copyrighting with electronic artists

[Mr_Furious]

Do electronic artists fall under the same copyright act?

we were discussing this at school and the final verdict was.....Anytime someone plays your song in a club, on a cd, or even uses a sample, they have to get royalties, which in Canada are paid to SOCAN.

Does anyone know anything about this? It just seems that DJ's mix whatever songs they want with complete immunity. Most DJ produced mix compilations these days are 75% other artists, while the dj in question is only responsible for producing/composing at most 3 or 4 of the tracks.

Any thoughts?

 

[Syntax Error]

i'm pretty sure that mix cd's need licensing for the songs they play although not all have it.

 

[Mr_Furious]

if that were the case, then DJ's would make little to no money from cd's or maybe even end up owing money......

What about local dj's that make mix tapes? according to copyright laws, that's illegal

 

[AshG]

ok lets not confuse the issue by bringing in products for sale outside a club - strictly speaking, they all must have copyright approval.

the club issue is interesting tho - a friend of mine used to manage a club and he was concerned about brining in burned cds because all the cds the club owned (even comps) had royalties paid to the artists thru SOCAN. burned discs avoid this, and so are illegal for club play for this reason. apparently SOCAN does check up on these things once in a blue moon.
but so are whitelabels.
i know the way it works on british radio is that if someone like pete tong plays some mashup bootleg, then somehow(i don't know how), all artists bootlegged in the cut do end up receiving royalties.

 

[Syntax Error]

^^^

IT IS ILLEGAL!

it's just very hard for the artist to enforce. it cost a lot of money to hire an entertainment lawyer to defend the producers rights. and most producers are not all that rich. the police aren't gonna go out and start arresting dj's.

 

[patri©k]

this is a very 'touchy' subject. As you know there are many artists who record and produce work under psuedonyms and let's not forget the amount of 'white' labels that are out there.

Also.. SOCAN or 'society of composers and artists of North America'.. have no way of keeping track of vinyl sales, bootleg cassettes.. remember the mixtape raids a few years back... the studio mix tapes... I mean.. they know it would be a losing battle.

Besides.. the artists will still get royalties from the 'legit' vinyl or CD's they've released..the way that usually works.. with most record deals, most record companies compute artist royalties as a percentage of the record's suggested retail list price, SLRP. The SLRP is an approximation of the price received by the retailer. If an artist has a 10% royalty, it means he gets '10 points'. From this price, the record company deducts a packaging deduction and it's made because the artist should only get a royalty on the record, not the package. That result is what's called a 'base price' or 'royalty base'. They do get paid, however not all that they're entitled to... which is what the whole NAPSTER thing was about.

if you created something... and it was alllll your idea.. it was your brainchild... and when it was complete.. other people were using your shit without yer permission.. you'd get pissed... and you'd want your due.

im rambling.. leafs won.. cant concentrate.. we'll discuss this tomorrow

fattyp©2002

 

[Mr_Furious]

apparently HMV has just registered with SOCAN to pay royalties for the music played in stores.....but once again, how do they keep tabs on that?

 

[trinitydub]

Where to check is http://www.cmrra.ca - the Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency - they deal with licensing/royalties for all that stuff, and I know they've got some good info on their site, only I am way too busy writing an essay right now to look.

Last Minute Panic,
JC

 

[Deus]

When you buy a record doesn't that automatically enable you to play it wherever you want. I agree that putting it on a mix-tape compilation is illegal, but as a DJ you should be able to pay them where ever you want because that is what you paid for and that is why they were made in the first place.

 

[Mr_Furious]

apparently when you purchase cd's and tapes there's an added tarriff that basically gives you the right to copy, but I heard SOCAN also gets money for the playing of musice inside clubs too.

not sure how it all works, just seems to be a lot of speculation in this thread.

 

[AshG]

Originally posted by Deus
When you buy a record doesn't that automatically enable you to play it wherever you want. I agree that putting it on a mix-tape compilation is illegal, but as a DJ you should be able to pay them where ever you want because that is what you paid for and that is why they were made in the first place.

Firstly, that is NOT why the music was made. The fact that you pay a SOCAN fee when you buy records or whatever is there only to reimburse artists for 'personal' use of the records (and a limit of one backup copy per owner of the recording). The fact that you, as a dj, feel it is your right to play some of this copyrighted music is beside the point; it is actually an issue between the club and SOCAN, not the DJ and SOCAN.
There is a separate fee that all clubs must pay to SOCAN in order to play copyrighted music in their club. This on top of the fact that the music they play(if copyrighted), is typically already taxed with a personal use SOCAN fee(if the club purchases their own music).
This is why white labels and burned copies cannot, without infringing on copyright, be played in clubs.
As mentioned above, this policy is rarely enforced in practice, and in the case of electronic music artists, would probably inhibit rather than accentuate sales, so there is little reason to pursue the matter legally.

 

[nebula]

The problem: who audits SOCAN.

All the money that is collected by SOCAN goes into a big kitty, and is then divided among the artists which, based on random SOCAN sampling, appear to be getting play.

Since SOCAN does not regularly audit the clubs, the extra royalties which may have been paid on their recordings are more likely to end up in the pockets of Nellie Furtado than some unknown house producer.

While my few releases have been registered with Socan, about 10 years in the music industry have netted me a SOCAN credit of about 6 bucks. I know my material has gotten tons of college airplay as well as finding its way into the hands of a number of ambient DJs (and mix tapes).

Mix tapes are generally highly illegal btw, because no royalties are paid to the original publisher at all. In fact by law, prior to releasing a mix tape for sale, the party releasing must get permission from the publisher of each of the tracks used, who are entitled to a minimum of I believe 10 cents per song per unit sold.

So if my mix tape contains two Plastikman tracks, and I get Plus 8's permission to use them, then each unit sold will have a minimum of $ .20 going to Richie.

Nobody does this though.

 

[Mr_Furious]

Originally posted by nebula
The problem: who audits SOCAN.

All the money that is collected by SOCAN goes into a big kitty, and is then divided among the artists which, based on random SOCAN sampling, appear to be getting play.

apparently they've accumlated around $11,000,000 in royalties and they're not sure how to disperse it.