Copyright Enforcement Coming to a bar near you
 

Florida bar sued for not paying royalties. Check it HERE in a news article. DJ, background, and live performance are covered. Do you suppose this might encourage bars to hire local artists playing original tunes?

Bob

Maybe, and they should pay the ASCAP (or whatever) fees, but there are alot of restaurant and bar venues and only so many undercover ASCAP PIs.

Yes, but the potential for a $150k fine (the figure stated in the article) would probably be significant enough to force most venues to either pay the ASCAP fees or adopt an "oriiginals only" policy.

As someone who has always been in original bands, I hope that it will open up a few more opportunities.

There will still be plenty of venues that pay the fees in order to bring in popular cover bands, because I'm sure that's still going to be the more lucrative option.

This has been going on with ASCAP and BMI for years, of course. In several cases that I know of, the venues will only allow original or public domain music. In one case that I know of, the venue had a good lawyer who was able to negotiate lower license fees because a majority of their acts do original or public domain music.

In most cases when a small venue is threatened (with "get the license or be sued") by the ASCAP and BMI reps, I suspect they just drop live music altogether. Technically, an original artist who happens to be a member of ASCAP or BMI can't even grant a venue the right to host performances of his/her own work without a license. In joining the performance rights organization, he/she has granted his/her organization (ASCAP, BMI or SESAC) the power of attorney to collect fees.

In my opinion, there's very little silver lining here for original acts who gig on the local level. The ASCAP and BMI small performance licenses are much more of a hindrance than a help.

Gary

I played in a quintet many years ago (mid 70s) in New Orleans with a drummer who was an ASCAP rep. Heard lots of war stories from the front.

No doubt true, unless, of course, you are an artist or composer who depends on the lawful payment of royalties from your recording contract(s)

John Locke's applied economic theory, applied in the US as Capitalism, ensures that even little guys can own land and profit from the work of their own hands (or "intellectual" property).

No where on earth, before this, were "commoners" allowed such privileges. Otherwise we'd all still be serfs and indentured servants.

I kinda like it, having written a few songs I'd want protected against unlicenced use: by copyright, and businesses who specialize in the "biz" as revenue collection agencies.

Of course our Constitutional Rights are always under attack by the popular misconceptions of Communists. They don't like private ownership of anything, and would have everything publically owned, including your house and the guitars in it.:sick:

How many "little guys" do you know (and by that I mean original acts who gig on the local level) who have received royalty checks from BMI or ASCAP? There are a few regional acts that I know of, and they are far outnumbered by countless "little guys" who've never received a penny from ASCAP or BMI for playing their original music in licensed venues.

Gary

The clubs simply need to pay a few hundred dollars per year for their blanket license (as opposed to an event license). That covers DJ, karaoke, live music, radio, the sound from a big screen TV (which will contain copyrighted music)...etc. It's not a big deal and they rarely sue or shut down anyone, ASCAP/BMI simply wants the revenue from the annual license fee. The threats are typically leverage to encourage compliance, although every once in awhile some club will be made an example of to encourage compliance by other establishments in the area. So if you are a club owner, pay your annual blanket license fee and there's no worries. Enforcement efforts come and go in waves from time to time here in Northeast Ohio.

Your registered copyright won't get you doodly in performance royalties unless you register the work in the US with either ASCAP or BMI as a composer, artist, or publisher....whichever applies. Other than mechanical royalties, there aren't a lot of ways for a composer or publisher to make money, and it's now made all the worse these days by illegal file sharing.

It never ceases to amaze me that a restaurant or club thinks they should get a free ride because they are a little guy. Some only play cd's for backround music and feel they shouldn't have to pay a royaly if there's no dj or live music. The simple way around that is to use a service like Muzak and they'll pay the royalty for you.

Nevertheless, the potential is there, and the rule of Law is in the favor of the originator of the product.
Whether or not that product is received by the public in numbers that amount to anything is the other side of the quotient.

It's not usually enough to have a good song. You must usually get that song placed with a publisher, and promoted.

I personally have never had any of my songs placed with a publisher, though I have pitched many to artists and publishers.
The next step in the process is registering a song that has some "action," with an organization like BMI or ASCAP.

Persuant to the original thread, I'm just saying that I would want my intellectual property protected by someone too. Especially if it were my sole means of support. The law works for you when you're creating, not copying or "covering."

John Fogarty lived for years off his mechanical royalties checks, while his career was in limbo wrangling with Fantasy.

GSMC Bob,

Its been ten years or so since I've had discussions with any venue managers about what their ASCAP and BMI licenses were costing. Back then, two of them told me that they were paying between $400 and $500 each for the minimum ASCAP and BMI licenses for six months. That's a minimum of $1600 a year for very small time operations - one or two nights of live music per week in small capacity (under 75 seats) venues. Unless things have changed drastically since then, I don't see how any venue could be getting a "blanket license" for a few hundred dollars.

BTW, I'm in Ohio also. Please send me a private message if you have any specific examples of venues that are getting a blanket license for a few hundred dollars. If things have changed that much, I'd be curious to talk to the venue managers (if they'll discuss it) and learn what's up.

Gary

I think it was performance royalties that kept him going for his recording situation was a mess.

Maybe BMI and ASCAP should go after the individual musician that plays covers for profit, I don't know, but for sure they should go after DJ's.

After much Google searching, I finally found some hard data the on license fees for different sized venues (in this case bookstores, with or without cafes).
http://news.bookweb.org/features/3403.html

LOL, its no wonder that one bookstore I know of won't even let their music acts play "Happy Birthday". It also appears that in the case of bookstores, there's a heavy penalty (for the BMI rates) for having more than one person in the act. That doesn't make sense to me. Two performers doesn't mean that twice as many songs will be played. On the other hand, ASCAP charges the same heavy rate ($34.50 per performance) irregardless of the number of people in the act. Curious stuff.

Altogether you'll have $70 or $80 in ASCAP and BMI fees (there's also a square footage fee) for one live performance of a duo - not to mention the bookstore can still be sued by SESAC if the duo happens to play the wrong gospel song. :roll:

Gary

ugh. don't get me started. on the one hand i support this enforcement, because i'm an originals-only guy (+ public domain original arrangements). i think protection of created works is a good thing.

at the same time and in that vein, i'm also bmi. so really... i'm not even permitted to play my own bmi protected original material in an originals-only venue (not paying fees)... this includes house concerts, most coffeehouses, many small performance spaces, etc.

i've been mulling the bennies of bmi and these scenarios as they relate to my little place in the universe for a while...

sigh.

From the info in the link in your subsequent post, it sounds like the club owners I dealt with were paying just for the jukebox/DJ/pre-recorded music in their annual fees. Either that or they were only paying one licensing body. $300 to $500 annually was the range I kept hearing a few years back when I was more active in the smaller club scene. Good info on the fee schedules!!