Music while you work? Oh! The Horror !
p2pnet news view | P2P | Music:- Once upon a time Aunty, aka the Beeb (officially known as the British Broadcasting Corporation, or BBC), had a program called Music while you work, launched during WWII, “as a ploy to keep workers contented and therefore productive,” says turnipnet.com.
“The stirring theme tune was called Calling All Workers by Eric Coates …”
It’s good thing Britain’s Performing Right Society wasn’ t around then, otherwise the BBC would probably have been sued by Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG the crime of copyright infringement.
A truly law-abiding citizen
“Is there anything you can do with music that doesn`t make you a thieving, blood-thirsty pirate in the eyes of the music industry?” – wondered CustomPC, going on:
“If you were going to be a truly law-abiding citizen then you wouldn’t copy any of your music to use for your car or MP3 player and, apparently, you wouldn`t listen to a radio at work either.”
You wouldn’t?
“Yup,” said a p2pnet post, “because Kwik-Fit, UK car repair firm which allowed its employees to listen to music that work, has been accused of infringing musical copyrights.”
‘Looking not unlike a sales rep’
That was a couple of years back and now, “Lyn Ball was preparing for her next customer at Mane Connections, the hair salon she runs in a market town in the South West of England, when a man, looking not unlike a sales rep, popped into her shop,” says the BBC.
But, “far from trying to sell her anything the visitor introduced himself as being from the Performing Right Society (PRS) and promptly issued her with a demand for a £200 music licence,” says the story.
“What had Ms Ball done to warrant this notice? Turn on her radio.”
Hmmmm. Wonder if the PRS is related to SOCAN?
Short for Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada, it’s, “zeroing in on hair dressers with a ‘pay up or face legal action’ message, said p2pnet, going on to quote SOCAN customer operations manager Serge Boutros as telling the CBC:
“Hairdressers happen to utilize music quite frequently and so currently, we are targeting hairdressing salons to educate them on the fact that they do require a licence if they are using music.”
SOCAN also threatened p2pnet with legal action because we dressed up the SOCAN logo with a rather charming, we thought, wig.
Playing music illegally !
Now, over in the UK, “More than half a million businesses across the UK are estimated to be playing music illegally, it is estimated,” says former arch transgressor the BBC.
Playing music illegally ?!?!?!?!? Nooooooooooooo!
“I think it’s a con,” the Beeb has Ball saying.
“The radio is hardly audible – it’s there to provide a bit of background noise. It’s there for staff. How does it differ from someone listening to your car radio if you give them a lift?”
It doesn’t.
Unless you’re working for Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG. To them, the customers who keep them in business are dirt.
(Thanks, Phil)
CustomPC – Listening to radios at work is illegal, October 8, 2007
p2pnet – Music at work? Illegal!, October 9, 2007
p2pnet – SOCAN goes after hair dressers, July 20, 2007
CBC – Hairdressers must pay to play music, SOCAN says, July 19, 2007
dressed up the SOCAN logo – SOCAN threatens p2pnet. Again, August 2, 2007
BBC – Sounding the wrong note?, January 19, 2009
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January 20th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
now hang the hell up!? you need a license to Listen to the radio? correct me if i’m wrong but i’snt the bbc radio part funded by the tv license AND commercial advertising and don’t radio stations already pay royalty’s for the pleasure to air music over the airwaves?
why on earth do you have to then have another license to listen to the radio in a public setting if the radio stations themselves have already paid royalty’s to air said music!?
and who the hell are this “society” anyway? are they government backed? publicly funded? what legal right do they have to demand payment for something which infact is already being paid for by way of the tv license by 99.9% of the adult population?
January 20th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
wiki quote:
In the United Kingdom, the current annual cost for a colour television licence (as of 1 April 2008) is £139.50 (approximately â¬176) and £47.00 (approximately â¬59) for monochrome TV (black and white).[38] The licence fee is charged on a family unit per household basis, which means there could be many TVs per household covered by a single licence. The majority of UK domestic customers will require one licence per household. The licence fee is used to fund the BBC’s radio, television and internet services. A similar licence, mandated by the 1904 Wireless Telegraphy Act, used to exist for radio, but was abolished in 1971.
January 21st, 2009 at 11:19 am
This is bullshit and needs to be called out as such by the general public and industry in general across the country. If this is allowed to stand the idiots are once again in charge of the asylum.