It looks like the CRB hasn’t won just yet. In a recent article on CNetNews.com, they are reporting that after receiving thousands of emails and letters, Reps. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) and Don Manzullo (R-Ill.) have introduced a bill in Washington called the Internet Radio Equality Act that would invalidate the March 2nd ruling by the CRB that would cause most Internet radio stations to fall silent in the very near future with a retroactive rate hike. The CRB is calling for the royalties currently paid by Internet radio stations to be raised 300 - 1200% by 2012 - rates that terrestrial and satellite radio stations would never see. The bill being introduced calls for a flat percentage of 7.5% of revenues to be paid by the Internet radio stations rather than the draconian per listener-per song fee of .08 cents climbing to .19 cents by 2010. The CRB royalty rate plan seems like an outrageous effort on behalf of the government, the RIAA, and SoundExchange to strangle webcasters. While musicians deserved to be paid their fair share of royalties, the burden should be shared equally by all outlets - something the CRB ruling clearly overlooks. Let’s hope that the bill on Capitol Hill gets some good lobbying and that the ruling is overturned for a more reasonable and equitable agreement. Internet radio stations should certainly pay royalties, but not at the expense

If you haven’t done so already, please visit SaveNetRadio.org and sign the ePetition to keep Internet radio alive.  It looks like their efforts are working. For an interactive diagram of the whole issue, click HERE. Please join me in signing the petition to help keep of the last great online music resources in business.

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

I got an email yesterday from Tim Westergren, founder of the Internet radio site Pandora.  Pandora is my personal favorite of the many sites out there, and I’ve mentioned the problems facing Internet radio and Pandora in a previous post.  The email I received asked me to sign a petition to help convince Congress to overrule the incredibly high, and seemingly unfair royalty rates now imposed retroactively on Internet radio sites by the Copyright Royalty Board.  I urge you to join the effort to help save sites like Pandora that will most likely go out of business if something is not done to change this ruling.  Please click HERE to sign the petition to let your government representatives know that sites like Pandora need to stay online.  Save Internet Radio!

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

There are many videos of classic jazz television performances from the 1950’s and 60’s posted on YouTube - videos of Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, John Coltrane, Duke Ellington and more. I posted about Google Video and You Tube back in January. Since the acquisition of YouTube by Google Video, most of the videos on Google Video are now hosted on YouTube. Unfortunately, both Google Video and YouTube are currently blocked websites in my school district because there are many videos hosted on the site that you wouldn’t want young children to access - especially at school. In order to view these videos, you must be logged on to the site, even if you download the video player that comes with Google Video. This means that I can’t show any of these amazing videos in my classroom. Or can I?

In an effort to seek a solution to this problem, a student told me about a cool application called TubeSock that allows users to download YouTube videos and convert them to a number of file formats - including audio only. Simply open the application (you can get a free trial version that allows you to download the first 30 seconds of a video or you can pay for it $19) and paste th YouTube URL into the provided window, choose the file format you’d like to download the video in, and TubeSock does the rest.

So, is this legal? There have been numerous stories in the press lately about lawsuits against Google for the posting of copyright protected content on their site. However, using short video clips in the classroom is protected under the Fair Use provision of the DMCA. While there a certainly copyright protected videos that are hosted on the site, the jazz performances that I have seen have been there a long time, and they have not been pulled off of the site yet. The copyright question is a bit confusing to everyone right now. Is it legal to post OLD television performances from the 1950’s and 1960’s? Probably not without permission. Is it legal to use these performance in the classroom? While they are on the site, I would say it is a Fair Use, but we’ll see…

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

What Songs Are In The Public Domain?

Many people mistakenly assume that certain songs are in the public domain, purely because everyone knows them and sings them. Songs like Happy Birthday and Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer are simple not in the public domain. If you’ve ever wondered how you find out what is in the public domain, and what isn’t you can either do some simple math (the year the composer died plus 70 years) or you can check out a great website called PD Info. The site contains a listing of almost every song in the public domain. There is a handy little search engine that allows users to input the song title and it will let you know whether or not the song is in the public domain. There is also a library of free downloadable sheet music, and a great guide to public domain music and copyright law. It’s great resource for any interested in using music for multimedia projects or arranging works for performing ensembles. Check it out.

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

The Failure of the DMCA

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 (DMCA) was written to protect works in the digital domain from unauthorized duplication and the circumvention of technologies that protect the works from being copied (DRM). DRM has had quite an unwelcome reception by consumers, and there have been some changes to the original law based on the now landmark case where Sony was implemented DRM on their CDs without consumer knowledge - eventually recalling all of the effected CDs for a full refund. There has been quite a bit of press recently about EMIs decision to drop DRM from their music being offered on iTunes - one of the many online places to purchase DRM protected music. Some say it is a move by Apple to avoid becoming another Microsoft in the EU. Nothing stings quite as hard as anti-trust litigation in the European courts.

I was recently reading one of my favorite technology blogs, TechDirt, and I came across a fascinating article about Bruce Lehman, one of the original architects of the DMCA, who now admits that the DMCA has been a failure. He is quoted as saying: “our Clinton administration policies didn’t work out very well” and “our attempts at copyright control have not been successful”. Well said Bruce. While I am a strong advocate against music piracy, I am equally firm on my stance against DRM. When I purchase something I believe that I have the right to do whatever I want with it - as long as I am not breaking any laws. When I bought my car it didn’t have a device that would shut down the engine the moment I drove over 65 MPH. When I bought my cell phone it did not have a device that would give me a small shock when I used it in the car while I am driving. If I get caught breaking these laws there are consequences - and there should be - but can you imagine the American people’s reaction to cars that shut down and cell phones that shocked? DRM is the same exact thing in my opinion. It is a device that controls my actions with legally purchased music. One of the down sides of DRM is that the protections placed on the music are often paired with lesser-quality file formats. Apple’s Protected AAC format is nowhere near the quality of an AIFF file. So not only are you buying music with protection on it (CDs do not have these protections) you are buying an inferior quality product. I am hopeful that the EMI move motivates American record companies to do the same: drop DRM. Until then, I’m sticking with CDs.

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

In what could be the start of something big at the iTunes Store, British record company EMI announced yesterday that they will begin offering DRM-free music on the iTunes Music Store - at a higher price. The New York Times ran an article yesterday that detailed the deal between EMI and Apple. For $1.29, an increase of 30 cents, you can download a higher quality music track without DRM - allowing you to make as many copies of the music as you’d like. I read the article and asked myself a few questions:

1. Is this just a way for iTunes to raise prices?
2. Why would anyone buy a track for 30 cents more in order to make as many copies of the music as they’d like?
3. Is the increase in sound quality worth the 30% increase in price?
4. What message is iTunes and EMI sending when they offer DRM-free music?
5. When will iTunes drop DRM protection on their other offerings? Will there be an increase on those files as well?

I think the move announced yesterday is more of a marketing ploy and revenue generator than an attempt to deal with the DRM controversy swirling around the music industry. It is still a much better option to purchase the physical CD and import the highest quality audio into your iTunes library - and it’s DRM free! Perhaps the real reason for the increase is to help dull the shock of the prices of the Beatles tracks that should be on their way to the iTunes Music Store in the near future (EMI distributes all of the Beatles music).

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

Believe it or not, the last of the lawsuits over the original Napster was finally settled yesterday in a German court, seven years after Napster first appeared - forever changing the music industry.  In an article in today’s New York Times, the German media giant Bertelsmann has finally settled the last lawsuit with EMI over it’s financial backing of the original Napster.  Back in 2000, Bertelsmann provided $85 million in loans to get Napster up and running and they have been paying settlements to the many record companies who sued them over that funding.  Since the original Napster only facilitated illegal file sharing they really had no choice but to make these settlements.  In a similar settlement last year, Bertelsmann paid the Universal Music Group $60 million - a settlement that paved the way for Universal to buy Bertelsmann’s music publishing unit for $2 billion - seems like a pretty good deal to me.

So who’s next?

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

The Internet Public Library is one of my favorite websites for finding public domain works on the web.  This not-for-profit site began in 1996 with a purpose of providing researchers, historians, and scholars access to works that exist in the digital domain.  Included on the website are moving images, music, audio, text, and software - all that are in the public domain.  This means that virtually everything you find on the site can be used in the classroom for projects without fear of violating copyright law.

One of my favorite things to do with students is film scoring - and they love it as well.  The Prelinger Film Archives is hosted on the site and it is amazing.  There are thousands of films from the public domain available in a wide variety of formats.  These films include old horror movies like Nosferatu and classic TV commercials.  You can download any of them for use in student projects.  There are also thousands of audio files on the site - everything from the Grateful Dead to famous speeches from history.  You can use any of these files with sequencing software to create interesting loops and mixes - and you can rest easy about copyright law.

I strongly recommend you check the site out for yourself and spend some time browsing through the large collection of works available.  It is an important website for anyone concerned about preserving public domain works.

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

I received an email recently from a band director who believes that posting and distributing recordings of student ensembles that are performing copyright protected works falls within “Fair Use” and permission is not required. His argument focused on the fact that the sale of a professional produced recording of the same work was not being hindered by a student performance. This is simply incorrect.

It is a very common misconception of music educators that once they have legally purchased an arrangement they have the right to record it for educational purposes - including making copies of it to give to the students for critique and evaluation. Even if you are giving the recordings away to your students you are violating copyright law, and Fair Use, without written permission from every publisher whose work is represented on the recording. The reason for this is that there are to separate copyrights that protect a musical work - the publishing rights and the recording rights. When you purchase a work for your ensemble, you are only obtaining the right to perform the work - not to record it. Fair Use guidelines allow you to make ONE recording of the performance as long as it is for archival purposes only. You may play the recording for the students for evaluation purposes, but it must not leave the classroom in any format without written permission for each publisher. Obtaining this permission is relatively simple - visit the Harry Fox Agency and select “Limited Licensing” if you are making less than 2,500 copies. If you plan to sell the recording, current royalty rates are 9 cents per work or 1.75 cents per minute - whichever is greater. This rate applies to each track included on a CD - per CD. If you have 10 compositions on a recording - each under 5 minutes, you only owe 45 cents in royalties per CD. For such a small sum of money you are not only helping to keep composers and publishers in business, you are doing things the right way.

MENC has posted a comprehensive guide to copyright law and the FAQ section on recording is quite clear on this issue. It doesn’t matter whether your student performance is as good as a professional level recording, you simply do not have the rights to record and reproduce - you must legally obtain those rights. Fair Use does not cover educators on this one. I strongly suggest that before you record your ensembles and make copies of those recordings (whether for sale or not) you take all of the necessary steps to make the recording legal. You are setting a good example for your students and fellow educators. For more information on copyright law and Fair Use, read the MENC Copyright Guide for Music Educators, visit the Music Publishers Association website, or the US Copyright Homepage.

I welcome your comments and suggestions.

Got Caught Illegally Downloading Music? Settle Your Lawsuit Online!

I was reading Wired.com last night, and I came across an article titled A Poison Pen from the RIAA by Eliot Van Buskirk. The article is all about a new campaign being waged by the RIAA where “pre-lawsuit” letters are sent to universities asking them to turn over the student names behind IP addresses to avoid being sued themselves (they are sending letters to individuals as well). They are even offering a discount to settle with the RIAA before further legal action is pursued. At an average of $3,000 per settlement, it is a lucrative campaign.

I was intrigued however by a link in the article to a website called P2PLawsuits.com where would-be defendants can settle their lawsuits online. In my opinion it is the scariest chapter in the music piracy saga thus far. When you get to the site you can either click a link to learn more about how to download music legally, read FAQs about your P2P Lawsuit, or - rather unbelievably - click a link to settle your lawsuit online by paying the fine with your credit card. Think about it - rather than pursuing costly lawsuits the RIAA is sending letters around to as many people as the can letting them know that they are “busted” and they can either pay the piper now, or take it to court and possibly pay even more.

Let me be very clear, I am a firm advocate against illegally downloading music. I purchase all of my music legally and think everyone else should. Whenever I discuss piracy with my students they always say the same thing: “I’ll never get caught“. With so many people downloading illegally, my students feel that the likelihood of the RIAA actually pursuing litigation against them is very unlikely. Now, with this letter campaign, the likelihood has skyrocketed. For the price of a stamp the RIAA can receive $3,000 in return - quite cost effective. Hopefully now it makes complete sense - even to a 5th grader - to pay 99 cents instead of $3,000 to download a song. I don’t want my students to download music illegally, but I don’t want to see them get sued either. I will be telling all of my students about this latest development, and I think you should too.

I welcome your comments and suggestions.