PRS Demands License Fee To Play Music To Horses

An anonymous reader writes "A woman in Bushton, Wilts, has been told by the Performing Rights Society (PRS for Music) that she needs to pay an annual fee in order to play classical music from the radio to the horses in her stable, something that she has been doing for the past 20 years. The PRS claims that it's not about the horses — rather, it's about her staff of over two people, which puts Mrs. Greenway in the same category as shops, bars and cafes. 'The staff are not bothered whether they have the radio on or not, in fact they don't particularly like my music and turn if off when I'm not around,' said Mrs. Greenway, 62. 'Especially on windy days I try to play it — it gives [the horses] a nice quiet atmosphere, you can only exercise one horse at a time so it helps the others to stay calm. We are right next to the RAF Lyneham air base so it dulls the noise from the aircraft as well.'"

Comments

lolwut

[RuBLed]

She is already tuning to a local Classic FM radio station, from what i had read she isnt even playing her own CD's, tapes etc.

brb, I'm setting my radio now to max volume and pointing it at the street. Now if everyone would just do the same...

Re:lolwut

[TrancePhreak]

Yea, that sounds a lot like double-dipping to me... Since the radio already pays to play it there.

Re:lolwut

[Anonymous Coward]

The copyright is presumably on the recording and not the composition itself.

Re:lolwut

[mdwh2]

I didn't realise that there were limits on where you can and can't play the radio to be honest. I figure if they're going to broadcast unencrypted radio signals through the air then it shouldn't be illegal to pick them up whether it's at a stables, in an office or at a building site.

Indeed, especially since radio waves are a limited resource, and there'd be others who would love to fill the place if they had that privilege. It seems mad to me that we still crackdown on "pirate" radio stations (who are willing to publish for free), but then say that playing the radio of legitimate stations is also "piracy".

Let's make the right to play radios (perhaps along with other fair use rights) a mandatory requirement of broadcasting on the air. If they don't like it, they can stop polluting our public airwaves, and make room for someone else.

Re:lolwut

[Anonymous Coward]

The fee Finnish taxis pay is 33 euros per year, which means less than 1 cent per ride. It's practically meaningless.

Compared with the USA many of the Finnish practices are very fair. You never see 200k+ charges brought up against granmas or students copying music off the Internet. USA is on its own level with corporatism, and as much as the Finnish nerds love to complain, there really is no comparison. In fact, I don't think anything in the world really compares with the way copyrights are enforced in the USA.

FWIW, in Finland this lady would have zero problems playing music at her stable. She could legally play copyrighted music all day long and there would be no charge at all: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fi&tl=en&u=http://www.gramex.fi/index.php%3Fmid%3D268&prev=hp

So stop...

[KingSkippus]

She should simply stop. Get a buttload of dirt cheap CDs in the bargain basement bin for $0.99 each, or better yet, get a lot more stuff off a site such as Magnatune or an Internet radio station, and let the PRS rot in hell in total irrelevance. I think they've completely lost the concept that they need this woman, in actually having an avid listener, a hell of a lot more than she needs them.

Re:So stop...

[Anonymous Coward]

It might not be enough. As others have pointed out, CDs may be taxed as well, as happens in some countries (the keywords being "public performance", regardless of the source of music).

Even trying to play music licensed under Creative Commons or some such license may prove troublesome, as the PRS collects fees for all artists, even those that have opted out of it.

Maybe if you could prove the music was CCed and from a foreign origin...? Quite troublesome as well. The point being, where does the madness stop?

Re:So stop...

[Reziac]

My solution would be (since the other reply is right -- your personal CDs are the same as a radio for lic. purposes) to find a radio station that played ONLY royalty-free music, and make sure everyone knew WHY I chose that.

Tho the only one I can think of offhand plays decidedly unrestful music :)

Re:So stop...

[Anonymous Coward]

The thing is that music you buy in stores is, legally, licensed (just like software). While there may be no EULAs, you still are only legally allowed to use the music for personal use. The line of legal uses is blurry (playing the music to your family is clearly legal; playing it in a for-profit business like a disco or selling copies of that CD to others is clearly illegal - if you want to do that, you have to negotiate a special license with the record studio). In other cases it's a gray area, and the case in question is one of those gray areas.

The "internet radio" is legally questionable even by itself under present copyright laws as interpreted by those in power (heavily sponsored by record studios), and there's nothing to stop *AA from suing someone for using Internet radio in their "business" any differently than from using a CD.

That of course doesn't mean that current copyright laws are a bunch of bullshit, and more things are illegal under it than you'd imagine (technically operating a library can be illegal under current copyright laws!). With media like film and music, however, record companies are much more aggressive at pursuing their interests, and since they have technical legal standing, they'll push the matter pretty much as far as they are able to, no matter how low they have to stoop. Hence this story. And last time I checked, telling a judge that "what I'm doing may be illegal but it's morally right" doesn't fly too well in court.

Moralizing with these bastards is like moralizing with a poisonous viper that biting people is bad. You can't nice-talk them out of it, you have to pull their teeth.

As time goes by, however, more and more people are affected by the death-grip of the record industry/associations/whatever on average people; it's not just about the guy in the basement pirating music anymore. Once the critical mass is accumulated, we should see some lobbying against the current laws, rather than just for them, and we may yet see some change. Won't hold my breath just yet, though.

Re:Wilts isn't a country

[Macthorpe]

Wilts is short for Wiltshire, which is in the UK. Let me Google that for you, just to confirm.

It's fine to list a state or county in lieu of listing a country, when it's made clear elsewhere in the summary that this took place in the UK.

Easier solution.

[tagno25]

Ear plugs for ALL humans within shouting distance of the barn

Horse trading

[Anonymous Coward]

She could up the ante by engaging in some horse trading over rights.

She owns the horses. She can claim that the noise the horses make are "performances" and charge them royalties when they come over to visit her... say, $500,000 per neigh. She can offer to waive the payments if they offer to waive theirs.

I'm doubtful of the legal validity of this, but it'd be funny as hell to see her try. You might say, we'd be in for a galloping horse of a time.

Alternatively, someone could direct her to our friends in Sweden. She can eat like a horse there without these bottom-feeders leeching off of her.

Seriously, it's this sort of shameless cash grabbing that makes me feel not even a little bad about music companies going out of business. They clearly don't give a toss about anyone but themselves, so why should others treat them any differently?

ugh

[Anonymous Coward]

So, let me get this straight:

If I listen to the radio.. that's fine.

If I listen to the radio and my friend listens to his radio... that's fine.

But if we both listen to the same radio, I'm supposed to pay for it?

backwards going we are?

[nicc777]

This is insane! It's like we are going back to the dark ages...

I just can't imagine that there are people sitting some where in a room that can actually think of ways like this to milk innocent people for more money.

Ah - and now you will tell me that the devil made them do it - and for once we all might agree on /. :-)

Re:In Holland it's even worse

[Ronald Dumsfeld]

...I received a letter from the SENA (equivalent of PRS) stating that I need to pay for music played in my own home, for my ears only.

Same shit applies in most European countries - seen it in Belgium. The irony of the case I saw, was it was a Thai supermarket - they only played music off imported Thai CDs. Do you think any of the original artists get a cent from this collection body?

No, neither do I.

Re:Bring it on...

[digitig]

Sure, they could send an army of lawyers and bailiffs after her, but all she has to do in court is say she's unable to pay, and that will pretty much be that.

Considering it's "her stable" she may have difficulty showing that she doesn't have the assets to pay the fine or for the license that she will still need. If the ordinary small business can't cover its liabilities then it goes bankrupt and the creditors take its assets (it has to be a really big business before the government steps in and gives the failed business its creditors assets).

As others have pointed out, it's nothing to do with playing the music to the horses and everything to do with other members of staff being able to hear it. That needs a licence in England and Wales (don't know about Scotland). So scrub the stuff about horses; all this story is is "You need a licence to play a radio in an English workplace", which we don't like (although at least we no longer need a licence to operate a radio receiver anywhere) but isn't news.