Well, it's been a long day. Thought I'd go for a wander around the net and clear my brain a little, maybe browse some music stuff. So I surfed about here and there, and landed in a nice-looking website that serves as an e-retailer for assorted small-label & independent non-commercial/mainstream CDs, as well as sheet music. I run a little publishing company so I thought I might consider placing some stock with them. Their sales policies and assorted money matters seemed quite straightforward, so I clicked on the Terms & Conditions (which to be fair were not hard to access or to read). And I got the most incredible feeling of deja-vu. (Richard – if you see this – thanks for making me aware of a lot of things I'd never even thought of before. I'm sorry you're gone.)

Anyway, below is the relevant excerpt – notice how certain phrases sound eerily familiar, things like "perpetual" and "non-exclusive" and "sub-licensable". They also want you to waive moral rights. There's a bit at the end about terminating your sales agreement with them, returning stock etc. But not a word about nullifying that license.

What is going on that you're expected to hand over these sorts of rights to an ordinary SALES RETAILER (and they will only handle things initially on a sale-or-return basis, which is already pretty risk-free)?   This is a small outfit run by what do appear to be honest, quite aproachable & sincere people (and the type of music they deal in is never going to make anyone rich). So how common IS this sort of thing? Do Amazon & MusicRoom require stuff like this?   

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