Copyright Law Blog

Knowing The Legalities Of Your CD

August 13th, 2009 at 06:35pm Under copyright act

Once you’ve finished your recording, what now? You have all the right mixes finished and everything is in its place, but there is still work to be done before your CD will truly be finished. By knowing what needs to be done after all of the recording is finished, you’ll have a much easier time getting from recording to successfully finished product: your CD.
After the CD is finished recording, the first thing which needs to be done is to send a copy off to the copyright office. This will ensure that no one else can release your music as your own, as well as letting you have a written record of what you have done. Normally, what you’ll need to do is to fill out a copyright sheet for the copyright office and send that in along with your CD and a fee for the copyright. Your copyright will last a number of years before expiry; at which point you will need to re-register your copyright.
After doing this, there a number of ways which you can license and register your compositions. ASCAP and BMI are the best places to start. Both of these organizations act as a sort of head office for keeping track of compositions. If anyone else ever performs your compositions, these organizations will send you a performance fee for your compositions. If you have not yet finished your CD, you should nevertheless consider registering with ASCAP or BMI for musician’s rights and then send them copies of any music you record to keep a record of this.
Next, you should think about how royalties for the use of your music by others will be administered. If someone wants to use a piece which you have composed for a compilation album, for example, you’ll want royalties. There are businesses which take care of royalties and publishing licenses such as Harry Fox; doing this will let you get royalties for each sale of your work by someone else (such as a compilation album maker).
There are other licensing options to think of as well. If another band uses your composition, or your music is used on television or for a commercial, these people must pay you a royalty fee along with a mechanical licensing fee. You still hold the copyright to your music, but basically ‘rent’ out the song to others for their use. ASCAP and BMI can usually track your composition’s appearances as long as you have registered your recordings with them and the person using your work goes through the proper channels to obtain permission to use your music.
Once this registration issue has been handled, you have some choices as to how to go forward with preparing your music for distribution. The growth of the internet as a marketplace and venue for entertainment means that you can approach sales of your music via physical CDs as well as digital distribution; e.g. – downloads.
Digital distribution offers the musician a lot of possibilities, such as websites like SnoCap, CDBaby and IODA. All of these take your music, convert them to MP3 format and distribute your work to websites and online jukeboxes which will make them available to the public. All you have to do to accomplish this is to register your CD or other recordings through this (there is a small fee) and the portal will do the rest of the work.
Whatever sort of music you are recording and no matter how you intend it to be used, experienced and enjoyed, you should always have the legalities of the recording process in mind. This will help you not only to sell your music, but to achieve wider distribution for your work.

Views on Copyright

July 23rd, 2009 at 12:42pm Under copyright law

From what is stated in the aim of copyright grants, the law in the first place intends to stimulate scientific progress, whereas protection of the individual moral and economic rights is secondary to that of the society. Following this pattern of thought, under utilitarianism, both neo-classicist and economic incentive rationale approaches, there is no intrusion of the moral rights of the author when a compulsory copyright license is issued. Now, let us consider the two primary approaches to the copyright in more detail.

The two views on the copyright are based on utilitarianism – both essentially take wealth maximization and allocative efficiency as the starting point of the analysis, however further articulation on the subject matter follows the opposite directions. Incentive maximization was formed in the early 18th century, when the Statute of Anne of 1709 based its approaches on the copyright law assuming that writers will not get stimulus to publish their works if their rights are not adequately respected through prohibition of reprinting.

As such, copyright is necessary to protect the market from being undermined in creative expression. However, there are a few shortfalls of this incentive arising from the increasing social cost, as copyright has to be limited in order to avoid possible monopoly pricing. Consequently, the incentive approach does not favour issuance of the compulsory copyright license. Under this approach, moral rights of a creator can be intruded to the extent to make it still perspective for others to continue to work in Science and Arts; however, in general the issuance of compulsory copyright license should be minimized.

Neo-classicists view the subject matter from an absolutely different perspective. Even though they do not deny the need for stimulus formation for creators, the incentive approach is still two-dimensional. The notion of the copyright itself is broadened to include the mechanism for market facilitation through moving already existent works to the highest potential value. Copyright will be mostly effectively implemented only if copyright owners are able to realize the full profit from the product created. As such, rationalization of the development of creative works would come as a consequence of selling the exploitation rights and in such way realizing the full benefits of copyright ownership. Consequently, copyright owners can charge public for the works created not to undermine the value, but rather to establish a guide for resource allocation in the future. As such, neo-classicists would favour the diminishing public domain.

A Diploma In Intellectual Property Rights For Science Graduates?

July 19th, 2009 at 04:26am Under intellectual property

hey i have completed a BSc chemistry and vocational biotechnology and wish to appear for the 2009 MBA entrances..since this year i would be doing nothing but preparing for the entrances i thought that i would take up a diploma in intellectual property rights which i have heard is pretty suited for science grads? i want to know how useful this course would be and if not suggested what other short time/ diploma courses could i look forward to,to avoid a one year gap which would be disastrous if i had to apply for an MBA college as i would be answerable to it

Does The Ordinary Individual Need A License For Intellectual Property Rights, Please?

July 18th, 2009 at 10:25pm Under intellectual property

will you be ripped off if you do not have a license for intellectual property rights? i only mean this question for individuals who may need this license, not for large corporations or other types of people who would actually know that they needed an intellectual properties rights license. and if they do need one what kind of company would be issuing the licenses for it?What kind of terms are included in such a license?And any other pertinent information you can provide about this subject (i.e. cost). thank you

Can I Be Sued For Violation Intellectual Property Rights?

July 18th, 2009 at 04:25pm Under intellectual property

This guys website had no saying of it being protected so I bought his program off his siteand i sold it on ebay. He is saying he has intellectual property rights, but in the package that I bought from him it is nowhere implied nor on his website that he has IP.
The package is information and links to public websites with a sales letter he wrote. Need help on this thanks.

How Is Ensurance Of Continued Remuneration To Performers Is More Imp Than Performer’s Rights? (copyright Act)

July 18th, 2009 at 10:23am Under copyright act

Rewrite your question so it’s understandable, and try again.

Which Of The Following Involve Intellectual Property Rights?

July 16th, 2009 at 10:25pm Under intellectual property

Which of the following involve intellectual property rights?
a. A college textbook.
b. A process to manufacture a product.
c. A recording of an amateur musician at a fair.
d. All of the above.

What’s The Difference Between Intellectual Property And Intellectual Property Rights?

July 14th, 2009 at 10:29am Under intellectual property

More specifically, is a patent an intellectual property or intellectual property right??

Where From I Can Do Diploma Programme In Cyber Law And Intellectual Property Rights In India?

July 13th, 2009 at 04:25pm Under intellectual property

I am pursuing LL.B. from Panjab University Chandigarh… well i want to do some additional diploma programme in cyber law and intellectual property rights with distance education. could you guide me in this regard?

Music Online Glossary – When Music, Music Careers and Pcs Collide

July 13th, 2009 at 12:42pm Under music copyright

The Internet has proven to be where music can be discovered, reviewed, discussed, shared, and purchased. Musicians know this and get online to upload their music and become a part of the world wide music machine process. They come on the Web at every age, at every experience level – musically and computer savvy. From youngsters starting out to seasoned musicians just learning where the computer on switch is, the workings of being on a computer can be overwhelming with everything else they have going on in their lives.

The Web also allows musicians access to music knowledge. Artists will come across difficult terminology and phrases that they do not understand. Compiled in the following mini glossary are music business, digital, organizations, record biz lingo, computer terms and basic need-to-know info. Hopefully, something listed here will help you navigate music online a bit easier, and so you know, this glossary is an excerpt of an extensive list found on Artistopia. A&R – Artist and Repertoire, aka talent scouts: a record company liaison whose duties may include to find, select and develop the music artist, band and/or songwriter.Affiliate Program – a way to earn income by linking your Web site to another site, depending on the action taken by the visitor. ASCAP – American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers which licenses and distributes royalties to it’s members’ copyrighted works. Bandwidth – has nothing to do with the size of a band but is a measure of the amount of information (data) that can be sent over a network connection in a given period of time. Bandwidth is usually measured in bits per second. Bitrate – The number of kilobits per second of data in your audio file. The bitrate you choose when creating an MP3 file determines the size and quality of the resulting MP3. The highest commonly available bitrate is 320 kbps and the higher the bitrate, the closer the encoding is to the original source of music. Blanket License – allows the user to perform any or all, in part or all, of the songs in the ASCAP repertory. What a warm and cozy license. Business Manager – an artist or band manager that specializes in the financial matters, including planning, investing, income, taxes, decisions and contracts. Buzz – to get people talking about a new artist, band, song or album, creating intense excitement and/or rumors. Clause – a chubby fellow in a red suit is Claus: in a record contract, there might be certain limitations, specifications, or modifications that stipulate the final outcome of that contract. Concert Promoter – with duties including ticketing, PR, marketing, and booking, this agency or agent responsibilities are for concert event promotion. Content – to make the Search Engines happy and have pages rank well in a search result, a good quantity of well written text aligning with the site’s keywords and theme updated regularly is a Webmaster’s steak and potatoes. Cookie – no, not chocolate chip, but a piece of software that records info about your visit to a Web site, then holds the info until the server requests it. Copyright – a set of exclusive rights regulating the use of a particular expression of an idea or information, in our case artistic properties, the songs and sound recordings. Derivative Work – a new work based on or resulting from one or more preceding works. Digital Licensing – the use of copyrighted music compositions including downloads, on demand streaming, limited use downloads and CD burning. Distributor – the agency or agent that handles the sales and shipment of the music (records, CDs) to the marketplace or basically, gets the product to the consumers. Domain Name – a sign post on the Internet, it is a unique name that identifies an Internet site. DRM – Digital Rights Management is a technology that protects a piece of intellectual digital property such as a music, video, or text file. Encoding – the process of converting audio to or from a compressed format like MP3 or WMA. Exclusive Rights – under copyright law, the privileges that only a copyright owner has with respect to the copyrighted work. Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC) – a file format for audio data compression that does not remove information from the audio stream, as MP3, AAC, and Vorbis do. Grammy Awards – an award ceremony for all genres presented by the Recording Academy for outstanding achievements in the recording industry: a gold megaphone for your mantel. Groupie – what’s the point of being an act without groupies? Overly enthusiastic fans with much love to offer. HTML – HyperText Markup Language, programming language for the world wide web. A web browser interprets the code written and displays it for a web page and web sites. Some very basic knowledge of HTML may help on some sites. Hook – a pirate: a music phrase, a passage, an idea – something (catchy and/or repetitive) that makes the song stand out and be more appealing and remembered. Hype – sensational and extreme promotion of a person, idea or product. Indie – an independent artist or band that desires to do-it-all-themselves and/or not affiliated with a larger record label. Intern – usually a college student job at a record label in a no or low paying position, more of an apprenticeship learning the ropes and gaining business experience. Internet Service Provider (ISP) – how and who connects your computer or network to the Internet, whether dialup, DSL, Cable, T1 or T3. Master Recording License – pertains to the recording of a performance itself, which are usually controlled by the record label. Mastering – the final stage and preparation in a recording before weapons of mass duplication, includes the consistency of audio levels and quality perfecting. Mechanical License – the use of copyrighted musical compositions for use on CDs, cassettes, record albums. Music Contracts – all the various bits of paperwork used in the music business, always read the “fine print” to the many contracts – recording, management, finders fee, general release contracts. When the contracts come in – time to get an Entertainment Attorney. Music Industry – all things pertaining and related to the business of music, dominated by the Big Four major labels: Sony BMG, Warner, Universal and EMI. Music Publisher – provides services such as marketing, pitching and promoting works written by songwriters. Deals with the commercial exploitation of music catalogs and songs. Press Kit – aka media kit, a prepackaged set of promotional materials for a music artist or band for distribution including song samples, bio, historical info, photos and contact information. Producer – duties include: controlling the recording session, guidance of the artist(s), coaching, organizing, scheduling of production resources and budgets, as well as supervising the process of recording, mixing and mastering. Publishing Royalties – income paid to the writer of a song. RIAA – Recording Industry Association of America, the organization that represents the interests of record labels and producers in the USA. Ripping – means to take an audio CD and record it to a computer in an uncompressed file format (wav). Digital audio extraction from one media form to a hard disk. Roadie – the road crew that travels with a band on tour. These hard working individuals do everything but the performance, are technicians, do the set up and take down, security, bodyguards, pyrotechnics, and lighting. Sampling Rate – the number of samples taken per second when digitizing sound. The higher the number, the better the quality of the digital reproduction. SoundExchange – an independent, nonprofit performance rights organization that collects and distributes digital performance royalties for recording artists and record labels when their sound recordings are performed on digital cable, satellite TV music, internet and satellite radio. Sound Recording – the copyright of the recording itself (what you hear, the entire production) as distinguished from the copyright of the song (words and music owned by the songwriter or publisher). Synchronization License – aka “synch” license, allows the user to reproduce a musical composition “in connection with” or “in timed relation with” a visual image, motion picture, video, advertising commercial – from the copyright owner of the music. Talent Agent – or booking agent, the representative of the music artist(s) that sets up the live performances. Vanity Label – a celebrity recording artist is given a label within a label and runs under the umbrella of the parent label.