The biggest copyright scam!

Subject: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Alan Ross
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 07:20 AM

Has anyone on these pages ever had the misfortune to deal with the theft of their songs and recordings by corporate scammers who provide Youtube with material and steal them to place advertising in them?


Organisations are openly thieving copyrights, placing adverts in videos - and who knows who is being paid for downloads. In my case I know that they have no right to any of the digital or synch rights that they are claiming on the recordings. Youtube have a corrupt claims system, which allows the companies who are stealing recordings and copyrights to make their own decisions about their own 'ownership' of these recordings.

If you google these agenices whose name, you will see that they are stealing people's recordings and songs from automated so-called recognition software.   I know for a fact that we have not signed deals for Digital Rights with these companies yet these parasites get away with scamming on the basis that they bulk claim catalogues.

If you dispute ownership, then Youtube say its nothing to do with them. If you dispute ownership, and it goes against you in this self-policing system then your account is struck off after three disputes. What a corrupt, immoral, unfair and sick system!

It is also unfair that whole albums are being put on youtube by these companies so that they can put adverts in - none of which gives the ordinary songwriters or minor artists any money - as they are being scammed! No wonder people struggle to put out albums these days!

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 09:03 AM

But you will be told that you are supposed to put out your recorded music for free to market your live performance.

But promoters will tell you that you should do the live performance for nothing to sell your recordings.

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: Phil Cooper
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 09:16 AM

I recently posted a youtube video of us performing Richard Thompson's song Beeswing. I did put Thompson's name in the title (February Sky--Beeswing (Richard Thompson)). I did get a notice that someone decided to run ads on it. I let it go, because putting up "covers" is a very grey area on youtube. I have contacted Thompson's website about what they thought about people performing and posting his songs on youtube and never heard whether they approved or disapprove. So far the songs we post that my wife has written, or the traditional stuff I do has been flagged like that. In that case I would dispute the folks involved. I have gotten permission to post our versions of Dave Carter's songs, so I ask when I have the chance. If there was a licensing thing one could do like on a physical recording, so the writer's could get royalties, I would go that route.

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Alan Ross
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 10:35 AM

It's not the public.   It's corporate agencies, e.g. The Orchard (owned by Sony), who are taking whole albums and circulating them and using this to get advertising, even though they do not own the rights to this material. It's the separate digital rights and synchronising rights that they are stealing.

The artists are being ripped off, the songwriters are being ripped off. Millions of songs are involved, and whilst some artists have done deals with these parasites, others have not and are being screwed by Youtube and these parties.   It's not about members of the public, it's about corporate theft!

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 10:47 AM

Are you sure that what they are doing is dishonest ? A distribution company like The Orchard has the infrastructure to provide albums to youtube and pass on income from adverts to the rights holders (in return for a fee, I assume).

Do you know what arrangements they have (or don't have) with the rights holders ?

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 11:06 AM

They have no arrangements with some, of them certainly not us or other parties I know of. They are stealing our songs and distributing them without consent.    If you look up wikki even they mention their controversial practices. I am not talking about contracted artists, but the theft of back catalogue and the distribution of material without contracts, scamming artists and songwriters who have no agreements with these parties.

Album after album of back catalogue is appearing on Youtube with no agreement to the use of the material or payment with adverts. Youtube protect these parties and make no provision for independent adjudication on ownership and use. The Orchard are just one of a number of distribution agencies claiming ownership to works and recordings that the have no legal right to claim. See Wikki entry.   Many they do own - and many they have no right to use, but do so with impunity.

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: Joe Offer
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 04:13 PM

Well, I'm glad to see back-catalogue albums appearing, especially those made available through The Orchard. There are so many recordings from the "folk scare" era that have been unavailable for so long. Many of them I want to listen to just once or twice, so it's not worth it to me to buy the recording for $15 (sometimes much more).

Certainly, the owners of the recordings have a right to compensation, but how much is just compensation for listening to a recording once or twice? I think there are some who hold far too tightly to their rights, thinking they will make a fortune if they don't let people hear something. I assume the YouTube ads serve to compensate those who have rights to the recording. If you have rights and aren't being compensated, have your lawyer contact YouTube.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Alan Ross
Date: 20 Aug 15 - 04:32 PM

Hi Joe. You and others may be misunderstanding. It's not the fact that adverts are being placed in Youtube recordings. But the fact that millions of songs are being devalued by agencies who have no right to any part of the copyright in those works. They are being paid by bulk for adverts being placed in videos, etc. This money is being paid to parties who have no rights to those works, large corporations who are skimming off the money that should be going to writers and performers.

Can you imagine being told by Youtube, that you don't hold the copyright to your own songs and recordings - when these corporations don't have contracts with you - are not legitimately licensing these works - nor are they paying anybody money, yet they are getting paid for them themselves? They have a legitimate side, but when it comes to back-catalogue exploitation some are as crooked as can be. But who can take them to court, unless you're a pop star?

The so-called legitimate download market is full of these crooks as well. They act as middle men, but aren't interested in how works are licensed, if at all. The whole stinking cesspit of Internet music is a foul mess.   I knew where I was when it was just CD's!

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 01:44 PM

In my experiences, BEFORE an ad is placed on your YouTube video, you have to check off a box, indicating that you want your piece 'monetized'. I never have, and my pieces have no ads. However, if you DO check the box, and the ad appears, you are supposed to get a tiny fee. I've heard as little(or much) as $6000 per million hits. However anyone may look into the figures(they may change).

When I gave a CD, to a hospital, (that hospital is in the top 1%, of top cardio hospitals in the nation), because the cardiologist said, "I heard your music on YouTube, and boy, there is a LOT of healing in that music", On my return visit to the hospital, five weeks later, I gave the hospital and the cardiologist a small stack of CD's, with permission to use, copy and distribute the music, as much as they'd want, for the use of healing...with no residual or licensing fees coming to me. I told them, "If this music heals people, or even helps in healing people, just take it, and use it. It is a gift from God...."
At last check, it is being used, for cardio and psych, in six hospitals in four states!

I know that the money is nice to have, and to be compensated for all the time,(lots of it) in working the craft...but then there are other priorities.....and as far as 'profit'...it all depends on how you count 'profit'.....and you don't even need a political ideology, to 'take it from you' and re-distribute it......but then, that's a different story....

GfS

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Alan Ross
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 02:08 PM

I can see the philosophical point.   But, I am just pointing out that these organisations are taking albums and songs, which they may have no rights to and distributing them on Youtube. They are claiming ownership of songs that they often don't own. Often have wrong authorship where they mention them at all. They mix up the performing artists (my brother Ronnie Ross, is down as a jazz saxophonist of the same name/ a heather n' haggis singer called Carl Wilson is down as the Beach Boys guy. An Irish female country singer called Leon, is down as a bearded country rock guy Leon Russell.)

These agencies are stealing back catlaogue and artists who sell their CD's at gigs.

A friend of mine bought all his copyrights back from his original record company and circulates his own albums. His back catalogue has suddenly been pinched by the licensing agency who are circulating his recordings en masse over Youtube, streaming and download. He can't undo it. And once it's out there it's effectively impossible to get withdrawn - even though he owns his copyrights.   Whose got the money to take these crooks on? There are tiny amounts of money involved, but it's his sideline selling his own material, and now he has been robbed of these recordings.

That's just one example.

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 04:02 PM

Alan, Doesn't YouTube have a strict policy about posters, posting a song, and NOT violating the copyrights?? I also noticed that there is also a box to check-off, as to posting pieces in which the poster OWNS the copyrights? I have also seen video posts, that were removed because of copyright infringements.

I thank you for your posts, and this thread you started to discuss this, because it does concern some of us on Mudcat, as well as others.

I know that on my video posts, I include that it is copyrighted, and include the phrase, 'All rights reserved'...so please expound...

Regards!

GfS

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: Joe Offer
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 04:21 PM

Alan, as I said before, if you have rights and aren't being compensated, have your lawyer contact YouTube...or whoever is collecting income from YouTube. To my mind, the whole music business is a screwed-up mess that serves to deny income to those who actually produce the music while enriching scads of middle men. And in this age of digital music, the situation is worse....or maybe not.

Back in the 1950s, "records" were played on the "radio," which was supported by commercials (a phenomenon that is still with us). There was also a phenomenon called "payola," in which record companies paid broadcasters to play records so consumers would then buy those records. In the 1960s, college students like me recorded our friends' record albums onto reel-to-reel tapes, since we couldn't actually afford to buy the albums. Illegal, but I never heard of anybody getting prosecuted for it.

And then came 8-tracks and cassettes, and I can't imagine why anyone paid actual money for them. But they did play pretty well in car stereos, so that was an advance. And then sold quite well.

In the 1980s, we got CDs, which produced music of fairly high quality in a format that was far more durable than records or tapes. But in the 1990s, it became possible to make near-perfect copies of CDs, and that posed a problem. And then came the MP3, which made it easy to reproduce huge quantities of music.

So now we have streaming, and the music industry has again found a foolproof way to make money from recordings - "commercials."

As has always been the case, the best income from recordings goes to the distributors of music, not to the performers or songwriters. A few performers make a decent living from recordings - if their sales number in the hundreds of thousands. Many musicians can make a reasonably good living if they work steadily at it.

It seems to me that the most reliable source of income for a musician, is live performance - but even then, few musicians are likely to get wealthy. There's been an illusion that a performer can make a hit record and be fabulously wealthy for life....but it doesn't happen in real life.

My point in all this, Alan, is that you are very agitated about your loss of income from musical assets that probably aren't worth very much anyhow. You might be better off enjoying the fact that the music is available for people to listen to, and isn't hidden in a treasure chest somewhere, vainly awaiting the day when it will have substantial value.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Alan ross
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 04:55 PM

It's not the loss of income as such. It's the principle of unknown agencies claiming that they own recording rights and the copyright of songs that they have no legal part to any entitlement. They do not give proper credits to songwriters and when they do it's often wrong. Someone I know for instance did not assign his digital management rights to these organistations but they have been taken from him without consent. Only this artist should have had the right to exploit his albums.

   Also, The robots and databases they circulate are often wrong in the information given out on the artist and songwriter.

It's about complete strangers taking songs and material that does not belong to them and undermining artists and songwriters rights.

Youtube aid and abet the agencies, and if you have more than three disputes they strike you off. Youtube do not take the part of the public or artist, they uphold the judgement of the agencies who are making false claims on works. Their dispute procedures allow the distributing agencies to be their own judges. It's like putting robbers in charge of banks.

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: Joe Offer
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 07:17 PM

Hi, Alan - there are experts you can hire to sort that out for you, and that sort of thing could be beneficial to many people who have legitimate claims to rights for music. Joining a musicians' union might be a good idea.

I'm looking from a different position, however. I hate to see access to music be suppressed. I think music should be for all to enjoy, at reasonable or no cost. It bothers me to see music viewed as a commodity that is owned and protected. And most especially, I hate to see songs and recordings taken out of circulation to protect the ability of rights holders to make big money off a few successful pieces. Many, many obscure but excellent songs and recordings are lost because somebody suppresses access to thousands of pieces to protect their right to make a killing on a very few.

I spent the last year working on the Rise Again Songbook, sequel to Rise Up Singing. There was an earlier book in the series, Winds of the People, but my understanding is that that book was surpressed because it did not have copyright permissions. Rise Up Singing was published by the Sing Out! folk music magazine, and the nonprofit publisher purchased permissions or the rights holders donated permissions.

Rise Again, which comes out next week, has the same editors, Peter Blood and Annie Patterson. The publisher is Hal Leonard, a for-profit music publisher in Milwaukee. Since we aren't published by a nonprofit this time around, we couldn't solicit donated permissions, so we paid "the standard 12%" for every song that wasn't in the public domain. That's 12% of the $25 cover price of the book, divided by the 1200 songs in the book, or $0.0025 per song, per book. So, if we sell 100,000 copies, the songwriter gets $250, or $2,500 if we sell a million copies [Rise Up Singing sold 800,000].

Hal Leonard had established contracts for many of the pop songs we used, and it was my job to track down copyright holders that the Hal Leonard guy and editor Peter Blood couldn't contact. I have close to a 100% contact rate, but some people wouldn't give us permission, no matter how much we groveled.

Oh, and then there were other songs that should be in the public domain that we had to pay for, mostly Carter Family songs. And then there's "Henery the Eighth." It's a British music hall song published in 1906, but we had to pay for it because it was not published in the United States until the Herman's Hermits recording in the 1960s.

It surprised me how little money the songwriters got for their work, but I suppose it's the only way we could produce a book with 1,200 songs at a reasonable price. It makes me realize why it costs so much for sheet music.

So, it's a complicated issue. I don't know what the right answer is, but I think the public should have access to all songs and all recordings at no cost after a reasonable amount of time, maybe 25 years after publication.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 21 Aug 15 - 11:38 PM

Alan, (or anyone), Along with what Joe posted, the biggest percentage goes to the PUBLISHER...not the artists, composers, lyricists, studio musicians, performers etc etc....you can own the copyright, but you need to be your own publisher, and control your publishing rights!...or at least 51%!!!

So, be careful to read the small print on where you post, and/or your method of distribution.....sometimes to do so, they may want you to sign over a lot of publishing rights...or percentages of them..just to be heard!!

Break a leg!

GfS

Subject: RE: The biggest copyright scam!
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Aug 15 - 01:55 AM

Alan, you may be interested in reading the FAQ at the Harry Fox Agency, which licenses songs and recordings in the U.S. The licensing fee for streamed songs in quantities less than 10,000 is one cent per stream. I'm sure the performer gets no more than a tenth of that penny, if that - and it's probably not paid until the income reaches a certain amount. It's my understanding that if a recording or song is listed with Harry Fox Agency (HFA), the agency can license it according to its normal procedures.

Is there anybody here who has received payment for your work from the Harry Fox Agency? Can you tell us your experience? What's the equivalent in the UK?

I've licensed songs from Harry Fox Agency for friends who wanted to make recordings. It's a little over 8 cents per song per copy - not enough to bother seeking a cheaper rate. If you have your recording produced by a professional firm like Oasis, they require you to have a license for every song not in the public domain. In addition to producing CDs, they offer to handle distribution of digital copies. I think most performers don't expect to make much money out of digital copies, but it's some income and YouTube and such are good advertising - and it reduces their risk of having closets full of unsold CDs.

-Joe-