Sir Paul lost on 3 notes .... My Sweet Lord

Er, that was George

Guitarhacker 




Sir Paul lost on 3 notes .... My Sweet Lord

Yet, Lady A has not been sued for Need You Now as a rip on Eye In the Sky by Alan Parsons.

Go figure.

that was George Harrison, not Paul.
 
Also, Austrailian copyright laws are not necessarily the same as US.  Most of the info given here has been from the US perspective, however, I am sure they are similar.
 
I don't know anything about Public Domain for Australia.  And Herb has listed info on US PD, but I think he's a little off on that as well.  the PD copyright laws changed 1992.
 
anything created after 1978 is protected until 70 years after the death of the author (if multiple authors, the last one living is when the time starts). 
 

For works made for hire, and for anonymous and pseudonymous works (unless the author’s identity is revealed in Copyright Office records), the duration of copyright will be 95 years from publication or 120 years from creation, whichever is shorter.

 

works created prior to 1978 are covered in this document (and I think Herb's interpretation above is accurate, but I haven't verified each point).

 

http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ01.pdf

 

http://www.pdinfo.com/

 

Also, it has been mentioned, or eluded to, but I wanted to clarify:  it does not matter if distribution is free, for charity or for profit.  ALL distribution of covers not in the public domain must have a mechanical license issued by a holding company, Representative or by the copyright holder him/herself.  the law does not make provisions for non-profit, loss of profit or even free distrtibution.  ALL distribution (including streaming) must be covered by a mechanical license according to the law.

 

http://www.harryfox.com/public/DoIneedaMechanicalLicense.jsp

 

http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/

 

One thing about YouTube that is important to realize; Hardly anyone is being prosecuted for uploading covers.

YouTube's announcement of agreements are more accurately considered as announcements of intent to agree rather than a description of actual agreements.

Hardly anyone is being prosecuted for uploading covers so no one is paying attention to that nuance.

The artist and the studio that helped are fully liable should an asset owner actually take offense.

YouTube is working to perfect it's CYA policies. The Youtube policies don't cover you.


It's super easy to legally license CD and mp3. Check out http://www.harryfox.com/

It's getting easier to legally license sync to YouTube. Check out https://www.songclearance.com/ I want to learn more about that and start using a service like this.

Helping folks do it legally is a great service that you can provide and it protects your investment in your studio.



best regards,
mike

yeah... Beagle's right.... Harrison and the dates.. they (congress) change the laws every few years at the bequest of the industry lobbies. I don't keep up with the details....and simply grabbed that data from a web site.... likely violation a copyright in the process.

Nobody's getting prosecuted for posting covers because to do so would be such a huge time consuming task to contact everyone who is violating any given artist's song. The cost to send a notice to cease and desist would be too cost prohibitive for most artists surviving hand to mouth.

Just type the name of your favorite song into the search for youtube alone..... dozens of songs my as many people will come back... they are all violations of copyright law. then multiply that by the millions of songs, and you see the problem....

Since time is money, and lawyers don't work for free, the artist simply ignores the infringement violations and goes on with life. 

Using middle-men; paying them a service fee ((on top of the actual licences fees)) and they handle the payouts?. They mention Lawyers?, they say it's easier to process?. 

Point is; in regards to other sites who imply the process is complicated but can be made so much easier and charge extra (their service fees) pffttttt!!!  

When in fact for Aussies; if you go to the appropriate not-for-profit site it's actually IS very easy to obtain a licence, much easier than processing online business cards and best of all, you should only pay the licencing fee(s)! 

IMO Go directly to the appropriate sites for example, for Aussies, Apra-Amcos because they are legit, Not-For-Profit Organizations. Highly recommended! Let me point out; the OP is an Australian, so here I'm trying to give the appropriate advise! 


The cost to send a notice to cease and desist would be too cost prohibitive for most artists 


NO, not initially, because a cease and desist 'notice' can be sent by the copyright owner(s) this can be an individual or company for example; artists/writers may have their own label. 

Anyway... the cease and desist 'notice' is sent to for example; YouTube and they also have a section for owners to submit Copyright Infringement Notice -- Here 

That said; usually the above will resolve the matter especially if the notice is sent by the owner(s) along with supportive documents - evidence (at no cost) these documents can simply be E-Mail (or E-Form) attachments. 

A court cease and desist 'order' is issued by a government authority or judge. Don't confuse 'notice' and 'order'.

I have been through this process before and was successful and it didn't cost me anything, which means; I didn't have to take it to the next step.... cease and desist 'order'. 

Also, a lot (not all) of covers posted on YouTube may have actually been done legally, there is no clear way to determine as evidence for anyone who was not directly involved. 

The issue with paying sync fees directly to the asset holder is that the asset holder may be incredibly difficult to locate.

That is the historical reason for the third party, and the escrow services to have evolved.  Locating the rights holder can prove impossible and that means you may not be able to negotiate person to person.

I agree that if you can obtain a sync license without a third party service that this can be ideal. A sync license is negotiated per agreement as there is no statutory rate. This means the rate may be scaled by the asset holder and indeed, they may grant permission for just the cost of the paperwork if they like your project. They may also deny the use if they simply have no interest. It's up to them.

Anything is possible... but historically it has been very difficult to locate the asset holder without a service that is dedicated to the task.

The escrow services are providing a sketchy sort of band aid job... you can use an escrow service to demonstrate good faith as they rely on a Notice of Intent that supposedly puts the responsibility on the asset holders.

The asset holder is "obliged" to be aware of the NOI and respond with agreement or disagreement.

An issue to stay aware of is that the NOI is a "gesture"... and the outcome is simply being put off until later in the hopes that the asset holder will accept some payment rather than get frustrated when they learn that there is a NOI floating around that is addressed to them.

The point is... these services legally represent your interest with a NOI, BUT you may still be liable should an agreement not come to fruition. If the legal service is ineffective, or the escrow account goes bankrupt, then the NOI is just a piece of paper.

I wouldn't count on the NOI covering you if you use a song that the owner simply doesn't want you to use. If you want to rely on the NOI you may want to keep this in mind when choosing to mate music to picture.

If you've had a video editor cut music to a song and then you learn you have to yank the song... well, that gets expensive to patch that stuff up. It happens every day in the TV business where producers will jump the gun and start an edit without sync license and then learn the license is beyond the budget.



This is why the emergence of Rightsflow and Googles interest is noteworthy. If they start representing artists by providing sync management, Notice of Intent services etc. than the risks I mentioned above may be minimized. If Google gets Rightflow running they will probably build a reliable business and we don't have to worry that some entertainment lawyer may move to the Cayman islands with everyone's escrow account.



Rightsflow also has the possibility of becoming a bullying gorilla... an asset holder that disagrees with them is likely to be dwarfed by Google's capability to operate at the edge of, or outside the bounds of existing law.



It will be interesting to see how it all evolves and I am hoping that asset holders will welcome having a service that connects performers with publishers in a easy and affordable way. 

You can't really market anything aggressively until you have all the rights covered. I'm looking forward to being able to do it without the current expense of paper work and quarterlies. 


 

all the best,
mike

  


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