Slashdot Mirror
Creative Commons Responds To ASCAP Letter
An anonymous reader writes "Drew Wilson at ZeroPaid has a followup to the story about ASCAP telling its members that organizations like EFF and Creative Commons are undermining copyright. A spokesperson from Creative Commons said, 'It's very sad that ASCAP is falsely claiming that Creative Commons works to undermine copyright. Creative Commons licenses are copyright licenses — plain and simple, without copyright, these tools don't even work.' He also said, 'Many tens of thousands of musicians, including acts like Nine Inch Nails, the Beastie Boys, David Byrne, Radiohead, and Snoop Dogg, have used Creative Commons licenses to share with the public.' Many ASCAP members are already expressing their disappointment with the ASCAP letter over at Mind the Gap. Sounds like ASCAP will be in damage control for a while."
In Czech Republic you actually have to pay OSA (they collect money for music usage) if you want to publish your own work (they actually claim that they will return you 70% of that if you sign with them).
I read the letter from ASCAP yesterday, and as far as I can tell they are just trying to keep copyright as is (or possibly make it stronger); it didn't seem like they wanted to invalidate copyleft. As for copyleft, I don't see what the big deal is. If somebody wants to use a restrictive copyright license, fine; if somebody wants to use a permissive copyleft license, fine. The two can (and should) coexist without any issues. If one side doesn't like the other side, tough titties; the artist should have the freedom to do whatever he wants. The only concern is the strength of copyright, which I think we all agree has grown too much; however, that is a separate discussion from copyleft vs copyright.
Off the top of my head, you've got all the artists on the newgrounds audio portal, as well as artists on soundclick, mp3.com, last.fm, jamendo, and loads of smaller niche portals like them.
If you don't limit it to just musicians, then you've also got Youtube (obviously), Deviantart, most webzines (such as slashdot itself, and arstechnica), a lot of the projects on moddb, not to mention thousands of independents on services like livejournal and blogspot. CC is a *huge* part of the internet and its culture, and it's worrying that someone like ASCAP can even consider attacking it. The only way you could realistically fight a CC license would be to radically redefine copyright law - and I'm pretty sure that if someone tried that, the approach would also kill off the Apache license, the GPL, , or even just the busker on the street corner trying to give out demo tapes. Even broadcast TV could go down the pan - after all, you receive it on an implied license. End result? Essentially, a complete shutdown of the internet and culture as we know it.
Not a world I want to be a part of. Thankfully, I don't think ASCAP can affect copyright legislation in the UK and Europe, and the EC seems sane enough not to let something like this happen.
I don't agree with what ASCAP is doing in this case. But, the information in the post above is simply wrong. Based on the information found here (http://www.ascap.com/licensing/licensingfaq.html), only businesses greater than 2.000 sq ft and more than 6 speakers installed need to worry about a license.
I don't agree with what ASCAP is doing in this case. But, the information in the post above is simply wrong.
Based on the information found here (http://www.ascap.com/licensing/licensingfaq.html), only businesses greater than 2.000 sq ft and more than 6 speakers installed need to worry about a license.
2,000 sq ft is not as big as you think it is. And it's not hard to get up to six speakers, hell, most boom boxes are pushing that now, especially if you consider the woofer and tweeter as separate components on the same mold.
"Educate the mind but never at the expense of the soul."~Blessed Basil Moreau
I read the letter yesterday as I was getting on a plane to the 75th anniversary celebration for Foster Music Camp. I was not happy. By painting the CC as the enemy, they are supporting the chaos of incompatible one-off licensing for such uses prior to its existence. I wrote them a letter pointing out their mistakes.
I concluded by saying that I would reconsider my membership if they do not stop these baseless ad hominem attacks on organizations that do so much to improve the rights of authors, content users, and those who license content created by others. I encourage other content creators who feel similarly to do likewise. The only way they'll ever "get it" is if we members keep driving home the point that absolute control of copyright is not in anyone's best interests, including content creators.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
A quick Google search turned up some ASCAP asshattery:
http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendId=51550622&blogId=510343864 http://www.woodpecker.com/writing/essays/phillips.html http://www.synthzone.com/ubbs/Forum37/HTML/019179.html http://www.woodpecker.com/writing/essays/royalty-politics.html http://games.slashdot.org/story/09/12/16/0940232/ASCAP-Seeks-Licensing-Fees-For-emGuitar-Hero-Arcadeem?from=rss
Not only that, but ASCAP may come asking for a triple-payment. They may assume that the owners don't understand that fees have already been paid twice.
In fact, I'm not certain of the rules myself; it's my understanding that even if the source is a regular broadcast radio--and those stations have most certainly paid to play the music--businesses are still "required" to pay ASCAP fees.
Funny thing is that once upon a time, ASCAP was the artist's friend. Folks like Little Richard had their music stolen and used for profit by mega-moguls like Disney and others, and didn't see a cent of it. ASCAP was built to protect against that, and it's slowly devolved into a group of thugs that go after Girl Scouts doing public performances of the Macarena dance.
The CB App. What's your 20?