no, not again - NOONE POST HERE ANYOMORE, LET THIS ONE DIE HERE PLEASE

I didn't know if it would have to be the artist that would be sued or if there was an organization. BUT IT DOESN'T MATTER - DON'T POST HERE ANYMORE.

Dave

[EDIT: Sorry, I was posting at the same time...]

We're about to embark on a feature. We're on a limited budget. I'd give my left one for Filter's "Hey Man Nice Shot," and Santana's "Put Your Lights On." I mean I REALLY want these two songs. I'm not even bothering to look into it, because I know I won't be able to afford it. That's just the way it is.

I understand a wedding video is different, but it's still a matter of the law. I wouldn't go 75MPH in a school zone because my client really wanted me too and I thought it was stupid to have the speed limit set so low.

It would be really cool to have a "group licensing" that you could buy into, or some kind of deferred licensing on projects that could potentially profit (like movies).

There is no copyright holder who can stop you from recording any copyright protected song that has been released to the general public. ASCAP, BMI, etc, they all have a licensing fee shedule for using one of their songs.

For example, If you video weddings, you can obtain a video service license from ASCAP that for a fee will permit you to make use of performances of ASCAP administrated music. All major licensing organizations have similar arrangements. Obtain the license and you are legal.

They are not stoping you.

On the other hand, wedding video's can be construed as historical documentaries. The fact that a protected song was performed and you captured it to video is merely you and your video camera being witness to the use. You do not sit down with the bride and groome and plan what songs to use. They are the ones using the song. You are merely documenting it and had it not happened that way, you would not have included it in your documentary.

I do not know of any test case where a wedding video had been pursued as a violation of coyright. Are you?

There is a way for the smaller guys to make the videos legally. Ask for permission! You never know what you will get.

It's fairly straightforward to get permission to record your own version of a song. It is much, much more difficult to get permission from the major labels to use their recording of a song. Forget about streaming it over the internet for any reason. Here is a detailed post on that subject:

http://mediasoftware.sonypictures.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?Forum=4&MessageID=205404

As difficult as it can be, it can also be easy. I just got permission to use a song I like a lot for wedding videos, a song by Point of Grace called This Day. Both Master Use and Sync Rights contracts and licenses are on their way to me now.

I'll have to pay royalties on the copies I sell and distribute, don't know how much but I think it's in the neighborhood of .08 per license per copy, for sure less than a buck per use with a minimum fee during the reporting period. This isn't rocket science, isn't even computer science.

I wasn't going to post any of this until I had all the details, but your post about a class action suit floored me. At this point you know a few things:

1. You want to use one or more commercial songs in your video
2. You want to be legal about it
3. Other videographers wouldn't think twice about not asking permission

So...ASK for permission! If you get it, great. I doubt seriously that you will ever be told no. You might very well be ignored. Then what are you going to do?

But...you'll never know unless you ask. I would spend my time and energy researching what you can do instead of trying to sue somebody. Just my two cents...

David

90 Days?

Hasn't even been 90 Minutes :)

Bob - you said You do not sit down with the bride and groome and plan what songs to use.

Sometimes you do. And sometimes we use a track off a CD to replace the crappy recording we got from the "historical event" and sync it up ourselves. That is DEFINITELY cause for a sync license.

Alright, don't let this get like the last one please, but I did want to say, that I wasn't trying to say that I wanted to sue the artist, I was trying to say that the people responsible for not enforcing the law to the extent that it should be enforced on the national scale, should be sued - not the artists. It's blatently broken every week, if not everyday.

example - Billy is stealing cars, the cops know, but they don't care because he's only stealing cars on a small scale from huge car companies and selling them to make a living. - this is what I'm talking about spot, sorry for any unclear content in my first post.

Dave

(please don't let this get out of hand)

SPOT and a few others are using flawed analogies. A truck is physical entity, you buy one you own it period. You can do what you please with it (within obvious limits but they're not imposed by who made it), copyright is totally and utterly different. To keep making that comaprison only adds to the confusion.
When you buy a record you buy a grant of rights, NOT a physical entity, you are perhaps given a physical entity (a CD) so you can exercise those rights. You own the physical entity but NOT the contents, you may only use the contents subject to the terms of the rights granted to you. A better comparison would be a drivers licence, it's a grant of rights to drive a car, it comes on a piece of paper or plastic, you don't OWN anything, I can't sell my drivers licence or passport etc. If you keep that concept clearly in your head then copyRIGHTS are very easy to understand.

I do agree though with what's been said to kick this off (again). Laws and regulations that aren't or only selectively enforced are the root of a lot of the wrongs in our society. They have a habit of being dusted off when it suits certain interests and yet ignored by the same groups. That comment needs to be taken in a pretty broad context of course.
Bob.

1) Get ACID. Learn to use it.

2) Work with local, hungry (and hopefully talented) musicians.

3) Ask nicely, and be prepared for pleasant surprises. On my documentary I got permission to use some great songs by some very good, regionally known musicians. One of them I knew personally, the other two I didn't. They were surpisingly generous and easy to deal with RE: the use of their tunes. Be ready and willing to be generous and easy to deal with when THEY ask YOU for something.

I suspect some of this angst RE: copyright is because people pay too much attention to aquiring / wanting big name artists and their tunes. Someone once told me, and I agree, that almost ALL of the difference between the best-known acts and "unknown" acts is LUCK, pure and simple. Meaning, there are tons of local / regional artists who are VERY talented and even EAGER to work with filmmakers who are at a similar place in their filmmaking careers as the musicans are in theirs.

I mean, does it really matter if the audience has never heard the tunes you feature in your films? I've heard Spot's tunes and really love them, and I very much respect his abilities as a musican. Most people I know, however, have NEVER heard of Spot. Does that somehow make his music less than beautiful? How many people have to know Spot's work to make it "valid" or "good?"

Forgive the rambling, but every time this subject comes up I just want to scream: WORK WITH LOCAL GUYS, DAMMIT.

Or buy ACID and DIY.

I agree with you, Bob, which is why I also used the other analogies. A truck can't be digitally replicated and distributed, and it has a clear chain of single ownership. But the principle of property holds true whether it's trucks, digital media, or consumables.

I take it that my notion is entirely ludicrous because It's absurd to expect them to enforce the law?

Oh geez, GIVE IT A REST. Please!

If the government enforced every law on the books to the letter, 99.99% of the population would be fined, in the process of being sued or in jail.

Yes, hate to tell ya, but your notion is total, complete lunancy.

You also wish jaywalking violations to be enforced strictly? How about spitting on the sidewalk? Where I live there's even a "law" when you can get fined if your grass grows too long before you cut it.

YES, its too bad that some abuse copyright laws. They always have been violated and always will be until the law is re-written and makes sense. End of story. I live in the REAL world. Technical violations of a law where NOBODY is harmed doesn't cause me to loose any sleep.

Those obsessed with trival copyright "violations" thinking something should be done about it are living in fantasy land.

PS I don't hate you. I LOVE everybody.

ONE TIME!

BB,yah kooool Dude, "Where I live there's even a "law" when you can get fined if your " RESPECKT! RESPECKT! - I gotta get me citizenship to BB's town - and NO mistake! RESPECKT to the "BB Posse" - rite on!

So where IS this place?

grazzzeh

Hiya Grazie... Home is Naperville, Illinois. It sounds like a little town. Not any more. Roughly 133,000 people. We're located about 30 miles West of Chicago.

http://www.naperville.il.us/

Funny story about the grass growing. Several years back in early spring I drag out the old lawnmower for the first time. It won't start. So instead of dragging the thing to some shop, I call up a guy that comes to you. Anyhow, he gets sick and is delayed by a couple weeks. Grass keeps growing. I'm out in the backyard and I hear excuse me sir, I turn around and its a city employee. He hands me a copy of the city ordinance which specifies maximum grass height, etc..

It strikes my funny bone. I ask the guy, so I'm paying taxes for you to drive around and measure the height of people's grass? Oh no sir, we don't do that... but we got a complaint and we check out all complaints.

Never did find out which "neighbor" turned me in <wink>

You think that's silly, when we first moved here about 20 years ago, we had just put the grass and landscaping in and had a heavy rain over night and the back yard was under a foot or more of water because our property is a little lower than East of us and I was worried about drainage. So I call the city, they send a couple of college age kids in hip boots that pretend they are "city engineers".

Their advice? Well, the water is suppose to be divirted to either side of your property, then in runs down your block (a cul-de-sac) to the FIRST sewer that's about 500 feet away. I inquire, how come no sewers on our block? They say its all covered in the city ordiances.

So they worry about grass being too tall, but don't give a damn about a foot of standing water. Typical city hall.

Let's bring this subject a little closer to home... but on the Other Side.

Quite a few people who regularly contribute to this site make some part of their living by producing and selling video "projects". We all distribute to limiited but very ardent audiences - very much like the people who regularly attend this forum.

I'm specifically speaking of (not FOR) Spot, myself and John Beech. I'm sure there are more. All are regular contributors to the site (well, no one like Spot - but he's in a class all by himself). And all of us are willing to do "the capitalist thing" where you invest your time, and considerable money, to create a product for sale. Spots got books, videos and programs, Beech has a long standing RC model Video magazine, and I've got a video library (also radio control hobbies) which has been popular for over 15 years.

Now we don't have the backing or the anonyminity of Warners or MGM, but the issues are the same. Because we deal with copyright infringement and theft, every day. And it hurts.

My stuff isn't being copied in China and sent around the world on the internet. It's distributed to an audience that's too limited. But when "Old Joe" dupes one of my videos and gives ten copies to his club, "for cost", it's direct theft of MY time and MY capital investment. And all this is done by very (otherwise) NICE people. Hey - they are doing a FAVOR for their friends.

It makes you wonder, everytime you pick up a camera.
Now with the ease of DVD duplicaton, you've gtot to really consider whether you'll even recap the money that you lay out.

That's the other side of copyright theft.

>>>That's the other side of copyright theft.<<<

At least for myself it goes a bit deeper than that as far as the "other side" goes. I have made many posts about the distribution side of things and why costs "cost" and frankly someone making a copy for some friends is not the *biggest* issue from the other side here. In my view it is really the bigger distribution channels in the US and the bootlegs in other countries. And compared to someone making 10 dubs it really is no wonder most lawsuits aren't about the guy making a handful of copies.

True story number 1 - At AFM one year a film that was sold to a few different countries "came back" in a mean way. One rep from one of the countries walks into the suite and tears up the contract and throws it in the face of the main guy. He says "How dare you try to sell me product that you have already sold in my country." In shock the President goes "What are you talking about? I know what terrirtories this film has been sold in, and trust me yours was NOT one of them, you were given sole rights." So the guy whips out a VHS, with full artwork/slipcover and says "Than what is this???" So the tape is popped into the VCR and sure enough it is our film - with a warning that it is a screening tape, not for sale..etc. AND a time code window. Long story short - someone had gotten their hands on a screener and packaged it, duplicated it and did a high volume to legit stores - so much so that it killed off the "legit" deal. This was in a country where people are (were) so desperate for western films they really did not care what they were watching was a screening tape. A $30,000 deal down the tubes in that case. And the same year another country came in with an almost identical story.

True story 2 - in the United States one of the biggest films that the company put out went out the rental in the normal way. Out of the money we got about 50% off the top went to the main producer/company who financed the film. The 50% remaining had to be split between the production cost on our end, than what was left of that came out the distribution side - duplication, artwork, printing, publicity, marketing and so on. All this is fine and dandy - however about 6 months after we start getting product - brand new - back from distributors. They are asking for full credit on *their* unsold product. Follow me here? What happens is that the major chains such as Blockbuster will buy bulk and buy deep to get their discounts from the big distributors. Than about every 6 months they do stock rotations and count what is in the main warehouses - they pull all the over stock and send them back for credit and that, of course, trickles down to us. And here is a fact about all the units that are moved in the first month - sure Disney can claim that 10 million units of such and such went out the door - but no one ever says how many come back 6 months later. Disney and other large studios can swallow those types of returns but most smaller indy's can not.

True story 3 - My Amazon story. Amazon has sort of become the Wal-Mart of the web. After hearing how they were doing on the film side of thing I approcahed them. At the time we were getting complaints from people saying Amazon was selling some of our product that was listed at $9.95 for close to $100.00. I went to them and said "Why are you doing this?" and they said "We sell based on what our distributors/vendors tell us" So we talked back and forth and they decided it would benifit both of us if they started to deal direct with us and bypass the Baker and Taylors/Ingrams/VPD and so on. So I send them off our normal deal - the same deal we had with Ingram, VPD, Waxworks etc etc. They send back their "standard" contract - and when I read it and I fall over laughing. Among other things they want us to send them a minimum of 10 copies with no money being exchanged until they sell them AND they would not pay for postage. On top of this they want 75% off the SRP, but we can set the SRP at anything we want they tell me. So I, as nicely as I could, send back our "standard" deal, same one they already got, execept I break it down. FIrst I stress that they are, in a nutshell, asking us to supply them product for FREE. I explained that we never go 75% on only 10 copies but if they ordered - in one way sales - at least 200 pieces we could talk about 45%, the "standard" at the time. Also we never send out a small amount of units to anyone without them paying for postage...again, you order 50 - 100 peices we might talk about free postage. I explained the terms for payment and when they sent us a credit app we could work out details. And I also explained that the SRP was already set - at that time had been set for a year - at $9.95 and there was no way we could even get the product out the door to them at the cost they were requesting. They came back with a "Sorry you feel that way. Amazon does not negotiate. We have the same contracts for everyone, no exceptions." Which I laughed at saying, in part, that I doubted that was true because they told me, at the time, they were paying Ingram $50 - $75 for each piece of our product when I know for a fact that Ingram was not even selling one off copies to mom & pops for that much PLUS if they *really* demanded every vendor cut 75% off SRP they would have only been paying $10.00 - $25.00 based on our real SRP's. Of course being caught in a lie they could not get out of they just shut up and never returned phone calls or emails after that. And this lead to them refusing to deal direct but still to this day - many years after - offer some of our titles for almost $100.00 a pop. Not only that they have been telling customers for years the studio does not have any more copies available *AND* in many cases you can buy a "used" copy for "only" $49.95 down to $19.95, still way over the $9.95 SRP. They flat out REFUSE to remove our products from their site and they flat out REFUSE to adjust their prices because they INSIST that Ingram is telling them that is the correct SRPs. For the record we stopped dealing with Ingram when they refused to pay overnight shipping on rush orders. They removed all our product from their catalog...so yet another lie from Amazon.

So - now you tell me why it is again that if some guy dubs off 10 copies for his friends we here on the other side should feel threatened? I have Amazon wanting free product that they can sell and make money on, I have the "can't live without" distributors wanting credit on product they already paid for 1/2 a year or more ago and people mass bootlegging films - and that means a lot more than 10 copies.

So back to the topic of following the law - I do not endorse taking things from people and turning a profit from it. If you have 10 bucks than buy the damn video/dvd/cd/tape. On the other hand walk into a Transworld owned store and look at a new release - there it is, only $29.95 lets say. Fine - you buy it, no problem. Transworld turns a profit - you helped them make money. Hovever keep in mind they did not pay $29.95 for it - the did not pay $19.95 for it - they paid $15.00 or less for it. Again - this is fine, it is how the real world works. But lets turn it around again - walk into another chain store - lets see Kmart has it for $19.95, Wal-Mart has it for $18.75 and Target has it for $15.00. Well certianly that sounds a lot more resonable to me...but wait, wouldn't they *all* have to buy this at the same cost? How can Target sell it for $15.00 if that is what they paid for it? Ahhhhhhhhh....now this is the thing. Why do you think mom & pops have all but vanished? Why do you think many of these semi-regional chains go into Costco and Target and buy tapes and DVDs ther einstaed of from a distributor when they come out? Because the main distributors are being bypassed and many now deal direct with studios...but a small guy can not even get in the front door with a major. And this comes back full circle as to why people do the things they do - and right back to the whole licensing issue at hand.

As much as I agree with Spot, and other musicians and artists, I also agree with every musician or artist I have ever worked with or known that just want their music/art to be seen/heard. I don't know too many, or if any, people who would go the distance to see someone locked up and fined millions of dollars because they copied a video for a friend, or even 10 friends. On the other hand going back to my true story 1 - we started making dubs of tape with not only timecode burns and "screening copy only" but started to add things like "[Actors name] copy", "[Make up artists] copy" and so on so if someone came back we could trace it We did this maybe 12 years ago or so - The Academy started doing something like this last year (or 2 years ago now) with their screeners. Yes people are concerned more now because of the internet and yes the MPAA is going after people but you know I don't really expect to get any money from some kid in Merced who might have a copy of a film I may have worked on on his hard drive. I am way more concerned about the guy who is duplicating a sceening copy and packaging it and selling it on ebay and to video stores and so on. Hell - when it comes down to it - I say shut down ebay - they are no different than file sharing except they are getting away with allowing people to collect money for illegal stuff - DVDs, videos, images and so on.

How would I go about obtaining permission to use music from a big company? Is there a phone number or something?