ASCAP Wants My Money... Can They Take It?

S

SimpleMinded

Vault Fossil
Hey guys,
As you may or may not know based on my signature, I run a relatively big R&B web site, R&B Haven. Recently, I've had to stand against ASCAP for some interesting legality questions and since this is probably one of the more intelligent communities I know on the web, I figured it would be worth asking you guys for opinions.

Background: My site R&B Haven has a music videos section which offers embedded videos from other sites (youtube, webratsmusic, dailymotion, etc) that users can view on my site. Note: I don't actually host ANY music videos on R&B Haven.

In July, I received an email from ASCAP (the artist equivalent of the RIAA) which stated that I need to sign an agreement with them in order to provide musical performances on my site by any of their artists.

I responded back explaining that I don't host any of the content and that they should speak with the hosts if they have any issues with what I'm doing.


Today, a month and a half later, I received this email back:

Even though you are embedding material that is not hosted by you, it is still you're responsibility to obtain permission to stream music performances from you URL. You need either permission from the copyright holder's of the songs, or a license from a representing society such as ASCAP. We strongly recommend that you enter into an ASCAP license agreement, as this will authorize you to stream any and all of ASCAP's music over your website.
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Here's where my question to you guys comes in. Legally, is there any validity to what he's telling me? Are you liable for videos you embed on your site? IF so, does EVERY site that has embedded a video from YouTube fall into this position where they are now liable to ASCAP? Isn't it the responsibility of the sites allowing embedding to pay fees since they're the ones offering the service?


I appreciate your input.
 
Um... But, technically, the video stream is not coming from your URL, it's still coming off Youtube. Whether you're embedding it in your pages or simply providing links to relevant Youtube pages should be the same thing. And I've never heard of anyone needing permission to post a URL...

My 2 cents.

Also:

since this is probably one of the more intelligent communities
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Well, the first thing you have to keep in mind is that any advice here will be given by amateurs, not lawyers, and you will always get better advice from lawyers.

That said, this sounds like a standard (mild) scare tactic that doesn't seem like it has anything backing it up. A quick google (I wonder why you haven't done that, to be honest) provides this page agreeing with me.

The issue of hosting content, streaming content and linking content is a murky issue that has yet to be explored properly in court. And until it is, you won't really know what is legal and what isn't.
 
How exactly can they charge money for a service that's not regulated by legislation?

Man, clowns like these make me want to ***self-censored w-talk***
 
ascap are not clowns, you fucktard. they protect bands from getting ripped off and they don't "charge money" for their service to the bands protected by them, like myself.
 
Sander said:
Well, the first thing you have to keep in mind is that any advice here will be given by amateurs, not lawyers, and you will always get better advice from lawyers.

That said, this sounds like a standard (mild) scare tactic that doesn't seem like it has anything backing it up. A quick google (I wonder why you haven't done that, to be honest) provides this page agreeing with me.

The issue of hosting content, streaming content and linking content is a murky issue that has yet to be explored properly in court. And until it is, you won't really know what is legal and what isn't.
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Nice, I'd done some google searches but hadn't seen that site yet. I mostly found news stories on both sides of the tale.

The grayness of the Internet is what worries me about this kind of thing. While it makes sense to us that this isn't legitimate, to a court of law, I don't know how receptive they would be.

Thanks for the tips.
 
TwinkieStabllis said:
ascap are not clowns, you fucktard. they protect bands from getting ripped off and they don't "charge money" for their service to the bands protected by them, like myself.
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I'm sorry, my sarcasm detector seems to be malfunctioning. Are you seriously flaming me in General or are you simply trying to be funny?
 
DexterMorgan said:
How exactly can they charge money for a service that's not regulated by legislation?

Man, clowns like these make me want to ***self-censored w-talk***
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Because they own the rights to these performances, and want to exercise their rights. Whether or not they can do this when the one who streams the content doesn't host the content himself is a vague issue. When the legality of torrents is disputed because they simply link to data packets and don't host any content themselves, this is just as murky. You may not physically host the content, but you do provide integral access to the content.

The issue of legislation and the internet has been going on for years, and the legality of various things is constantly explored in courts around the world. This is not a clear-cut thing at all, no matter how much you apparently want it to be.

You're the one who's being an ignorant asstard here, not Twinkie.

And yes, for artists these organisations are useful, as many artists don't have the means or resources to protect their content.
 
look at all the cd's you've got and you'll see either ASCAP or BMI on them. they protect us and make sure people aren't using our music for their own gain. and if they find out it's happening, we get paid...you know...for our fucking art.

oh wait...half the douchebags in the world don't buy cd's, do they?
 
Are you people for real? Let me re-quote what OP got in his mail:

You need either permission from the copyright holder's of the songs, or a license from a representing society such as ASCAP.
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Now, since there is no law governing usage of such content by the OP, who exactly gives the right to ASCAP to issue such demands? Because they say so?

There is no murky water here man, they're very well aware they're blowing so much hot air and yet they, as you yourself said, engage in scare tactics.

And I'm an asstard? Why don't you and your butt-buddie twinkie fuck off, eh?
 
TwinkieStabllis said:
look at all the cd's you've got and you'll see either ASCAP or BMI on them. they protect us and make sure people aren't using our music for their own gain. and if they find out it's happening, we get paid...you know...for our fucking art.

oh wait...half the douchebags in the world don't buy cd's, do they?
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They protect you and make some nice cash in the process, almost $100 million in 2008 alone? Wow, talk about altruism.

Also:

ASCAP has also been criticized for its extremely non-transparent operations, including the refusal to release attendance records for board members, the notes from board meetings, and the reasoning behind their weighting formulas which determine how much money a song or composition earns for use on TV or radio.
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And I'm happy your right are well protected even against boyscouts.

TwinkieStabllis said:
keep talking out of your ass, dude. you're looking real credible here.
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I don't see you disputing anything in my last post. Just because you say so doesn't mean it is so.
 
you know what i'm happy about? my friend Ben getting paid thousands of dollars in back-pay because adult swim was using his music and had been for months.

as an outsider you can say what you like, but it's just flailing arms as far as i'm concerned.

EDIT: i could give a fuck about disputing shit I LIVE to some tard on the net. i'm telling you the way it is in simple terms. deal with it or keep crying. again, i could give a fuck.
 
Using his music for what? Great, now I can't delete my doublepost.

Well if you can't be arsed to actually use arguments in your rants and flames, why don't you just SHUT THE FUCK UP, YOU RETARD.
 
Again, you guys obviously aren't the best source for this, but do you think the situation would be different if I purely linked to the videos instead of embedding them?

As we've discussed, technically, it's not all that different, but to a techphobe, it looks a lot different.


So Twinkie... Are you saying I'm in the wrong here? I know you're largely arguing with Dexter but I'm curious if you feel I in some way owe money for this "Service."
 
DexterMorgan said:
Using his music for what? Great, now I can't delete my doublepost.
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in the background of one of their ads as far as i remember. he heard it one day, contacted ASCAP who he was protected by, and got paid. if he was unprotected he would have been shit out of luck.
 
SimpleMinded said:
Again, you guys obviously aren't the best source for this, but do you think the situation would be different if I purely linked to the videos instead of embedding them?

As we've discussed, technically, it's not all that different, but to a techphobe, it looks a lot different.
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To me it would seem logical for youtube and such services to pay the fees and then collect fees from people using the content they provide. But since there's no legislation regarding this issue, you can do as the guy in the article says: tell them to take it up with youtube.

TwinkieStabllis said:
DexterMorgan said:
Using his music for what? Great, now I can't delete my doublepost.
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in the background of one of their ads as far as i remember. he heard it one day, contacted ASCAP who he was protected by, and got paid. if he was unprotected he would have been shit out of luck.
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And I happen to be perfectly fine with such things. This is a completely different case.
 
DexterMorgan said:
And I happen to be perfectly fine with such things. This is a completely different case.
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not really. they are looking to keep their organization alive while also protecting the artists they represent. nobody said they're philanthropists but they're certainly not the "OMG EVIL CORPRITS!" you were dogging them for with your first post in this thread.
 
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