Spanish ‘CC’ cafe closed
p2pnet.net News:- Direccion000, a music cafe in Pontevedra, Spain, has been shut down by the local royalties collection agency.
It claims it was playing only ‘free’ songs under Creative Commons licences, it says, but the Sociedad General de Autores y Editores says the cafe owes it money for the performances.
According to a court ruling, “the document presented by the defendants-appellants as a licence for free use of music does not constitute anything other than a mere informative leaflet about its own content, lacking any form of signature, and therefore bereft of legal value whatsoever,” says TechnoLlama.
“The café lost the case in first instance and appealed on the basis that the locale has several signs claiming that they had permission to play free music in the establishment under the terms of CC licences,” says the story, going on:
“However, SGAE was able to prove that the music selection included artists under their representation.”
The author of the story says he finds the incident worrying, “because it seems to imply that CC licences are invalid without a signature, which would spell trouble for their legal validity in Spain. I would hope that the court was shown the human readable deed, and not the licence as such.
“I do not have sympathy for the café owners as it seems to me that they were playing commercial music while advertising that the locale only played “musica libre”. Still, I am greatly concerned about wider potential implications with regards to CC contract formation (or licence formation where applicable).”
Also See:
TechnoLlama – Spanish café loses case on “free music”, December 6, 2006
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December 7th, 2006 at 10:12 pm
“According to a court ruling, “the document presented by the defendants-appellants as a licence for free use of music does not constitute anything other than a mere informative leaflet about its own content, lacking any form of signature, and therefore bereft of legal value whatsoever,” says TechnoLlama.”
So what?
If a document says you can do anything that is legal, it does not matter if it is signed or official or otherwise valid.
The only beef the Spanish collective could have had is that the restaurant was performing songs represented by the collective, without the collective’s license.
CC licensed songs are not, presumably licensed by any collective, so a collective cannot complain about the performance of such songs.
Of course, if the restaurant wanted to perform songs licensed by the collective, they would, in theory, need a license from the collective, if with the license the restaurant was made aware of which songs are licensed. Meaning: The licenses are worthless.
In most places the collective’s licenses do not convey song names. Is Spain any different? I doubt it, but if anyone knows any better, say so, please.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com