Music suit creates discord

calidan · Aug 1, 2007, 01:13 PM

Source: The Seattle Times
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A Seattle restaurant is among more than two dozen venues swept up in a music-licensing crackdown for allegedly failing to pay royalties to play copyrighted music in public.

Without a special license, owners of bars, clubs and restaurants could be sued for playing any one of 8 million recorded songs, even from their own CDs.

The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) says that equates to performing copyrighted music without permission, and the group is going after local businesses that haven't paid them for the privilege.

Buddahpest · Aug 1, 2007, 04:06 PM

This crap just needs to stop.

**dj_stick** · Aug 1, 2007, 05:23 PM

we have similiar laws in australia, any business that wants to play music has to pay fees to APRA/PPCA, who distribute the royalties accordingly to labels

however:

Quote:

Many DJs get music free from record labels so they can play and promote it, Steuer added. "I'm sure that they'd never imagine that they're committing a federal offense by playing this stuff without paying for the right to play it."

If a record label provides a free promo copy, then there should be absolutely NO need to pay any fees, as the label, who owns the copyright of the recording, has provided that recording for free for promotional purposes - ie a DJ playing it to a crowd, so the crowd will end up buying it

other than that, i think it's fair for there to be some sort of licensing scheme, but it has to be one that'ssimple to follow

Customgamer1 · Aug 1, 2007, 08:43 PM

Thats just dumb!

People are getting way to tied up with money... I find it sad that playing music now is not legal without paying someone first. Whats odd about why they are cracking down is there is no way you can record it other than putting a recording device by the speaker thats it's coming from like a PA but who would do that lol?