Beware of Music in Your Podcasts – SoundExchange, ASCAP, BMI and SESAC Don’t...
Last week, I listened in to presentation by RAIN News providing an excellent overview of the digital music industry (their Whitepaper setting out the findings reported during the presentation is...
View ArticleCopyright Office Issues its Report on Music Licensing – Issues Include...
The Copyright Office this past week released its Report following its study of music licensing in the US; a comprehensive report addressing a number of very controversial issues concerning music rights...
View ArticleFCC Extends Comment Dates in Proceeding Looking to Regulate Online Video...
The FCC yesterday released a public notice extending the comment dates in their proceeding to regulate Online (or “over-the-top”) Video, particularly Internet video providers who provide multiple...
View ArticleMarch Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – Closed Captioning Quality Standards...
March is one of those rare months on the broadcast calendar when there are few routine regulatory deadlines for broadcasters. As we are winding down in the television license renewal cycle, the month’s...
View ArticleFCC Extends Reply Comment Deadline on Treating Over-the-Top Video as an MVPD
The FCC has extended the Reply Comment deadline in its proceeding looking at whether to apply some or all of the regulations applicable to multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs – cable and...
View ArticleSongwriter’s Equity Act Reintroduced – What Does It Propose?
The Songwriter’s Equity Act has once again been introduced in Congress (see our article about that Act when it was introduced in the last Congress). It proposes to make changes in provisions of the...
View ArticleFCC Admonishes TV Station for Including Commercial Website Address in...
In a decision just released by the FCC, a TV station was admonished for including, in the credits of a TV program, the URL for a website that contained commercial material. As this was deemed by the...
View ArticleHow Misunderstandings about Big Numbers Distort the Debate over Songwriter...
Press reports indicate that the Department of Justice is nearing the completion of its study of whether to suggest the revision of the antitrust consent decrees that have bound ASCAP and BMI for over a...
View ArticleCopyright Office Starts New Study on Enforcing Copyrights on Photos and Other...
We have written in the past about the concerns that broadcasters face about the unauthorized use of photos on station websites. Some broadcasters have had problems when they found that photos posted on...
View ArticleCopyright Royalty Board Begins Hearings on Webcasting Royalty Rates for...
The Copyright Royalty Board has begun the hearing phase of its proceeding to set the royalties to be paid by webcasters (or noninteractive digital music services) for public performances of sound...
View ArticleUnderstanding the Murky State of the Performance Right in Pre-1972 Sound...
It’s another summer with music copyright issues hitting the press almost every day. Over the next week or two, we will try to catch up on some of the legal issues raised by all the music news. First,...
View ArticleA Compulsory License for Internet TV Platforms to Retransmit Broadcast TV?...
Over-the-top video systems, using the Internet to transmit over-the-air TV signals to consumers, are back in the news. Last week, a US District Court Judge in the Central District of California, in a...
View ArticleHouse Judiciary Committee Begins Nationwide Listening Tour on Copyright...
The US House of Representatives has been looking at potential reform of the Copyright Act for some time, holding a number of hearings before the Committee here in Washington DC (see, for instance, our...
View ArticleUnderstanding Music Royalties – Congressional Research Service Releases...
The legal issues surrounding the use of music in broadcast and digital media is one of those topics that is usually enough to make eyes glaze over. The importance of understanding these issues is...
View ArticleDates Set for Comments on Good Faith Negotiation of Retransmission Consent...
A month ago, the FCC released its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking looking to reassess the requirement that broadcasters and MVPDs (cable and satellite television) engage in “good faith” negotiations over...
View ArticleNew Accessibility Compliance Deadlines for TV Stations Coming Very Soon
TV stations have in the past few years been hit with many requirements for making their programming – especially emergency information – accessible to all people within their service areas. Two...
View ArticleHighlighting the Scope of Legal Issues that Can Arise in a Media Company’s...
What legal issues should a broadcaster be concerned about when expanding its use of digital media? Two weeks ago, I did a presentation for the CBI National Student Electronic Media Conference on...
View ArticleAdele’s New Record is Not on Online Streaming Services – Except Where It Is –...
Adele’s decision to not stream her new CD “25” on services like Apple Music and Spotify has been the talk of the entertainment press pages – like this article from the New York Times. These articles...
View ArticleBeware of Using Photos on Your Website – Make Sure that You Have the Rights...
The use of photographs on websites continues to be an issue. According to trade press reports, lawsuits were filed against two broadcasters for the unauthorized use of photos on websites, though one...
View ArticleDecember Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – Ownership and EEO Reports,...
December is one of those months when all commercial broadcasters have at least one FCC deadline, and there are also many other filing dates of which many broadcasters need to take note. For all...
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