content you're releasing in a decade (and vice versa) and b) there's no easy way of updating the protection when it is cracked. DRM for protecting prints for cinemas would suffer none of these weaknesses. All they need is a projector that phones home for every print, a hardware dongle that is required for a print to work, a self-destruct mechanism for the print once its "lifetime" has expired and a legal contract with the cinema not to distribute any copies.

DRM for mass-market consumer level devices and DRM for specialised hardware are two _completely_ different ballgames. Don't kid yourself otherwise.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[evanbd]

There is truth to it in the sense that the profit motive changes the quantity produced. It wouldn't be zero without the profit motive, but it would be less. The assertion as commonly made, while incorrect, does have some basis in fact.

Wealth and value are the same thing. Supply and demand sets price, not value -- value is the utility of the object to the consumer. The fact that creating a copy of a book costs nothing does not change its value to me as a consumer (ignoring, of course, any pleasure I derive from the book as a physical object -- I'm speaking here of reading an electronic copy). Artificial scarcity raises the price without changing the value, thereby passing more of that value to the producer (via the sale transaction). Without the scarcity, all the value appears as consumer surplus; with it, it appears as some mix of producer and consumer surplus. The total utility (or value) is unchanged. The wiki article explains the concept far better than I can do in a /. comment.

As you can probably gather from this, I'm in favor of some degree of copyright. As I hope is also obvious, I believe the current system is horribly out of balance, and acting to the detriment of society at large. Limited copyright terms and real protections for fair use are as important to the purpose of copyright as the limited monopoly it grants is. Take away any of those aspects, and society is worse off for it. And no, I don't consider the current terms limited, especially since Congress keeps extending them.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

Wealth and value are the same thing. Supply and demand sets price, not value -- value is the utility of the object to the consumer.

Then we're talking about price. Apologies for not using the appropriate economist terminology.

The fact that creating a copy of a book costs nothing does not change its value to me as a consumer (ignoring, of course, any pleasure I derive from the book as a physical object -- I'm speaking here of reading an electronic copy). Artificial scarcity raises the price without changing the value, thereby passing more of that value to the producer (via the sale transaction).

But now you appear to be conflating "value" and "price". "Value" to the consumer is not an independent variable. If they feel a book is worth $20, but they see it for $10, they're not going to pay $20 just because that's the "value" it has.

The perception of "value" is influenced by price. If prices drop, so does the perception of "value".

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[evanbd]

I'm being quite careful to distinguish price from value, here. Artificial scarcity raises prices without changing the value per copy (to first order approximation). Value only changes significantly with price for a small minority of luxury goods. I'm quite sure music and books and such aren't among them -- though something like a $1000 concert ticket might be.

By raising the price, value per copy remains unchanged, but the number of copies goes down, which decreases the *total* value resulting from the work (apologies if I was unclear on that distinction). However, since the price of the work is higher, more of that value is shifted to the producer in the form of producer surplus, and less to the consumer as consumer surplus.

Monopolies tend to decrease the total surplus, while increasing the monopolist's surplus. Normally this is considered a bad thing, because the total value to society is less. In the case of copyright, however, we make an exception in an attempt to increase the number of distinct works created. The tricky part lies in setting the limits on copyright in a reasonable place to maximize societal value from all works created. Of course, the producers would like stronger copyright restrictions so that they end up with more money. Balance is, as always, difficult to find.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[drsmithy]

I'm being quite careful to distinguish price from value, here. Artificial scarcity raises prices without changing the value per copy (to first order approximation). Value only changes significantly with price for a small minority of luxury goods. I'm quite sure music and books and such aren't among them -- though something like a $1000 concert ticket might be.

I'm afraid I don't understand what you're saying. My interpretation of your argument is that if a person considers something has a "value" of X, then they will pay X, even if that something is selling for a price of Y (where Y<X).

I also don't see how price and value can be independent. No-one pays any more than the absolute minimum they have to. Similarly, no-one sells for any less than the maximum they can. You appear to be saying that if the maximum amount something can be sold for plummets, people will still keep paying the old price because their perception of "value" has no reason to change.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[evanbd]

Ah, that explains the confusion. The value, or utility, or reservation price, is the maximum amount I would be willing to pay, if I had to -- ie the maximum price above which I won't buy the item. Obviously I'll pay less if I can (because, for example, market forces have set the price lower than that, be they monopoly pricing or competitive pricing). If I pay less than my perceived value, then I am better off after the transaction than before. The difference is called consumer surplus -- seriously, read the article, it does a better job explaining it than I can.

Think of it like the reserve price in an auction (for producer surplus) or the complementary concept (consumer surplus). Below the reserve price, the seller is uninterested in selling -- they'd rather have the item than the money. Above the reserve, they'd rather have the money. But, of course, they're quite happy to get more from it if the market supply / demand factors conspire to let that happen. Hence, reservation price.

Re:No "fair use" in Australia

[bzipitidoo]

I'm all ears. Any suggestions?

That's the hard part. I've thought about this on and off for years. One difficulty with any idea is presentation. Without appreciating that they are doing so, people will expect perfection from any proposed system. They'll see potential problems, and that's all they need to decide against it. The flaws need to be put in perspective with the flaws of the status quo. Another difficulty is everyone's instinctive resistance to change. We just can't usher in a new system with a wave of a legislative pen.

Quite a few ideas boil down to 2 parts: generate revenue somehow, then divide up the take according to some criteria. As information effectively becomes everyone's, perhaps everyone should pay somehow. The obvious idea is taxation. Tax the people and use those revenues to compensate artists and scientists. Whether and how exactly the people should be taxed is open, and there are always some people who will absolutely refuse to consider anything that could be described as a tax. All taxes are odious. There are lots of arguments against it, such as "wasteful government bureaucracy" and "I refuse to pay for music I hate!" However, there are levies or taxes on blank CDs, Internet usage or service, related equipment such as all audio equipment, or maybe just speakers and headphones, and even energy. It would seem desirable to have the tax be related in some fashion to the activity it is meant to pay for. But that's not necessary. Many tax funded projects draw from funds that have nothing directly to do with the activity.

If taxes won't do, a popular way of raising money is of course advertising. But it's doubtful that would generate enough revenue. Then there's what amounts to begging. Beg for donations. Perhaps some non-profit charitable foundation could be created to accept donations. Also probably wouldn't be enough money. Then there's the usual stock in trade: throw concerts and sell t-shirts and the like. That wouldn't help scientists or other sorts of artists such as painters and writers much. While none of these alone may be good enough, perhaps some combination would.

Raising money isn't easy, but it is possible. Figuring out how to pay it out might prove to be the hardest part of all this. Can any such system be gamed and cheated? Of course. The question is, can it be made better at dealing with that sort of thing than our current system? Some of the problems we've had are Payola, truly awful contracts that screw artists to the max, bundling (have to buy a whole CD to get one good song), and the current messy legal climate.

The great part about the market economy is that's been one of the best ways to find out how valuable something is. Without information of that sort, it's much harder to set a value for some work of art. How do we figure out how much some artist should get? But remember that the market is far from perfect at valuation. We all know that bad music can be sold if it's marketed aggressively enough. The market can be manipulated. Even without cheating of that sort, figuring the true worth of something is nigh impossible. A lot of research is like that. Solutions looking for problems. It can be decades before the real value of some mathematical proof becomes apparent.

I thought perhaps searches for or downloads of songs could be counted. But if that was possible, then why not just extract payment when counting occurs? Also, what of artists pumping their own works by, say, engaging a spammer's network of zombies to download their stuff? What of privacy concerns? Thanks to problems like that, I really can't see counting working. Same goes for estimating counts via statistical methods. That is, rather than try to count everything, take a sample and extrapolate.

If counting activities is hard, maybe we could get numbers via a voting or polling system. Thanks to certain companies, electronic voting doesn't have a good reputation at the moment, but that's

In other news...

[jd]

The AIRA declared all Australians to be DJs, and that converting from optical media to an electronic signal in a player (and then from the electronic signal to an audible one) were conversions requiring a license. Botany Bay is to be used to house all juveniles who fail to pay the double licenses.

Re:In other news...

[MichaelSmith]

Botany Bay is to be used to house all juveniles who fail to pay the double licenses.

Botany Bay is actually quite a nice place now. The people we really don't like get sent to Woomera, Christmas Island and Naru.

Re:In other news...

[Slimee]

Botany Bay is to be used to house all Botany Bay is actually quite a nice place now. The people we really don't like get sent to Woomera, Christmas Island and Naru. I seem to remember a country that sent people it didn't like to another island too a long time ago...hmmmmm

Re:In other news...

[jd]

Ah! And the ones you hate, loath and despise, you exile to Canberra.

Re:In other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah! And the ones you hate, loath and despise, you exile to Canberra. Amnesty are currently investigating this as being excessively cruel.

Re:In other news...

[bemo56]

Well we have a rather bad immigration system, but we are not cruel enough to force immigrants to put up with our politicians :P

Re:In other news...

[AstrumPreliator]

You forgot Ceti Alpha V.

Re:In other news...

[Neo-Rio-101]

These days, everybody wants to be a DJ..... I just want to be a drummer.

Re:In other news...

[MadMidnightBomber]

Ah, memories of AusCERT. Could be quite a nice conference if you banned the breathtakingly dull contingent from the federal government.

Re:In other news...

[Gideon Fubar]

yes, yes, we're all aware of that. Our last government was keen to show us that our British Overlords were right to send us here, for a myriad of reasons.

this latest lot.. well, they haven't really shown a position on it yet, afaik.

Re:In other news...

[BadOPCode]

You think Australian Parliament would be interested in some Chinese internet technology too? They could have a 1000 dollar fine for anyone posting a blog saying ARIA sucks.

Re:In other news...

[mrbluze]

Botany Bay is to be used to house all juveniles who fail to pay the double licenses. But only when referring to formatting shit music. Like, when you have hard-drive full of shit music, you might just decide to format it instead of backing it up, since you never listen to the crud any more.

Re:In other news...

[maglor_83]

They're closing down the Nauru and Manus Island detention centers. Although all I can find of actual action are a few articles saying it will close in about a month. All about a month apart, and it hasn't happened yet, so who knows how long it will take.

Re:In other news...

[Yoozer]

I seem to remember a country that sent people it didn't like to another island too a long time ago...hmmmmm

from Bill Hicks:

Let me get this straight... You keep the shitty food and the shitty weather and we get the Great Barrier Reef and lobsters the size of canoes?

...I'm Jack the Ripper!"

"No, I'M Jack the Ripper!"

Re:In other news...

[nri]

maybe he meant long bay (which is close to botany bay)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Bay_Correctional_Centre

Re:In other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

.... so what has changed?

Re:In other news...

[gfxguy]

I thought they just got the boot.

Re:In other news...

[kocsonya]

Nauru is actually demanding compensation because the new kids on the block told them that they wanted to shut down the lucrative (to Nauru, that is) off-shored concentration camp business.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/02/26/2172904.htm

Re:In other news...

[DavidV]

I am actually a descendant of one of the convicts sent on the first fleet so it's not surprising I'm a music thief.
Where are they going to send me next? Somewhere with even better weather I expect. (if that's possible)

Re:In other news...

[ScrewMaster]

Botany Bay is actually quite a nice place now.

Sure, it's a great place to take a long nap, until your suspended animation chamber fails.

Re:In other news...

[MichaelSmith]

Botany Bay is actually quite a nice place now.

Sure, it's a great place to take a long nap, until your suspended animation chamber fails.

You've lost me there.

Dumb and dumber

[Anonymous Coward]

Beam me up scotty, no intellegent life here...

Does this match up with other Australian laws?

[dafrazzman]

Is it legal to record a TV show on a home VCR in Australia? Is it legal to save a .jpg to .gif or .png? Is it legal to move the sandwich you bought from the deli from a plastic bag to a brown paper bag? If such a law is to be, they should at least be consistent. Right now it's a just a way of squeezing money out of people in a way that makes no sense. If there's no prior basis for this, such a law should by no means be permitted.

Re:Does this match up with other Australian laws?

[dns_server]

There is a "time shifting" exception that allows you to make a recording of tv recordings for your own purposes.

There is also a "format shifting" making it legal to rip a cd and place the music on your portable player.

The problem with these exceptions are that they are for non commercial uses. it is fine for YOU as a citizen to do it for yourself but not as a PUBLIC performance which has always been a separate part of the law. If you are getting paid to do it in public you have always been required to pay a licence like this, perhaps the only difference is the industry body is now doing this. It seems just another way of clearing this public use of music which you would have ether gone to the record company itself or another agent to do this.

Re:Does this match up with other Australian laws?

[QuantumG]

Ignoring for a moment that you're trying to use common sense to figure out copyright law and that is always a big fat waste of time, you're probably not away that only last year did it become legal to tape something off TV in Australia.

For almost every case, Copyright in Australia is worse for the consumer than it is in the US. Almost.

Re:Does this match up with other Australian laws?

[noidentity]

it is fine for YOU as a citizen to do it for yourself but not as a PUBLIC performance which has always been a separate part of the law. If you are getting paid to do it in public you have always been required to pay a licence like this, perhaps the only difference is the industry body is now doing this.

Read the relevant condition more carefully. It doesn't have anything to do with actually playing the songs publically, just literally copying them from a collection of CDs to the editing computer. If the DJ instead kept swapping the CDs out of his computer, he wouldn't have to pay this fee (oh, and did not make any backups of his music either).

A DJ wanting to put sound recordings from his various albums on to a single source (computer hardware) for ease of use, and as a back-up in case originals get lost or stolen.

Re:Does this match up with other Australian laws?

[cheater512]

Although the silver lining is that Australian Police and Courts generally dont give a shit about personal and small time piracy.

They go after the big fish: the ones which cause actual damage.

Re:Does this match up with other Australian laws?

[bakes]

Remember too that the 'time-shifting' exception was only recently legislated - less than two years if memory serves correctly. Prior to that time recording TV shows on a VCR/PVR, even for private viewing, was technically illegal.

I'm not certain that format shifting is formally recognised as a legitimate exception to the copyright law (maybe it is, I don't know) but even if it isn't nobody is going to be jailed for that, just as nobody was jailed for using their VCR to record Neighbours.

Just when we thought RIAA was bad...

[ulash]

we have this... or... wait... My bad. I guess nothing another organization can do can actually make RIAA look any better.

public performance.

[timmarhy]

this is a public performance for which these DJ's are paid.

fair use and consumer law does not apply.

Re:public performance.

[upside]

Why are you trying to change the meaning of the article? It says they specifically pay for format shifting, as does the frikkin ARIA website.

From TFA:

Yep, they need to pay a licence fee to copy music they already own legally to their iPods, laptops, or compilation CDs.

From the FAQ on the ARIA website:

What sort of sound recording reproductions can ARIA license? ... A DJ wanting to put sound recordings from his various albums on to a single source (computer hardware) for ease of use, and as a back-up in case originals get lost or stolen.

And regarding fair use, it does exist for private persons:

Under legislation passed in late 2006, you no longer need permission, under limited circumstances, to make a copy of a CD or a digital download that you own for your private and domestic use for use on a different device.

Re:public performance.

[timmarhy]

i'm sorry did you miss the blindingly obvious part where it says "under limited circumstances"?

This licensing is aimed at DJ's copying stuff off their ipods and using it for PUBLIC PERFORMANCES. if this was just making backups of stuff they already had a license for to play publicly or for personal use, then you might actually have a point.

Re:public performance.

[nguy]

The ARIA can impose fees on the public performance. But format shifting isn't public performance, it's something that's done prior to public performance, and separately.

Re:public performance.

[Omestes]

I know I'm trying to be logical when it comes to the various recording industries, but...

If I got this right, the DJ has to buy, and pay royalties towards music purchased in format X, and potentially the venue also must pay royalties. So music X is bought and paid for, correct?

Now if the DJ decided to shift X into Y he must pay AGAIN, noticing that X was already completely paid up and legit.

I don't see where this is different from me doing the same, even if my use is not commercial. The main similarity, of course, is that X is completely legal, legit, and paid for. What the difference from me playing the CD containing a song, and me playing an mp3 of the same song, ripped from the same album. Where does the industry lose money? Is there something in the process of encoding and ripping that takes back all the money I paid in the first place?

Off topic, but relevant: WTF is up with the new comment boxes and format? The comments make me feel like I'm using a ghetto version of Reddit, and the actual page format is just UGLY. The huge gray buttons are... well... And the new way of displaying threads is more moronic than the last version...

Who taught the monkey to play with code?

Re:public performance.

[Mushdot]

I was about to say a similar thing and noticed your comment. A lot of DJ's now use laptops/ipods meaning they can now use music sourced from anywhere and I guess the record companies are seeing potential revenue streams going down the drain, not to mention the fact that a couple of torrent downloads could provide a DJ with several days worth of digital music for free.

Re:public performance.

[tepples]

But format shifting isn't public performance, it's something that's done prior to public performance, and separately. But it's still being done for the purpose of subsequent public performance.

Re:public performance.

[IndustrialComplex]

Then are they allowed to force licensing for every step of the public performance preparation?

License to place a CD in a CD drive
License to play a CD from a combo CD/DVD drive?
License to move the file from one directory to another?

License to use a solid state storage medium in a performance?

License to alter the volume level of a performance based on listener preference?

How about a license for playing music above a certain volume at a performance?

Re:public performance.

[tepples]

Then are they allowed to force licensing for every step of the public performance preparation? No, only the steps that involve reproducing a work in copies or phonorecords or distributing those copies or phonorecords.

Re:public performance.

[IndustrialComplex]

Lets say I setup a set of CDs for a performance. I've done all the steps to get a license. If I have equipment that buffers the audiostream before it is sent to the speakers, should that require an additional license?

Re:public performance.

[kocsonya]

> The main similarity, of course, is that X is completely legal, legit, and paid for.

It's the same thing with stores. You open a CD or a DVD store. You buy your stuff legit, you sell them at reasonable prices, you pay your taxes. You think you are legit. But then, the local representatives of the Music And Film Industry Association (MAFIA) come to visit you and point out that you should pay a licence fee to them for *not* participating in the niche sport equipment business that they own in an esoteric level. The on-site demonstration that usually follows practically always convinces shopkeepers that they would rather pay the license fee than to be forced to enter the very tough baseball bat business.

However, the above method is not very efficient. Thugs are way too soft and too dumb to come up with new ways in innovative licensing. Hence the use of lawyers (they are smart) and politicians (they are tough). Costs a wee bit more, but your profits will skyrocket.

Don't buy into this...

[elynnia]

Speaking as an Australian, I encourage DJs to not purchase this license. What the ARIA are doing is legally questionable, and shelling out for this only justifies their actions and legitimizes it in their eyes.

With the number of DJs here, I would not expect all of them to even know of this rule or for the ARIA to suddenly take all "offenders" to court. Don't feed the hands that bite you!

-Aly.

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would DJ's want to use this? Perhaps we're using two incompatible versions of the term DJ here, but to me a DJ is someone who you go to see play live because they have a reputation for playing new and interesting music. It's already been established in the 1990s dance culture that DJs replaced the function of the record company as a selective taste filter. Indeed some would say that the DJ became *too* powerful in the UK with people like Tong, Cox, Rampling, Cook, Grooverider &c becoming the leaders of mass culture. Okay, so that scene is dead (and I'm showing my age :), but the DJ
surely lives on as the avant garde of whatever the kids are listening to today? Why would DJs even be thinking about playing music that is already signed and licensed? It's likely mainstream pap rather than independent new productions.

If anything the DJ's should be pioneering selective filtering of the Creative Commons and underground music scene, completely bypassing the established order. And FWIW, speaking as as an ex-musician, I'd have no problem with them using CC licensed work to make money if it's promoting my music and drawing people to my site.

In my understanding the DJ's tell the record companies what to do, not the other way about. Record companies only sell safe MOR products and haven't invested in A&R for over a decade.

I think they must be talking about another kind of DJ, the sort you hire for wedding and birthday parties who plays Abba tunes so the oldies can dance ;)

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Anonymous Coward]

I know this is an Ausie affair. But I wonder why yanks don't use the RICO as a tag to this kind of story.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RICO

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Gordonjcp]

It's already been established in the 1990s dance culture that DJs replaced the function of the record company as a selective taste filter. Indeed some would say that the DJ became *too* powerful in the UK with people like Tong, Cox, Rampling, Cook, Grooverider &c becoming the leaders of mass culture.

You missed out John Peel. How could you?

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't feed the hands that bite you! Hands with teeth?

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Thanshin]

You missed out John Peel. How could you? John Peel is not enough.

Re:Don't buy into this...

[garett_spencley]

DJs could also include people who are hired to play pop music at weddings.

Could also include radio DJs (although I would assume that they would already have special licenses since they're broadcasting and have been the biggest target of music licensing and copyright issues for the past century).

I did not RTFA so I don't know what type (types) the law applies to.

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking as an Australian, you should know we spell "Legitimise" with an 's' not a 'z' (zed not zee in case you're wondering) over here.

That is all.

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Anonymous Coward]

As it currently stands in Australia, DJ's don't ever have to pay any royalty/licensing issues...
Its all managed by the Club/Event Production Managemnent. (ala the Companies responsible for running said event).

ARIA is simply trying to "Double Dip", as they already receive a 'licensing payment' based on the number of people who could potentially hear the music.
ref: http://www.aria.com.au/pages/licensing-faq.htm

As what music they cover ~ well they claim to represent "all music", regardless of the genre/nationality/copyright... and the Australian Government supports this view.

From personal experience, i was invloved with touring a Swedish Electronic Music Group thru Australia ~ where the group were signed to their own label, which they OWNED.
ARIA still claimed we owed them licensing payments for any music heard from the Swedish Group... WHICH WAS THEIR OWN MUSIC!!

Try being an unsigned garage band in Australia who write their own music, who decides to put on a "free concert" to promote themselves.... better watch out, ARIA will come calling, and they will find you.

Re:Don't buy into this...

[Tpl2000]

Hmm....I really don't think i'd mind if this hand bit me.

http://www.joe-ks.com/HandFace_small.jpg

ARIA to be charged for musician advertising?

[Zey]

Sounds like a fair deal, presuming DJs are free to charge a similar fee back for all that previously free advertising of ARIA's recording artists. Without their music played in venues, their sales plummet and music loses mind-share as a passtime to other forms of entertainment such as the Internet, video games, cinema tickets, etc.

Has the world gone bonkers?

[uuxququex]

The music distributing companies should make their minds up.

You either:

1. Buy (and subsequently own) the music on the physical media. Then you are legally allowed to do whatever you want with it, including selling.

or

2. Buy a license to listen to the music. Then you can media-shift all you want, as you are licensing the music. You never have to rebuy it either, if your disk breaks, just download the music, you already have a license.

This thievery has to stop. It is insane.

Imagine a world where the people weren't such meek sheep.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Anonymous Coward]

> 2. Buy a license to listen to the music. Then you can media-shift all you want, as you are licensing the music. You never have to rebuy it either, if your disk breaks, just download the music, you already have a license.

They can simply say that you have the license to listen to the music on THAT media you purchased.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Kjella]

2. Buy a license to listen to the music. Then you can media-shift all you want, as you are licensing the music. You never have to rebuy it either, if your disk breaks, just download the music, you already have a license. Says who? If you have a license, you're bound by whatever the license stipulates. Since you don't own anything, you don't have any ownsership rights like first sale or fair use or anything like that. You're thinking of one possible license which grants you everything you want, but there's no more reason a media-bound content license should be any more invalid than a computer-bound OEM software license. Licensing does away with pretty much all the pesky problems of selling anything, because you can agree to pretty much anything by contract. What's needed is to create a "buffer zone" around sales, that if it acts, talks and walks like a sale then it's a sale. It shouldn't be possible to make a license that is "just like a sale, minus all the consumer rights granted by a sale". That's an end-run around everything those consumer protection laws are meant to protect.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Sure, but you need to bear in mind that if you buy a licence (which would be the option they'd invariably go for, because it's what's on the that's of most value) and physical implementations come gratis or at cost, the price will go up. The prices as they are now rely on increased profit margins from people who are careless enough to break or lose their media, and as people realise they can get cheap copies for themselves and friends, there's going to be increased piracy rates and production costs, which will further drive the price of music up.

But otherwise, if we're prepared to pay the extra for unlimited licenses, it sounds like a great idea. Next time I see media for sale with such a license attached, and it's not horrifically expensive, I'll buy it, just to support them.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Phoe6]

Can you buy license for "listening" alone without copy? Does such a thing exist in the world?
You buy the song, the file and the license prevents you from sharing it or reproducing it for public use. AFAIK, license for listening is weird.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Paul Bristow]

Wait a minute. Copyright is an artificial right. It is a temporary monopoly granted by the government. As such it only gives exactly as much power to the copyright holder as the law allows. If that goes too far, change the laws, at least in a democracy. If democracy isn't working you have much bigger problems than putting CDs onto your iPod.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[tepples]

Buy (and subsequently own) the music on the physical media. Then you are legally allowed to do whatever you want with it, including selling. You can already sell your copy of the music on the physical media. You just can't make more copies.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[russotto]

Wait a minute. Copyright is an artificial right. It is a temporary monopoly granted by the government. As such it only gives exactly as much power to the copyright holder as the law allows. If that goes too far, change the laws, at least in a democracy. If democracy isn't working you have much bigger problems than putting CDs onto your iPod.

"Change the law" is the cry of those who hold all the cards and like it that way. It's the modern-day "let them eat cake".

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wouldn't 'Fair Use' and the ability to make a 'backup', argue otherwise?

I'm still waiting to be stopped on the street or in a mall by a police officer or security guard, for humming a known tune.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Paul Bristow]

I wish I held the cards. The world would be a different place :-) However, I have a deep and abiding suspicion that you are 100% correct.

Re:Has the world gone bonkers?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't remember acquiescing to that licensing agreement. Hell even EULAs require some action to signal your agreement with the terms and draw those terms to your attention - where are the terms of this agreement for my perusal?

Re:This is actually ok

[freedumb2000]

This is NOT Ok. A DJ (or more likely the venue he performs at) already pays royalties for publicly performing canned music. This new rule specifically covers for example ripping a CD to mp3 to be used with computer based DJing software. Doing that is solely for convenience of the DJ and does not make anonyone more money. Except now of course for the ARIA.

Australian DJs are funding terrorism!

[Thanshin]

Australia has to be invaded before they release all they terrorist, pirate, and probably also ninja DJs to kill us all.

What about scratching?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this mean that scratch DJs have to pay a format shifting fee for each scratch?

Re:What about scratching?

[jd]

Does this mean that scratch DJs have to pay a format shifting fee for each scratch?

That comes under License Extensions for Time Delta Shifting, Recursive Shifting and Spanish Inquisition Sketch Shifting, all of which must be paid for individually. Remember, every time you scratch a record without paying, an angel gets its wings and legs ripped off.

2006 copyright law changes

[Michael Wardle]

In 2006, the government passed a law making format shift legal. In particular, it would be legal to copy from a CD to an iPod.

It turns out this is only for "private, domestic use", which wouldn't apply to DJs on commercial premises.
Format shifting fact sheet

Re:2006 copyright law changes

[invader_vim]

From the fact sheet:

You may download and print one copy of this information sheet from our website for your reference...

Heh! Can't even distribute it to your family members...

I can see the 'A' slowly shifting... ARIA becomes RIAA. Give it six months and the malicious law suits will begin...

Since the venues are already paying a licensing fee for public performance, maybe DJs should 'sell' their music (in all its formats) to the venue for the duration of the gig. I know it doesn't get around the 'private use' element of the act, but I'm sure there will be some creative workarounds.

Re:2006 copyright law changes

[Anonymous Coward]

It looks like they attempted to be reasonable, unfortunately they totally failed. Why can't the public copy DVDs? There's no copy protection in the world that defeats a bit for bit copy. Why can't the Australian public rip a DVD image to a home media server?

I'd want to use different formats for listening at home and streaming over the net or listening on a portable (eg: vorbis/Flac). The "one copy" limitation is arbitrary and stupid.

Australians don't stand for bullshit, so I've gotta wonder how come they let so many backwards tech policies (filtering etc) get through?

Re:2006 copyright law changes

[Anonymous Coward]

From the fact sheet linked to above:

Reproducing this information sheet
You may download and print one copy of this information sheet from our website for your reference, or you may
purchase a printed copy from our online shop - http://shop.copyright.org.au/ - or direct from us.

OK, that shows you how f*&cked up copyright law in Australia is.

You did get the tag updated for that stolen car?

[Steauengeglase]

Wow, a license just to copy to your iPod. Sounds like marijuana tax stamps to me.

Re:This is actually ok

[Beastmouth]

Oh, come on now. This is just as much a load of crap as the RIAA going after barbershops that keep a radio turned up!

I bet there aren't many DJs in Australia

[sahonen]

Wait wait wait, how the hell does that work? Let's say a DJ works on a laptop as opposed to spinning vinyl or CDs... He buys a CD, rips it to MP3 and loads it into his software. Even if he's paying ASCAP fees for the use of the music (or whatever the equivalent organization is in Australia), he gets fined $60k unless he pays a SEPARATE fee for the ability to work from MP3s instead of the original CDs? My mind just exploded. As long as he's paying his ASCAP (or whatever) fees, who gives a shit whether he's working off a CD or an MP3?

Re:I bet there aren't many DJs in Australia

[NekSnappa]

The ARIA, Duh!!

Some people will argue you just buy a license

[aliquis]

That is you don't really own the music, you just buy the right to use it from the CD. Not that it makes any sense and why should they pay twice or more because they want to change format to something more convenient than fucking CDs? Retarded. But then I don't buy music so not much of a problem for me.

So when are they going to stop calling it buying?

[pembo13]

It surely seems like you don't buy a song from ITunes, and you don't buy a movie from Blockbuster, etc. At the very least they should stop using the term buy.

nope

[nguy]

A recording industry association can't arbitrarily define themselves what's legal and what isn't under copyright law. They are bound by copyright law as much as everybody else.

Format shifting is not a public performance. Therefore, it should be covered under standard copyright law and not require separate licensing.

Public performance of the music can, of course, be subject to licensing fees. But the recording industry shouldn't be able to set licensing fees based on which media or equipment the DJ happens to use.

Re:nope

[lordlod]

Standard copyright law (in Australia) doesn't allow reproductions of a work. That includes format shifting and backups.

Many DJs these days use computer based equipment which involves transferring the data onto a computer. Whilst this is technically infringement and many DJs are were aware that this was the case it wasn't being pursued.

The introduction of a new fee is a way of the record industry acknowledging the new reality and accepting it. They aren't redefining copyright law and given that an alternative was prosecuting DJs who have been offending this is not such a bad move.

Don't DJs promote music?

[MadJo]

Are the record labels so scared of promotion that they want to kill it? That they want nothing to do with it?

Yes, copyright infringement is illegal, but paying to shift formats (from disc to any more portable format) should fall under fair use. And DJs already pay royalties to be allowed to play the music. So why should they have to pay twice?

Re:Don't DJs promote music?

[BadOPCode]

Why should they pay any more than any one of us. It's not like we got to walk away with our own shiny plastic discs that they had. It's not like they played our requested songs the exact second we requested (with some DJ's, ever.) This wonderful tactic being performed by the music industry currently can only be called suicide. The thing you want the most is your music being played by DJ's, music tours, friends car, on the radio station, etc etc.... the more people hear a catchy song the more likely they will go out and buy it. Like right now, I bet there has recently been about 2 million record sells for Rick Astley. :-)

mod parent up

[QuantumG]

even if he is capt'n obvious, his point is correct.

Generally, if you don't like the power that copyright owners have over us then don't give them so much bloody power.

So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds logical, since they do that for commercial purposes -aka "earning money".

It's not like copying for private use...

oops

[upside]

I misinterpreted your post as meaning this was a payment for the public performance itself. Silly. You're right that a professional DJ's format shifting is not done in the capacity of a private individual.

However, the DJ must have either permission from the rights holder to use the original material in the first place, or the right to do so by law. ARIA's case seems pretty contrived.

I wonder what ARIA's position in on music purchased in digital format that doesn't involve an original physical copy.

Re:So when are they going to stop calling it buyin

[QuantumG]

About the same time they stop calling it "theft".

The realities on the ground for Pro DJ's

[zuki]

What are professional DJ's supposed to do?

As a rule, when speaking of bigger names, not only do the record labels definitely give them the
music for free, actually they beg them to play it. Now suddenly the same DJ's who were GIVEN
all of these songs from the record labels, the producers or specialized promotion companies for free
would have to pay for the use of them?

A while back, a little known organization in the UK named the PPL managed to get similar laws enacted
To my knowledge, no one has ever gotten busted for not complying with their arcane rules
which border on extortion pure and simple, and are impossible to comply with.

What's happening pure and simple is that many of the people who make up the voting boards of these
entities are totally overwhelmed by technology they just do not understand, and are passing measures
which they believe in earnest are going to help stem the tides of something they feel they can still control.
As someone posted above, paying such tax is only helping legitimize something which is patently
unfair at best, and not ever going to be a solution to anything other than yet another desperate attempt
at trying to put the proverbial cat back in the box, when the box itself has all but disappeared.
Let's not even go into details on who is going to get the money collected (probably pop artists
whose songs never get played once in the clubs, but who have enough airplay stats to register
on the radar of performing rights societies... LOL)

Who thought the dying throes of an entire industry were going to be that much fun?

Z.

Re:The realities on the ground for Pro DJ's

[Carewolf]

Well, with everybody breaking this law, the music industry can now cherry pick which DJs to sue. For instance the DJs that do not play the right kind of music!!

Fix all THE MISSPELLINGS in the article!!

[rubypossum]

Maybe I'm just stoned, but I read the article heading as:

RIAA Sells a License for DJs to Format Shit Music

Which seems to make more sense.

Re:Fix all THE MISSPELLINGS in the article!!

[asylumx]

Telling samzenpus how to spell "license" would be good enough for me. Two articles in a row? Come on.

Re:Fix all THE MISSPELLINGS in the article!!

[Anonymous Coward]

ARIA is an australian group, so they sell licences.
RIAA is an american group, so they sell licenses.

it's just like how you fuckers in the US spell colour wrong

Re:Fix all THE MISSPELLINGS in the article!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re:Fix all THE MISSPELLINGS in the article!!
it's not our fault you American's insist on spelling everything wrong. Australia, the UK and Canada all agree, you fuckers can't spell for shit

Performance fees are also going up

[Zouden]

Performance fees for dance music in Australian nightclubs are changing from $0.07/patron to $1.05/patron, a 1500% increase!

Re:Performance fees are also going up

[Techman83]

A PPCA spokeswoman said clubs should be more than capable of absorbing the cost. They had to see music as an overhead and pay a fair rate for it, which 7Â was not. Some people really don't fucking think about things fully do they!!

As an Australian this appals and disgusts me, I am not looking forward to the day where my local pub can't play a bit of music and I'm stuck signing without the music (Because I guarantee that will be the last time I'm allowed in the pub :P)

Re:Performance fees are also going up

[caffeine_high]

About 15 years ago one of my first dance coaches in Australia was approached by APRA to pay a fee to play music. He was about 70 at the time and was not happy with paying them a fee. He asked if they only represent Australian music. It seems that they did not really have the right to collect 'royalties' on behalf of overseas artists. He told them he only plays German dance music and they just left him alone. I'm not sure if this is still correct or even if it was the full story. However, it would be sad if Australian clubs could avoid apra fees by not playing Australian music.

Re:Performance fees are also going up

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

So you're telling me that it's going to be cheaper for everyone to buy a take-home copy of the song being played from iTunes than it will be to hear it once on a night out?

Re:Performance fees are also going up

[Anonymous Coward]

It's only a 1400% increase!

Innovation

[Anonymous Coward]

Was it not Apple that originally came up with the concept of format-shifting in some patent not too long back (it was certainly the first I time I read the phrase). This is where Apple truly innovate - in new ways of screwing money out of consumers

Is this not already enforced in the UK?

[ma0sm]

Or something similar, at least:
http://www.djlicence.org.uk/faq.html

"I only use original CDs in my performance, do I need these licences?
No, these licences are for copying or dubbing music tracks to pc or mp3 player.
These licences also DO NOT allow you to copy from CD to CD-R.
To understand more about which licences apply where download the NADJ Licensing Grid."

DJs pay far more for a single already!

[hardcoredreamer]

These days you have to be prepared in case you show up and the venue has either vinyl turntables, or a digital setup. They could say that they have turntables, and they turn out to not have needles or better yet - they haven't been used in years and end up not working. Of course, with this you would have to buy your music twice, and 12" electronica vinyl records have 1-3 songs for $12-25 EACH. How much can one pay for one song they will actually play?!

License violation = CIVIL issue

[Anonymous Coward]

and you have to prove harm.

Is that so difficult?

To ARIIA and you, yes.

Feh!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Given that we have to pay APRA and ARIA licenses already just to "broadcast" their music (as we operate like the UK were simply playing in a public place is considered "broadcasting") and that all the venues we played at pay the SAME license fees this is just outright bloody money skimming greed.

In fact over 10 years ago I questioned APRA and ARIA about transferring legally bought or supplied (given both the big 4 and the minor labels would dump free vinyl and CD's on us) to self made compilation CDs and the response from both of them was pretty much along the lines of:

"Sony gave you it? why should we care if you copied it to CD, go ahead we're not going to come at you"
"you want to copy the music you have on Vinyl to CD? you bought the record? yes? go ahead, we couldn't care less"

update to 6 years ago and substitute MP3 for CD for and CD for Vinyl and I got pretty much exactly the same answer from both ARIA .

now they want more money to do this?

so glad I got out of the business when I did (3 years ago)

It IS private!

[Anonymous Coward]

The DJ's aren't mixing in public (that would be a boring gig...) and they aren't selling the mixes. The format shift is done in private. The public part is PLAYING THE MUSIC.

And if playing a format shifted version of a song is different from playing the song unshifted, then sharing MP3's is NOT sharing the original song (and so no lost sale since you can't BUY that version...).

Re:It IS private!

[BadOPCode]

Copyright and patent laws, put as simple as possible avoiding the insane logic, are there so software and entertainment companies can throw themselves to the ground, whine and cry about anything they don't like, like the little babies they are.

About time DJ's

[EEPROMS]

started charging record companies for "promoting their music in public venue's". TV stations charge record companies why can't DJ's.

tar and feather

[Anonymous Coward]

If the ARIA guy shows up at the DJ's home, how can he prove which songs are owned by the DJ for personal use? And if he shows up at the gig... Well the DJ just says "thanks ARIA guy!" over the Mic and the loyal party-goers should make sure the ARIA guy doesn't make it more than a block from the establishment whilst retaining his memory of the DJs name, or his own for that matter. Thats a lot of power to the DJ, so equal punishment should await DJs who abuse it.

When you don't like the laws, enforce your own. There is nothing immoral about that, but there can be consequences.

Re:So when are they going to stop calling it buyin

[pla]

It surely seems like you don't buy a song from ITunes, and you don't buy a movie from Blockbuster, etc. At the very least they should stop using the term buy.

They don't call it "buying" - They call it "stealing". If the recording industry had its way, we'd have to fork over $16 for a "license" in the form of a shiny plastic disc (non-transferrable and corporeally-bound, of course - Don't go thinking that just because you "license" their content you have some silly rights to either resell it or to keep using it in the event you lose/break your plastic disc). Then we'd pay separate format-shift licenses for converting the contents of that disc to a stream of bits; then for converting those bits to 16- or 24-bit words (perhaps on a "per-bit" basis, just for fairness to the industry); then for converting those words to analog signals sent to the speakers (this may require a separate broadcasting license, as it leaves the vicinity of the CD player itself); then for converting those analog levels to waves of sound pressure; then finally for converting those waves of sound pressure into neural impulses in the cochlea.

You greedy pirate bastards think you can just have all that for free, just because you plunked down $16 for a plastic disc? What, you want Cary Sherman's kids to have to go to public school???

Please tell me...

[SharpFang]

WTF is Shift Music, and how does one format it?

So, how much will it cost me to...

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's say I've purchased a sequence of 0's and 1's. How much for a licence to convert that to sound pressure waves? Wait, my application requires that it be converted to electrical energy, and then mechanical energy. Damn, this is going to get expensive. Good thing I don't need to do anything really crazy like move those 0's and 1's from where they currently reside.

ARIA is an anagram of RIAA: figures!

[Anonymous Coward]

Look, it's THEM. They just shuffled the letters around a bit. So don't act so surprised, I guess they ran a bit out of dead people and children to sue in the US (as a side effect of the living ones starting to call their bluff).

Yet another Digital DJ Licence then?

[DaveHowe]

The UK has had this for some time - its been generally ignored so far, although I guess at some point they are going to start prosecuting people for using mp3s instead of cds to dj (assuming they are allowed close enough to the dj to look)

Licence

This is a third bite at the cherry - you pay for the music, then you pay again for the performing rights licence, then now you pay a third time for the right to transfer the music you paid for into a format where you can play it to the public (which you paid for the right to do)

Five years in the slammer for making a mixtape..?

[Joce640k]

Pretty soon the RIAA will have a direct debit into out bank accounts and they'll be driving around with loudspeakers to make 100% sure we're all eligible to pay.

pointless change

[Chuffpole]

What's with the intrusive new ugly "Reply to this" and "Parent" buttons here?
Horrible. Is there any way to go back to the old appearance?

Re:pointless change

[Andrewkov]

Welcome to Slashdot XP!

Re:pointless change

[Yvan256]

Indeed. On OS X, I see flat grey buttons (with a mouse-hover effect) and I see regular Aqua-styled drop-down menus right to their right (for modding).

Just because buttons are ugly by default on Windows doesn't mean you should mess with the interface of others.

What's more, I see that the Preview, Quote Parent, Options and Cancel buttons at the bottom of my reply window are still regular Aqua-styled buttons.

DON'T MESS WITH GUI's!

Not to mention that this new interface doesn't even offer me a "Submit" button even after I clicked on "Preview"! I had to use the old interface to post this reply!

Who's coding half-working interfaces?!

Re:pointless change

[Yvan256]

P.S. to the coding monkeys: I only had the "no submit button" problem when I also had mod points AND had already modded the discussion.

Re:pointless change

[Blimey85]

Horrible. Is there any way to go back to the old appearance?

Yes, yes there is.

Re:pointless change

[Anonymous Coward]

How helpful you are. I'd be interested in how one can revert to the old appearance.

Re:pointless change

[sasha328]

Amen to this. Go back please. (Buttons are almost as big as this comment if it was just the first 3 words)

Re:pointless change

[Chuffpole]

Ok thanks, that makes my confusion all the more pleasant.
You're too kind.
Please consider being even more helpful.

Re:Not even a speed bump.

[lewko]

Why was this marked as a troll? It's a perfectly valid point.

Most nightclub owners will tell law-enforcement or ARIA's solicitors, with a completely straight face, that there is no illegal activity inside their clubs.

Lets talk dollars?

[Anonymous Coward]

After all that, has anyone managed to find the cost of this license yet? I can't find any firm figures. I format shift lots :|

(P.S This is bollocks)

Re:Lets talk dollars?

[PortHaven]

Probably along the lines of the royalty rates charged to web radio on behalf of artists* - likely more than the average light-duty DJ makes. They'll base the prices on the top club and wedding DJs and expect the small time DJs to be able to cough it up.

* NOTE - Artists were completely robbed on web radio royalty. RIAA was granted by Congress a card of opportunity to steal all the royalties of artists. Artists were never given the right to negotiate. Soundexchange collects royalties from all the web radio stations, which mainly play independent artists not on RIAA's labels. But those independent artists seldom get enough plays to ever receive royalties. But for web radio stations have to pay for ALL broadcasts. So SoundExchange gets to sit on all the proceeds, and never pay out cash.

MafiAA Sez...

[Moryath]

"Nice collection of music you got there... pity if something should 'happen' to it... you oughta pay us some 'protection'..."

Having to pay for the "right" to make a backup of something they send out on flawed, easily destroyed media? Uhm... no. Consumers have the right to protect their own investment from destruction.

Re:MafiAA Sez...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Vista + SP1: If you put whipped cream on a turd, it's still a turd. (Please do not reply to sig)"

(Please don't have a stupid flamebait sig then)

So let me get this straight....

[pandrijeczko]

...as a result of the increased expense of licenses for public broadcasts, a few DJs will find it more costly to play music that invariably sounds like some woman screaming in pain from the inside of a dustbin that is being rolled down some stone steps and that is only bearable in the first because anyone in earshot is totally off their heads on ecstasy?

So where's the problem?

And if there's a few less peroxide-haired record changers around who are no longer bragging about what wonderful "musicians" they are, then that's even better...

i'm just wondering....

[Anonymous Coward]

how long till they flip the whole performancer, listener license thing backwards....

how about implant everyone with a chip that filters out the music that they haven't paid to listen to?

that way, anyone can have all the music they want, copy it to whatever, and listen to whatever they want, but they won't actually HEAR anything unless they've paid for the rights to have it format shifted from air pressure waves to electronic signals in their brain.

the only downside is for the big music lables, is that 99.9% of the stuff that comes out, and that people are _forced_ to listen to in various forms, such as advertising, radio play, is monumentally crap. So i would pretty much never pay anything. plus i wouldn't have to put up with kids playing the current chart topping garbage out of their mobile's speaker phone on the train home, as i wouldn't hear it.

DJ's that play bootlegs, their own mashups, whitelables, and small production houses probably wont be on the on the "v chip" blocking network, and so their stuff will actaully get played for a change.

this can only be a good thing, as it will lead to performances being prepeared beforehand so they don't contain any music that could infringe any particular license, or upheald right (also covered as, mass producted tat).

i'll shut up now as i seem to have come full circle on this in my own mind...

Simple solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Artists,

I implore you to no longer play any of your old music that you have created but no longer own. You sold it to whatever music company you sold it to. But obviously they care little for your hard work or your art-form, you are just a number to them and in fact they want to squeeze you dry as much as possible.

What I suggest you do is to let go of any of that music you had created and strike out on your own. Create new music that will not be sold to any record label. At your next concert play the new music and tell your fans to no longer purchase the old music as the company you sold it to is treating you like shit.

Dear New Musicians,

I ask that you do not sign into contracts company that is a member of the RIAA or it's equivalent in your country. Strike out on your own. There is this wonderful thing called the internet that will help you promote your music that in the end will benefit you 100%. It will allow you to get a larger percentage of the sales of your songs. And you won't be putting money in the pockets of greedy lawyers and executives that don't really give a rats as about your art.

The real problem is that DJ's don't have...

[PortHaven]

The real problem is that DJ's don't have a massive lobby group like the record labels and radio station conglomerate.

Realize, at least in the U.S. that something like 80%-90% of albums rights are held by four conglomerate corporations. Likewise, probably about 80%-90% of radio stations are owned by 4-5 major conglomerates.

DJ's are thousands of independent joe-average people, many working part time on the side.

> We have to buy the albums but are never given a license. We have albums stolen, broken, etc. at a much higher rate. But have to replace said albums at the full price (even though we already have a license).

> We have to pay performance licensing for the right to play songs in public. (FYI, weddings are a private event and different rules apply.)

> We receive few guarantees and protections. While a specific grant in the DCMA allows for radio stations to make ephereal recordings. DJ's are not given that protection. For one simple reason...they didn't have a mega-association with millions of dollars to lobby (bribe) Congress. Yes there are some DJ associations, but the industry doesn't really lend itself to such a conglomerate as labels & radio does.

> Advantage of digital recordings. Our masters are safe from theft. Instead of having to lug 4 80lb suitcases of CDs to bring all our stock. We can lug one 5 lbs external hard drive.

It's disgusting...

Oh, by the way, if you are a musical artist and you want me to respect your copyrights. Get the law changed to protect DJs and web radio.

Cause I quit recognizing your copyrights as soon as the laws stopped. If your an artist...don't gripe to me about the violation of your rights. Cause us DJs have had our rights violated repeatedly.

Copyright is a two way system. If you want it honored, you have to honor the users as well. If you're going to claim people are only buying a "license". Then give them a real license and let them register their license. Otherwise, more and more people are going to cease recognizing your copyrights.

I no longer do. Anyone who wants copies of any of my CDs are welcome to make them. I've got a burner in the basement. Having lost several hundred dollars to copyright law abuse, I've cease recognizing your right. While you may have the law on your side.

Most people don't care about legality, rather, they care about right & wrong. (There are plenty of laws on the books that are 'legal' but far from moral.) And most people only feel a moral contractual obligation to another party if that party is acting in good faith. (Which the conglomerate copyright holders are NOT doing.)

The ones that need to change the system are the artists!

Re:The real problem is that DJ's don't have...

[Anonymous Coward]

Two wrongs don't make a right.

Your right as a consumer is to not purchase music if you don't agree with the conditions.

If people stopped buying the music, you can be sure that the conditions would change.

Re:The real problem is that DJ's don't have...

[Winter]

Two wrongs don't make a right.

But three lefts do...

Re:The real problem is that DJ's don't have...

[monxrtr]

You are exactly right. It's about time artists are held accountable for their fair share of blame. They've been let off the hook, and allowed to skate because they complain how they are screwed by record company contracts. They never once complained about the insane length of term increases to copyright. And plenty of artists like to call their fans thieves. It's high time we call out the artists who are making money from 30, 40, and 50 year old material the public domain thieves they are. Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, et al are stealing culture from future generations of kids, making it more scarce and higher priced.

None of theses artists didn't rip off the artistic ideas of other artists either. Their claims of copyright, their claims of originality, their claims of art, are pure delusions of fantasy. Welcome to the internetz. Don't give these people money even if they are independent. Don't go to their concerts (if they cost money). Don't buy their cds. Don't buy their merchandise. Artists need to themselves start demanding an end to the copyright insanity. We need a better filter than just they are not an RIAA label. Perhaps a signature Declaration of Free Culture enumerating 21st century expectations of the use and compensation for ideas can be circulated through the musician community to put individual artists in the clear, and their material safe to purchase, if they sign the document. Said petition can then be used as counter RIAA propaganda and testimony for sane law changes, first and foremost a reduction in the length of the term of monopoly distribution grant to equal or less than the length of patents.

Society will be much better off in the long run if we starve and burn the food supply of musicians for 10-20 years.

Re:The real problem is that DJ's don't have...

[PortHaven]

"Multiply two negatives and you get a positive."

Sorry, I've never bought two wrongs don't make a right. False philosophy used by those with authority to subdue those from gaining authority.

***

That aside...

What about the three-thousand CDs I already own? If the record industry is going to change the rules. I'll start respecting them as soon as they refund me the money for all the albums I have already purchased.

Thank you very much...

***

Lastly,

Two wrongs don't make a right...

But acting within your right doesn't make it wrong...just merely illegal. I care about wrong or right. Not legal and illegal...

Re:The real problem is that DJ's don't have...

[PortHaven]

As I like to point out, Disney would not exist today if they had not borrowed from public domain. Disney has yet to contribute anything substantial to public domain.

Frankly, I think we need a class action lawsuit on the behalf of "The People" to declare Disney's ownership of the following movies null.

> Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs
> Sleeping Beauty
> Beauty & the Beast
> Pinocchio
> Cinderella
> Alice in Wonderland
> The Sword in the Stone
> The Jungle Book
> Robin Hood
> The Little Mermaid
> Pocahontas
> The Hunchback of Notre Dame
> Hercules
> Tarzan

Fair rate...

[PortHaven]

I love how XIAA's always say...

"Have to pay a fair rate/pay their share."

Which translates into "Paying whatever the !@#$% we want. Even if it's more than all their profits.

Down under done under?

[Just Some Guy]

My wife and I had vaguely looked into relocating to Australia, as it seemed to embody a lot of what the US was once proud to stand for. From all the news we've been hearing from there, though, it seems like they're following the bad example we're setting. Am I misreading things, or is Australia really rushing to become another nanny state of infinite laws?

Re:Down under done under?

[Anonymous Coward]

sadly, you have it right. australia is basically on track to be "little america"

Re:Australia...

[SlashWombat]

Compared to the USA, Australia is a paradise. It was even better before our previous Prime Minister virtually sold our soul's to that bastard currently running the USA into the ground. We are now signatories to the very same DRM goodness promulgated by the US legislature.

If you read RTFA, you would be aware that its a sister organisation to the RIAA making the waves here. (Heil indeed, you are probably from the same country that has a department called "homeland security". Now that really sounds like a facist organisation! (Papers please: Vot!, Dis is not a REALID(tm).

PS: Our previous prime minister has now got a permanent brown spot on the end of his nose from licking GW's arse!

PPS: Most of the shit Australia is in can be directly attributed to the USA. When the USA farts, the rest of the world needs to check to insure they didn't accidentally follow through!

Whats with the new /. look & feel?

I'm a DJ

[WilyCoder]

I'm a DJ so I will quickly toss in my two cents. It is the responsibility of the venue to pay the ascap fees for the public performance of music in said venue.

Re:I'm a DJ

[Anonymous Coward]

Since no one seems to have mentioned this point so far, you're getting some mod points from me today. :) For anyone else taking notes: In Canada, the venue also already pays a fee, and there is already what is known as a "hard disk license" that the DJ is supposed to pay. Per hard disk. Including the backup drive in your gig bag. And the backup at home. Yeah. Imagine how many "hard disk license"s have been paid in Canada. What's that? The sound of trees rustling. :)

Re:I'm a DJ

[Anonymous Coward]

Whoops. Forgot I can't mod and reply on the same post. My spirit is with you, though. ;)

Re:This is actually ok

[russotto]

Oh, come on now. This is just as much a load of crap as the RIAA going after barbershops that keep a radio turned up!

The RIAA would never do that. It infringes on the turf of ASCAP and BMI.

Glad I don't live there

[Duncan Blackthorne]

What a bunch of crap. Inetersting though to see that the Aussies are just as much a bunch of greedy motherfuckers as their North American counterparts. Don't they read global news sources? Don't they see what's happening to the recording industry here because of shit like this?

Same in Belgium

[QplQyer]

Sadly it is the same here in Belgium (for a couple of years already now). SABAM is extorting local DJ's for a fee of I believe 250 euros for this.
And why? Only because the law here says they can do it, you can only create public performances off of legitimately bought products, not derivatives.

It's just all very much twisted and fucked up, I am still awaiting the first rise of DJ's who aggressively campaign against this extortion (or media coverage of this malfunctioning copyright system). But pretty much to no avail.

Ephemeral copies

[tepples]

Lets say I setup a set of CDs for a performance. I've done all the steps to get a license. If I have equipment that buffers the audiostream before it is sent to the speakers, should that require an additional license? This is called "ephemeral recording". In another common law country, ephemeral recordings are subject to either an explicit exemption from copyright law or a statutory license (17 USC 112 and 114). The statutory licenses involve a royalty payment.

The ARIA doesn't represent artists that DJ's play

[matrixskp]

First of all the ARIA doesn't represent or pay royalties to most of the Electronica artists that club DJ's play. So why should the DJ's pay them royalties? The ARIA should have to prove that the DJ's are playing artists that they represent. I would recommend that all makers of Club style music register with and demand royalties from the ARIA. Secondly most of the club DJ's I know download/swap their music as MP3's anyway. They don't format shift and they don't buy music. As a maker of club music you want the DJ's to be playing your music, much like commercial music makers need radio. I agree that these fees should come under the public performance fees and be payable by the venue, as long as said fees are actually being distributed to the artists whose music is being played.

Kee-fuckin'-rist. Mullah Omar had a fuckin' point

[crovira]

prescribing all Muslims from listening to music.

Then you can forbid any ARIA from entering your country UNDER PAIN OF DEATH!

I see these lawyers just swinging from tree limbs.

Why can other industries do it right?

[CrazeeCracker]

Imagine a world where the situation with other media was as insane as it currently is with movies/music.

Imagine pre-school teachers had to pay "broadcasting licenses" to read children's books to their pupils. And school libraries had to invest fortunes into multi-user licenses for their books and magazines ("because, hell, any student could read it!")

Imagine you had to pay a royalty fee everytime you quoted someone else's research paper ("What's that? You want to just be able to quote any research you want and expect to get away with it without million-dollar lawsuits? What kind of utopia are you living in?").

Why aren't stories like these happening when they seem so abundant in the music and movie industries? Because the funding behind scientific research and (arguably) other areas of publishing aren't in the hands of people who have long since stopped seeing any intrinsic merit in what they are doing and run things with the sole intent of squeezing as much money as possible out of it.

We can't blame the MAFIAA, ARIA, or their international counterparts -- these organisations are businesses. They're structured and run like businesses, and, sadly, they seem to be rather good at it. What needs to happen is this: music needs to stop being a business. We need to put a lot of the funding behind artists back into the hands of the public. Subventions for artists by the government (or, on a smaller scale, by local municipalities) is an important cultural stimulant in many countries, and it has the benefit of supporting more independent and emerging artists without focus on factors like "sellability" (i.e. how much money can be squeezed out of it). We have large-scale scientific funding*; why can't we have large-scale artistic funding for artists? Sure, music might not be as important (though I'd rate research for the sake of advancement of knowledge fairly close in importance to cultural evolution), but something needs to fundamentally be changed about the entertainment industry in most countries. We can't just sit and wait until the *AA implodes and another equally unsuitable system takes its place.

* N.B. I'm not USian, so the "we" here refers to all of North America/Australia/Europe



* sits back and watches the -1 Flamebait mods roll in... *

Um . . .

[catbertscousin]

Am I missing a level of posts, or have you been debating with yourself? I guess the good side is you're winning. Wait . . .

Who Do You Pay?

[tobiah]

The article wasn't very clear, nor is ARIA's statement. There are several lingering questions:

1) Who do you pay? How do you know if a recording you have is represented by ARIA? They are one of many music industry groups. Looking at the album cover isn't guaranteed to work, the album may have been printed overseas. Artists switch labels and copyrights can be transferred or expire.

2) When does this apply? Either music published prior to this proclamation is exempt, or DJs have been spinning illegally for years and are liable for back-pay.

3) How is this policed? Does the Australian government really want to be responsible for examining the legality of every song on a DJ's hard drive? If ARIA gets aggressive about this all they'll do is get their music out of circulation, because compliance is too expensive and time-consuming.

Re:Who Do You Pay?

[trawg]

1) Who do you pay?

You need to look at the list of participating ARIA members

Basically, ARIA just say "you need a license to play any music*", and then the hidden * is ".. the copyright for which is owned by a participating ARIA member".

2) The real question (to my mind) is, is such a license required at all? Format shifting is specifically allowed under Australian copyright law since the Copyright Amendment Bill of 2006, as long as its for "private and domestic use". I assume "domestic" in this context means "inside the home". I haven't read the actual legislation (yet).

3) ARIA will do what they always do - wait until violation is brought to their attention (I assume this happens less and less) or through their active enforcement measures (eg, they, or some other entity, have people wandering around looking for shops that play music that don't have a license sticker in the window).

The rule of law need not apply

[Anonymous Coward]

There are also on-the-spot fines of over one thousand dollars.

I wasn't aware that they are actually an administrative branch of the government. Who needs judges and witnesses and prosecutors and all of that stuff when you are an arrogant prick of an industry, willing to keep riding your gravy train over the bodies of the artists whose copyrights you stole in exchange for distributing their work?

Ironic: the word I have to enter below to post this is "justices".

Huh?

[ScrewMaster]

What the fuck is an "on the spot" fine? Does that mean some RIAA heavies just come in and demand money? That sounds like a job for law enforcement and the courts, not a private corporation.

Re:Huh?

[lordlod]

In my state it's enforced by the liquor licencing body which is a government entity. I assume other states are similar.

Re:Huh?

[ScrewMaster]

Interesting. Doesn't do much for due process.