http://www.macclesfield-express.co.uk/news/s/207/207169_its_a_fiddle.html
This has me steaming. Now they aren't just going after CD rippers and Ipod users, but people testing musical instruments in a music store???!! What a load of rotten, stinky, rancid crap! I simply cannot believe that they are going this far. They charge by the square footage of the building!
In the UK, it's PRS, but here in the US, BMI and ASCAP are going after bluegrass jams. They say the organizers of those jams must pay exhorbitant royalties because people play "copyrighted" material! The River City Bluegrass festival in Portland, which I attended, was recently fined over $2,000. Some bluegrass festivals have a total budget of $2,000 for
everything!! Paying $2,000 in royalties would literally eliminate 90% of the festivals in this state. Basically, it's $2,000+, or
all public domain songs, songs that most bluegrass people are absolutely sick of!
I don't have words to describe how I feel about this. It is just so far out of line that I cannot imagine what kind of twisted person came up with this idea.
This issue is especially pertanent in the bluegrass world where even the big artists really don't mind people playing their songs. I have personally talked to big name artists like Rhonda Vincent, IIIrd Tyme Out, Ronnie Bowman, Del McCoury, and James King. Those are all some of the nicest people you could ever meet and none of them give a damn that people play their songs in jams. BMI and ASCAP seem to think they do.
Extending this ludicrous idea to music stores is...
They ACUTALLY send people to music stores and jams to see if copyrighted songs are being played. How in the hell can they possible know all of the songs out there and which ones are copyrighted/public domain?
What do you think?
