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Pithecanthropus wrote:

It's not about profit.  You could mount a play that no one came to and you'd still owe royalties.  You could mount a play where all the proceeds were going to cure cancer and you'd still have to pay royalties.

That's not true. You'd not necessarily owe royalties, but, assuming you don't have permission from the owner of the work, you are liable to be sued for damages.

If you are able to obtain permission from the copyright holder, you're in the clear.

.tsooJ

Eh?

.tsooJ

A lot of film companies borrow copyrighted ideas. Arguably most do so legally, though even some of the legal instances are less ethical than they are legal.

Beyond that it's a fairly standard practice for media labels to copyright in the label's name instead of the artist. The artist gets their name on the product and (hopefully) a paycheck and the label gets ownership of the product.

ScifiterX wrote:

Beyond that it's a fairly standard practice for media labels to copywrite in the label's name instead of the artist. The artist gets their name on the product and (hopefully) a paycheck and the label gets ownership of the product.

Uh, unless these deals are made with guns pointing at heads and stuff, tough luck.

Again, I don't see this happening all that often, either.

.tsooJ

Bull smurf.

.tsooJ

Alien wrote:

Bull smurf.

The gun is a simple lightning bolt, the lawyer is the vulture feasting on your liver every day for the rest of your natural life.

Who are these artists that sign their property rights over to their record labels? Who are these writers being stiffed by movie studios?

.tsooJ

Okay, sorry, but I still see nothing but vagueries, here.

You do realise that a lot of these stories are "let's pirate because big business is screwing the real artists" reasoning, right?

.tsooJ

I'm not doing your homework for you. I don't think I own any albums that didn't list composers after the tunes, though. I ususally do check the credits.

And even if they weren't listed, it's the registration that counts; not what's listed on the album. I know enough artists that released albums that had the most outrageous nicknames listed in the credits; they're still getting their royalty payments, you can be sure.

.tsooJ

Alien wrote:

You do realise that a lot of these stories are "let's pirate because big business is screwing the real artists" reasoning, right?

This is where the axion two wrongs don't make a right fits in. Just because the record company does a wrong doesn't make it right for someone to wrong them.

Alien wrote:

I'm not doing your homework for you.

And I not getting into the who list one, list another, list another trap. I could be at it for months even years, and you still wouldn't see. In part that could be due to our countries respective laws (who ever has the best lawyer here can get away with tons of BS). In part it's because how you view the wrongs of one group being used as an excuse for the wrongs of others.

ScifiterX wrote:

Alien wrote:

I'm not doing your homework for you.

And I not getting into the who list one, list another, list another trap. I could be at it for months even years, and you still wouldn't see. In part that could be due to our countries respective laws (who ever has the best lawyer here can get away with tons of BS). In part it's because how you view the wrongs of ones group being used as an excuse for the wrongs of others.

I don't think I exclusively listen to Dutch artists. Quite the contrary.

I haven't heard of this practice you describe as a widespread one. Perhaps you are referring to cookie-cutter songs written by professional writers (yes, sometimes on the record company payroll, sometimes owning their own label) writing songs for cookie cutter teenie bopper idols?

Simply stated: if a record label  or movie studio representative shows interest in your work, you know you've got potential gold on your hands. At that point in time: get your own lawyer. If you don't: chances are you'll be screwed. Too bad. Stupid people deserve to get screwed over.

.tsooJ

Rights and copyrights are a good thing in theory, in and of themselves. But moneyed interests with their paid lobbyists have gone too far and going farther, and soon it'll affect much of the industrialized world, also Third-world countries who seek to join in future. (If they opt out, no cookies for them).

(apologies for the long quotes)

With the controversial copyright reform PRO-IP and PIRATE Acts all but forgotten about, the United States Senate introduced a new bill designed to incorporate the best of both worlds for IP protection, dubbed the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Act of 2008 (PDF).

Unfurled last week on the Senate floor, the EIPRA seeks a number of new measures to bolster copyright protection in the United States, including the appointment of a “copyright czar” and corresponding government bureau (borrowed from the PRO-IP Act), and allowing federal authorities to file civil suits against and seize property of suspected copyright infringers (borrowed from the PIRATE Act).

EIPRA would also increase the penalties assessed against those found liable for copyright infringement.
...

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=12535

ACTA is on track for the end of '08.

The bill was well received at the G8 meeting, the meeting of the world's largest economic superpowers which takes place each July.  The G8 published a document entitled "Declaration on the World Economy".  The document contains a section "Protection of Intellectual Property Rights", which contains the following update on the status of the ACTA legislation:

We encourage the acceleration of negotiations to establish a new international legal framework, ACTA, and seek to complete the negotiation by the end of this year.

Thus it appears that ACTA may be set in place by the end of the year.  The new policy allows random warrantless search and seizures at the border.  Under ACTA, border patrol agents will be able to seize peoples’ laptops, iPods, and other electronics which they suspect contain illegally-obtained media.  If the border patrol thinks they've found such media on the devices, they are authorized to destroy them at their discretion.

The law may affect many due to the heavy prevalence of file sharing and other forms of copyright infringement in the U.S. What may surprise some, however, is that such seizure provisions are already in place albeit in a different form.

Recently released information reveals that the Department of Homeland Security has been granted the power to, without any suspicion of wrongdoing seize travelers’ "device(s) capable of storing information in digital or analog form," including “hard drives, flash drives, cell phones, iPods, pagers, beepers, and video and audio tapes" as well as "all papers and other written documentation."  After seizure, the materials may be taken off site.  The contents of the laptops can then be shared with other agencies and/or private entities for language translation, data decryption or other reasons.

http://www.dailytech.com/US+Border+Patr … e12562.htm

Depending on applicable law, Celine Dion might be owed a lot of money from an unlikely source:

Most people can think of a few songs that simply drive them crazy. The U.S. military is reported to use music as a method of torture against prisoners in the Guantánamo Bay prison. The point of the music, according to the Guardian, is to induce sleep deprivation and drown out screams.

The Guardian has also posted a list of songs it says are used by the U.S. military as torture devices. The list includes songs like Enter Sandman by Metallica, Bodies by Drowning Pool, White America by Eminem, and the Barney Theme Song. {!}

One song is specifically singled out by the Guardian as being used in the so called "torture playlist." The track is called Babylon by U.K. artist David Gray. Howard Knopf, a Canadian lawyer specializing in intellectual property, says that the U.S. military may owe Gray royalties for playing his music in a public space.

Knopf wrote in his blog, "Certain collectives are quick to collect money from those in nursing homes, hospitals, prisons etc, on the basis that these are 'public' places. Never mind that the audience is captive and it's their home, like it or not."

Gray told the BBC, "That is torture. It doesn't matter what the music is - it could be Tchaikovsky's finest or it could be Barney the Dinosaur. It really doesn't matter; it's going to drive you completely nuts."

In Europe, artists can veto where their music is played in public spaces. The catch here is the inability for Gray to veto the use of his music in an American territory when it is being used by the military. It would also be next to impossible for any music publisher to pursue the military for royalties.

Many may wonder if RIAA will tire of endlessly filing suits against Americans -- and on occasion losing them -- and start looking to get money out of the much deeper pockets of the U.S. military.

American Military Could Owe Royalties for Music Used as Torture Device

Rib ?