Briefly, fingers tighten reflexively on mugs, facial expressions harden, and the ugly shouting from upper floors permeates the room.  A dark cloud slowly passes across the window wells of the Coffee House.  Gradually, the darkness passes, and as it does, the room brightens, the music comes up and mugs are filled.  The mood, bruised and battered, slowly retraces its steps.  A cautious sigh of relief washes some of the remaining tension from the room.

The barista says to no one in particular, "Take it easy, folks.  No one wants to get Sheriff Willy all riled up.  He may tell us to take this conversation upstairs..."

this thread has already passed the point of decency. 

Crg, Shad,
Grow up or i'll gleefully kick both your asses wearing my wifes nighty.  My address is in the phone book.    just look up no how.
This is coffeehouse not crackhouse.


ps......no one,,,,i mean NO ONe owes  proof of anything anywhere anytime.  As far as im concerned just weathering a breaking down body in this tilted world is 'artist' enough....and some do it ever so quietly and gracefully.
Let's get off our self righteous vigilante thing before we're seen for the naked beggars we really are.  

Upstairs---CJ VS John    nobodys winning but someone needs to turn off CJ's ability to use large fonts, its bad enough there are in his sig.
Downstairs- Craig is about to purchase a ticket to Ottawa on Ebay for $60 ( plus tax)

Everybody here seems to think that somehow this is about songwriters. Its not. It is about copyright holders who are rarely the actual content creators.

In fact, except for the relatively uncommon "work for hire," which requires that the author sign a contract prior to the creation of the work, the copyright is the songwriter's. Any monetary value of that right depends on the ability of the songwriter to enforce it. If you change the law so that right no longer exists, anyone can use it without paying for it. If he decides to license that copyright to a publisher or record company or his crazy aunt in New Brunswick, the value that he can expect to be paid for that license/assignment is largely in the ability of someone down the line being able to collect money from someone else for the public performance of the song.

One of the confusing issues about this particular right is that we are used to being able to hear broadcast songs for free in our own home. The performer/recording company has no public performance right in the phonorecord (derivative work) of the author's composition, so  radio broadcast does not require licensing (hence no payment). They have to make their money from the sale of the physical media (vinyl, CD), which arguably is promoted by radio play, returning value to the record company. This served everyone well before the age of mass piracy. The very powerful radio lobby was able to push that result through congress back in the days before many of us were born. The failure of the newer laws to treat "digital broadcast" the same way was the source of the Copyright-Law-Will-Destroy-Internet-Radio hubbub a couple of years ago. For the record, I think that drawing a distinction between air wave and internet broadcast is unfair, but the record companies won that round.

The author has had to rely on fees he receives for recording licenses (a few pennies a song and set by a government board), and public performance. While some art forms (printed poetry for example) have been stripped of any practical monetary value by the lack of market, there remains a potential for popular music to still pay its more successful creators. Will songwriting be better or worse if no one can earn a living (or dream of a fortune) from it?

slartabartfast

Everybody here seems to think that somehow this is about songwriters. Its not. It is about copyright holders who are rarely the actual content creators.

In fact, except for the relatively uncommon "work for hire," which requires that the author sign a contract prior to the creation of the work, the copyright is the songwriter's. Any monetary value of that right depends on the ability of the songwriter to enforce it. If you change the law so that right no longer exists, anyone can use it without paying for it. If he decides to license that copyright to a publisher or record company or his crazy aunt in New Brunswick, the value that he can expect to be paid for that license/assignment is largely in the ability of someone down the line being able to collect money from someone else for the public performance of the song.

One of the confusing issues about this particular right is that we are used to being able to hear broadcast songs for free in our own home. The performer/recording company has no public performance right in the phonorecord (derivative work) of the author's composition, so  radio broadcast does not require licensing (hence no payment). They have to make their money from the sale of the physical media (vinyl, CD), which arguably is promoted by radio play, returning value to the record company. This served everyone well before the age of mass piracy. The very powerful radio lobby was able to push that result through congress back in the days before many of us were born. The failure of the newer laws to treat "digital broadcast" the same way was the source of the Copyright-Law-Will-Destroy-Internet-Radio hubbub a couple of years ago. For the record, I think that drawing a distinction between air wave and internet broadcast is unfair, but the record companies won that round.

The author has had to rely on fees he receives for recording licenses (a few pennies a song and set by a government board), and public performance. While some art forms (printed poetry for example) have been stripped of any practical monetary value by the lack of market, there remains a potential for popular music to still pay its more successful creators. Will songwriting be better or worse if no one can earn a living (or dream of a fortune) from it?

I hear you and fully agree. Its just not what I (and I think Spindlebox) am talking about. In an ideal world the actual author would always hold the copyright. But this is not often the case for published and distributed works. The rights are most often signed away.

Irrespective of that, we are talking about blanket fees for works not even covered by the PROs. We are talking about organizations that have lobbied hard and wide to maximize the revenue obtained regardless of ethical right. They have manipulated congress, the judicial system and the public at large.

Does anybody actually deny this?

Some may agree with the practice. Some do not. Spindlebox's point was that perhaps its a lack of awareness that has allowed this to get to the state its in (a police state), and that with increased awareness more of us might stand up and say.. wait a sec... this may be legal, but its not right.

"Jonbouy"

The one area that does and always has annoyed me however although it doesn't affect me, is that some poor girl trying to run a hairdressing business has to pay for playing a licensed radio in a salon that the broadcasting company is already paying through the nose to transmit.

Ain't that the truth and certainly an undisputable fact. Legalized double-dipping while at the same time holding you and me hostage to a higher standard of conduct.

We are talking about organizations that have lobbied hard and wide to maximize the revenue obtained regardless of ethical right. They have manipulated congress, the judicial system and the public at large.

Next to the famous, "This too will pass..." that represents the statement that applies to the largest number of the organizations that have ever existed.

In fact the amazing thing about copyright law is that it gives any rights to the creator of the work at all. Look at how puny the political and economic resources of that tiny minority of writers that make anything at all from their work is compared to the power of broadcast media, recording and film industries, performance venues, telephone service centers, elevator companies, and yes even local neighborhood taverns. Everyone but the author would gain more from a system that made all artistic creation free to use and profit from. The average voter thinks music is already free.

Somewhere in the corrupt mass of self-interest that makes up a democratic government, there remains enough respect for artistic work to try to make it have some commercial value. Most of the corruption in the process is, as you say, to protect the monopoly the bigger players have bought from the author, but the fact that he has anything to sell is one of the mysteries of democracy.

Look, I think the present system of collecting on performance rights is a bad system. Just be clear that although as a private business it is legal, it is not the law, or the government or the just command of the lord thy God. In a perfect world, a clearinghouse for author's rights would be ethical in its mission and kind in its administration and capable of distributing income to the lowly as well as the great. It should also be willing to set rates that most people (hopefully including its clients) would find reasonable. In fact in a perfect world, we would have no need for such an organization since every musician and venue owner would recognize that playing music someone else wrote makes their job easier or increases their income and a portion of that income should be returned to the author as a matter of fairness, and get the licenses themselves. And every author would set a reasonable price and grant liberal exemptions to charitable institutions.

slartabartfast

We are talking about organizations that have lobbied hard and wide to maximize the revenue obtained regardless of ethical right. They have manipulated congress, the judicial system and the public at large.

Next to the famous, "This too will pass..." that represents the statement that applies to the largest number of the organizations that have ever existed.

In fact the amazing thing about copyright law is that it gives any rights to the creator of the work at all. Look at how puny the political and economic resources of that tiny minority of writers that make anything at all from their work is compared to the power of broadcast media, recording and film industries, performance venues, telephone service centers, elevator companies, and yes even local neighborhood taverns. Everyone but the author would gain more from a system that made all artistic creation free to use and profit from. The average voter thinks music is already free.

Somewhere in the corrupt mass of self-interest that makes up a democratic government, there remains enough respect for artistic work to try to make it have some commercial value. Most of the corruption in the process is, as you say, to protect the monopoly the bigger players have bought from the author, but the fact that he has anything to sell is one of the mysteries of democracy.

Look, I think the present system of collecting on performance rights is a bad system. Just be clear that although as a private business it is legal, it is not the law, or the government or the just command of the lord thy God. In a perfect world, a clearinghouse for author's rights would be ethical in its mission and kind in its administration and capable of distributing income to the lowly as well as the great. It should also be willing to set rates that most people (hopefully including its clients) would find reasonable. In fact in a perfect world, we would have no need for such an organization since every musician and venue owner would recognize that playing music someone else wrote makes their job easier or increases their income and a portion of that income should be returned to the author as a matter of fairness, and get the licenses themselves. And every author would set a reasonable price and grant liberal exemptions to charitable institutions.

Woah, I never said anything about giving anything away for free. But as SB pointed out, even that is a difficult proposition these days.

However, I think we are mostly in agreement on other things.

 A good example of a DW in recent times was when that Christian singer took Amazing Grace and added a new chorus about My Chains Are Gone to the original.....that my friend is a derivative work... a song that is based on another pre-existing song. And he picked a good one because Amazing Grace is Public Domain.....no existing copyright.

yeah yeah ...Chris Tomlin did that ... and his version was sung at my mom's funeral so now I have to cry every time I hear it :(




but to Tomlin's credit he has lots of songs he wrote without borrowing - which is neither here nor there in this thread - just saying I am a fan of his 

slartabartfast

Woah, I never said anything about giving anything away for free.

I guess I was confused by your confusion over wanting to change the business practices of PRO's and wanting to "change the law." The law that applies is the copyright law. The obvious way to change that is to rescind the author's performance rights' thereby eliminating the legal basis for the PRO's to collect payment. That would be potentially throwing out the baby with the bathwater, unless you do want to be giving away something for free. The PRO's are private businesses. How do you envision changing the law?

Regulations. Laws to remove blanket fees. Placing the burden on the right people. Deregulation led to where we are, re-regulation will hopefully lead us back to the free and fair countries we all want to live in.