sharke
I appreciate your points slartabartfast, but if you read my posts closely you will see that I was commenting specifically on SongCraft's comment that the bill also affects Spotify and other streaming sites, not broadcast radio. I have not read the bill, but since Spotify already pays performing artists for every stream, it's not clear what is meant by this. I can only assume that the bill seeks to make Spotify pay more to artists than the current rate. SongCraft went on to suggest that sites like Spotify would have to change their business model to "adapt," if they didn't want to "fade away" (i.e. go out of business). If this is the case then I oppose it as I would oppose any attempt by government to interfere with a business's prices.
A quick Googling around left me in the dark too - all the articles I've read seem to be quite vague about what it means for Spotify. Perhaps either you or SongCraft could enlighten me to this end.
I can not speak to Spotify specifically, but if you and the newly departed SongCraft were to have a serious discussion, you would both need to do a great deal more homework to understand the issue. I recognize that a pseudo-religious animosity to any government intervention in the market may make understanding the issues moot, but I take your question in good faith.
The main thrust of the bill is to return copyright protection to recordings when they are played on broadcast radio. There is some overlap in what is considered broadcasting, the law treats a service like internet radio differently than it does on demand streaming or downloads. The distinction being that if the broadcaster chooses the playlist, and everyone receives the same song at the same time, that is broadcasting ("nonsubscription broadcast transmission"), even if the medium is the internet rather than radio waves. If the user chooses the song to download that is online streaming (single play) "subscription" distribution. So to the extent that online services have successfully been claiming to be broadcasting (operating an internet "radio station") and thus not paying recording owners anything for playing recordings, they would have to do so.
Another issue arises from the history of recording rights in copyright.Before there was technology to record sound, the copyright statutes did not envision that it would arrive, so when it became possible to record music, the copyright law protected the songwriters and the publishers of paper music, but was mute on the rights of the creators of recordings. Early cases involved protection for the punched paper used in player pianos, and the courts over a number of years made decisions based on the logical extension of rights to this new technology. State legislatures in some cases provided specific protection, and eventually the federal copyright law did recognize the right to collect revenue from the recording rights (as was previously done for the author rights) in a recording. This was included in the Copyright Act of 1976, but it provided protection only to recordings created after 1972. By that time there was a large amount of recorded music out there, some still very popular, but since the law did not include them, they could be used in many commercial ways without paying their creators. This new bill would extend federal protections to those older recordings. So if a non-subscription streaming service were to have a catalog of old recordings that it was serving up to users without paying for the recording rights, that would change. As you noted previously, Spotify pays for other audio streaming rights already.
A third issue arises from how Spotify and other music services pay for their recording rights. As others have noted it is rarely the performer who is paid, but usually the owner of the recording rights. Spotify has deals with a number of major record companies, and in many such deals there is a metered payment to the record company without any reference to who played the music that was recorded. In many cases contracts between the performer and the record company make it unlikely that performers will ever see much from these deals. Studio musicians, engineers and producers are often doing "work for hire" and have zero rights in the final product. The bill does not give such hired performers any new rights. In a some cases the bill would require payments be distributed to performers where a "
statutory license" is used (actually where the work is eligible for such licensing). Currently that would be a non-interactive service like internet radio. How that would actually play out is murky. Assuming that the section applies, it would specify a division of license fees between the recording company and various types of free agent musicians who performed the recording, some of whom are being paid nothing now.
the bill:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/1733/text Title 17 USC which the bill amends and more:
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/circ92.pdf A pretty understandable summary:
http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=f67da04a-b8df-49c8-8327-7bed8f266e9b A very complete and balanced survey of the issues involved:
http://copyright.gov/docs/musiclicensingstudy/copyright-and-the-music-marketplace.pdf