Ever More Reason to Hate Disney

Oh, copyright. Forever looking for news ways to complicate life.

I refer now to this piece on Staring at Empty Pages, about how music rights-holding organizations want to charge fees to venues where live music is played, just in case any of that music happens to be a cover of a song they own.

So if I own a small bar, and I like to sometimes have local musicians come in to play, I have to pay these performance rights organizations a fee, just to cover any songs that any of those musicians might play that are owned by those organizations (or the copyright owners they represent).

The author argues that this is not really fair--what if none of my live musicians ever does cover one of those copyrighted songs? What if they play strictly original compositions and ancient folk ballads?

The interesting argument raised here is, why should I (as merely the manager of a space where someone performs) be responsible for making sure that copyright isn't violated? Ideally, the musicians themselves would take care of copyright.

And if they don't, why is it my problem? Again, I just run this little bar. I have nothing to do with the music business. If you think someone is violating your copyright, talk to them!

It's a pretty nice deal for the rights organizations, though, basically making performance venues handle compliance for them (also, I wonder, do they get fees from those musicians who do pay copyright fees, in addition to fees from venues? Double-dipping is great if you can manage it).

As the post notes,

That’s prompted some small places to stop having music, and that’s a sad thing. And I wonder where it ends. Square dance callers, who use recorded music and often call dances in school gyms and church social halls, have long had to have BMI and ASCAP licenses. But will the halls now have to get licenses as well? If so, will they refuse to rent their facilities to events such as those, which use copyrighted music?

Good questions, indeed.

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