[cc-community] CC licenses and recording rights for music
Denver Gingerich
denver at ossguy.com
Mon Dec 17 21:07:09 EST 2007
On Dec 17, 2007 4:16 PM, jonathon <jonathon.blake at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 17, 2007 8:15 PM, Denver Gingerich wrote:
>
> > Of the CC licenses, BY-NC-ND seems to be the best for the alternate
>
> BY-NC-ND requires the church to pay royalties on the song when it is used.
I was under the impression that (for church performances) only the
copying of the song lyrics and music was protected by copyright.
Since the church is not making a public performance of the music
(perhaps it is; see below), it is similar to singing a song in your
home. If you don't make copies of legitimately-purchased song sheets
or you sing it from memory, you can do it without paying royalties.
The definition of "publicly" in US law is available at
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_Code/Title_17/Chapter_1/Section_101#publication.
By the definition here, it appears that church performances are in a
gray area. Licensing companies tend to not address the case where
music is sung in church but no lyrics or music are copied [1] [2],
suggesting they don't believe it is enforceable. I would be happy to
hear other opinions or references to case law on this matter. What
other countries' laws say about public performance would also be
appreciated.
To clarify, when I say "performance" here, I mean the playing of a
song by a live band, not playing a CD or other media through the sound
system.
> > but would allow churches to use it in their services as long as no recording was taking place.
>
> I think that you are confusing "recording rights' with "performance rights".
I think the assumption I'm making is that a church's performance of a
song does not count as a "public performance". See the above
discussion.
> > could use BY-NC-SA, but that would allow anyone to make a free recording
>
> NC still requires that both performance and recording royalties be paid.
Thanks for the clarification. I suppose whether specific types of
performance are covered by copyright laws is another question (see my
first and second notes).
Denver
1. http://www.licensingonline.org/help
2. http://www.ccli.com/US/WhatWeOffer/ChurchCopyrightLicenses/License%20FAQs.aspx
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