This issue comes up occasionally at some of the hoots we have at our home in the Seattle area of Washington state, usa. I was startled about three years ago when one of the regular "performers" got quite irate over someone video recording her with a small phone/camera. She stopped the song, chewed out the guest, embarassed him greatly, and we've never seen him since. It caught me by surprise as I hadn't even noticed the recording.

Several of us had discussions about this event over the next few weeks ... I should mention that a lot of the people that come to our hoots are professional performers who record and tour a lot. Most people thought that I, as the host, should have "made sure" that no recording happened. I disagreed. I said that if YOU don't want want to be recorded, simply tell everyone.

Obviously good manners would dictate that permission be requested, and it often is in the sessions I'm around. But to demand that I act as a cop will make me take a much simpler approach ... I'll just stop hosting the hoots ... and I pretty much have.

In this age of increasingly improved (sneaky ?) recording devices, you will have a full time job just monitoring a large gathering to make sure no one is doing any recording.

Our hoots are very private gatherings, invitation only. As such, people are comfortable in "letting down their hair" and doing a lot of silly jamming and just goofing around. Great fun! And FUN is what they are all about.

... hope this helps the discussion ... bob(deckman)nelson