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Canadian Music Industry Copyright Class Action Settled
limber writes "The largest Canadian copyright class action suit has been settled for $50 million. The offenders? The four labels comprising the Canadian Recording Industry Association — EMI, Sony Music, Universal Music, and Warner Music. Ahem."
The terms of the settlement are a compromise — anyone with works on the pending list can receive compensation while the music industry is absolved of further liability. The two major Canadian licensing agencies (CMRRA and SODRAC) will be tasked with improving the licensing process to prevent future abuse.
The CRIA has had years to pay these artists. Why would they start now?
Also notice how this is less than 1% of what the CRIA actually owes its artists. Settlements like this only encourage them to keep stiffing their artists.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Why do I think this is going to trickle down and hurt the little guy no matter how it turned out?
They are only screwing shitty artists like Celine Dion, Anne Murry, and Bryan Adams. Come to think of it, I don't think there is a Canadian recording artist that doesn't suck. I'm finding it hard to give a shit about this at all.
Posting anonymously from work...
The two major Canadian licensing agencies (CMRRA and SODRAC) will be tasked with improving the licensing process to prevent future abuse.
Why do I get the feeling that means, instead of "the CMRRA and SODRAC will ensure the music industry doesn't make this mistake again", as I'm sure they'd like us to believe, that actually equates to "the CMRRA and SODRAC will ensure stricter copyright legislation so that the music industry has an easier time of controlling things and screwing over people"?... Why do I get the feeling the music industry actually won and the people of Canada got screwed?...
So, for willfully and illegally selling 300,000 works, the recording companies paid just $50 million, or $166 per song. And careful, that is per song, NOT per copy! So they are most likely giving a fraction of their illegally gotten gains - forget about any punitive damages, they probably even get to keep a lot of the stolen money!
Next time you are sharing a song online, make sure a) you make money of it b) you are a big corp.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
The record companies commit wholesale copyright infringement, and take the stance they should be allowed to do it and will settle the costs later.
The rest of us download a fucking Brittany Spears song and they want to sue us for eleventy trillion dollars.
I think it's time to start feeding recording executives to wild dogs -- they want draconian laws to make sure we can't do anything, but they just walk around them and pretend they didn't do anything wrong. Arrogant bastards.
I've said it before, if they keep extending this "copyright levy" to everything under the sun, I'm going to start pirating on a large scale. I'm already paying for it, I might as well get my money's worth.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Every time the **AAs get up in front of government or the public to claim "support for the artists" this situation and others need to be brought up plainly and clearly. I know that like many here, those arguments made me laugh, then made me sick and now make me angry. They are simply lying with impunity on this matter and need to be taken to account. I would love for them to be questioned before the US congress to see if we can get some truth and/or perjury from them. That won't and can't happen fairly, though, as long as they are major contributors to both big parties and to nearly every elected official in office today.
50 million is a ripoff compared to the billions owed in backpay. That's equivalent to your boss saying, "I'll pay your $50 an hour," waiting years for your paycheck, and then he hands you a measly $5 an hour and says "Oops sorry." I would not have accepted it.
Worse - Since there are lawyers involved, the 50 million will probably shrink to 20 million that has to be distributed amongst the ~1 million singers owed money.
And these nonpaying a-holes in RIAA screw the singers, but they have the nerve to demand WE the customers pay for every single song we make a copy of - $1 if we download it, $1 if we burn it to a CD-R, $1 if we duplicate it across a 2nd PC, and so on.
GRRRR.
(I am a little bitter. Can you tell?)
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
It's not about supporting the artists it's about supporting the politicians. The AA's never miss those payments!!!
The CRIA has had years to pay these artists.
Which is difficult if the artist cannot be contacted.
"The suit, which has not been given class action status..."
Doesn't even the poster read TFA anymore?
I don't have a sig.
If the artist can't be contacted, they can't file a lawsuit either.
A copyright owner can be reclusive up until the moment that the copyright owner is ready to sue. Or a copyright owner can die or go out of business, and it might not be feasible to trace to whom the copyright has passed. Quick question: Who owns the copyright in Zero Wing, a 1989 scrolling shooter video game developed by Toaplan?
modern music has become a corporate commodity, there's no creativity or art left, it's nothing but overpriced crap
Dear Canada,
Please stop ending acronyms with an A. It's confusing. We don't know whether you're saying CMRReh, or whether its real name is CMRRA.
And no, saying CMRRAeh doesn't help. There might, for all we know (not that we care - Ed) be a CMRRAA.
Put it another way, how can you distinguish these guys from these guys?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
~$6 billiion to ~$50 million, either there's a huge chunk of information missing, a large percentage of the represented class is going to opt out, or something is up. Obviously the vast majority of the class has no dire need for a short-changed payment, and can stand to sue individually, or as a group in order to get multiples of this settlement.
The corner of a round room
Anyone who omits Rush (whether knowingly or ignorant) has questionable taste.
to continue:
Triumph
Coney Hatch
Bryan Adams
April Wine
Pat Travers
BTO
Is it possible to bring up a settlement like this in US court cases as a type of precedent?
They wanted to use these songs on "Greatest Hits" and other compilation albums for free, rather than pay the wages due.
What wages due? Are there standard rates for licensing the right to make and sell phonorecords of a three- to five-minute nondramatic musical sound recording? I thought mechanical licenses were only for the composition, not the recording. If an artist switched labels part-way through his or her career, it's possible that the artist's former label said "not at any price". Or an artist's former label may have been caught up in , leaving the copyright ownership of the artist's early recordings unclear. In this case, it becomes no different from the Zero Wing example.
The artists asked for the unpaid royalties AND maximum copyright statutory damages per song. The settlement was unpaid royalties and much less than the maximum statutory damages. Oh and the 4 big corps have to pay the artists legal fees.
If you see, as I do, that the RIAA, et al are out of freaking control, then join the Pirate Party, as I have. We don't want to steal as the overlords would have you believe. We just want the corporations to play fair. Look us up.
If I were being sued by the RIAA/MPAA for copyright infringement, this case would now be my reference point for what the damages per song should be.
If the companies being the *AAs think that $160/song is all they should pay then why should Jamie Thomas pay more?
I think that this case has put a big hole in a lot of damages cases.
Looks like more than Three Strikes for these guys. They should no longer be allowed to use the Internet. And while we are at it, how about the Death Penalty for Corporations and jail terms for their CEOs.
Wow, you mean Canada's copyright implementation fails to fulfill the mandate of the constitution of another country?
First let me clarify: Nowhere did I intend to imply that a foreign country's constitution was the basis underlying Canadian copyright. But the framers of the 1982 constitution had to be aware of its neighbor's mandate. In fact, what mandate underlies Canadian copyright? #91 gives none. And the country that has such a mandate likewise has an orphan works problem.