composers
Europe’s dysfunctional private copying levy to remain
Europe’s “private copying levy” system is a mess. You might pay a hidden charge of €3.15 in Spain for an MP3 player but a full €25 in France. An inkjet multifunction printer levy could run €178.84 in Belgium but only €12 in Germany.
Continue reading »Unlawful Use of Copyrighted Karaoke Songs Costs Bar $49,000
Royalty-collection group accused Tucson, AZ restaurant of using 14 copyrighted songs over two nights of karaoke without a license. Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) , which collects license fees on behalf of songwriters, composers and music publishers, has been waging a long battle against venues of all sorts to make sure they pay for the privilege of playing copyrighted music to their customers, cover and karaoke songs included.
Continue reading »Musicians dropped from Digital Britain debate
p2pnet news view P2P | Politics:- “Mystery” surrounds the decision to uninvite the Featured Artists Coalition from a Digital Economy Bill dog-and-pony-show — sorry, debate — organised by The Telegraph and Virgin Media, says MusicWeek . “A panel of digital experts, including UK Music chief executive Feargal Sharkey, shadow minister for culture Ed Vaizey and FAC acting chief Jeremy Silver, had been due to take part in an online discussion about the key issues raised by the legislation,” says the story. ISP Virgin has just has just announced it’ll introduce DPI spyware that “analyses anonymous ISP traffic data” to supply information on the total volume of file-sharing” p2pnet posted yesterday.
Continue reading »Pirate Party Clashes with Music Industry Boss
Panel on P2P turns heated as Patrick Rakow CEO of BASCA (British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors) says Pirate Party’s plan for five year copyright limit would “completely undermine” the ability of content creators to make a living. Yesterday was day one of the three day In The City music conference in Manchester, England, and it got off to a bang with a panel devoted exclusively to the issue of P2P. Rick Falkvinge, founder and chairman of the Swedish Pirate Party which won 7.13% of the Swedish vote in the 2009 European Parliament elections, giving it as many as 2 seats in the European parliament, addressed the crowd by detailing 5 copyright law reforms proposed by the party.
Continue reading »JUDGE: Ringtone Not a Public Performance
American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) had sued Verizon Wireless demanding that it be compensated each time a person’s ringtone played in public, calling it a “public performance.” Back in June it was first mentioned here how the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) had begun suing mobile telephone companies with the argument that the playback of ringtones on a customer’s phone requires a public performance license, and that without one they are committing copyright infringement. “When a ringtone rings in ‘public,’ it is undeniably a “public performance” as those terms are defined in the Copyright Act,” reads a brief submitted to the court. Even further startling is that it argued that they are a public performance even if it’s switched to vibrate, turned off, or located at home.
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