Webcast Restrictions

[jazztrain]

I'm reaching out to others on the forum who may have radio programs that are streamed to and/or archived on the web.

I was informed yesterday by management at the noncommercial, educational station (based at M.I.T.) at which I've had a show since 1987 of the following:

>>

I'd like to take just a moment to remind people that our webcasting

license prohibits playing during any 3 hour period more than 3

selections from the same record or cd, more than 2 selections in a

row from the same record or CD, more than 4 selections from the same

artist or compilations, or more than 3 selections in a row from the

same artist or compilation.

If your programming requires you to violate these restrictions then

the webcasting and archiving feeds will have to be disabled during

your show. Please contact the tech department as far in advance of

your show as possible so that they can arrange to shut off the

webcasting software for the duration of your show.

>>

Since my show is typically "themed" (often featuring a single artist), these restrictions present obvious logistical problems and challenges. I'm apparently faced with completely changing the focus and structure of the program or simply having it pulled from the web.

Do others operate under similar limitations or are other stations simply ignoring this restriction?

[Chuck Nessa]

Lazaro Vega, who posts here, has had the same problem. He has worked around it a bit by getting waivers from the record companies. Some grant blanket waivers, some do it show by show and some will not grant them. Laz could fill you in on the details.

[Lazaro Vega]

Jazztrain,

I contacted the Vice President of RIAA and though he legally can not council us what he did say is you can get around these restrictions by obtaining a waiver from a copyright owner...So, I wrote up a waiver for the times we broadcast jazz which asked that we be able to broadcast more than 4 recordings by the same artist in such and such period of time, etc.

What you want to be clear about when talking to the labels is that your station pays it's flat rate royalties to Sound Exchange (by either being a CPB Qualified station, where CPB takes care of it, or on your own) and that this waiver effects only the "extra" plays you'd be giving an artist.

Also, as this involves the legal departments of the record companies, where such things exist, you'll want to make sure if your station has a lawyer that they are involved with what you are doing.

Here's an example of the waiver I circulated...

From the hours of 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. Saturday morning, and 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Sunday evening, Blue Lake Public Radio, WBLV FM 90.3/WBLU FM 88.9 as streamed on the Internet via www.bluelake.org is hereby waived of following these provisions of the Sound Recording Performance Compliment, 17-USC-114 (j) (13) for copyrighted sound recordings published by (name of record company) : “In any three (3) hour period you can transmit up to three (3) different selections of sound recordings from any one CD, but you can transmit no more than two (2) consecutively. Additionally, in any three (3) hour period you can transmit up to four (4) different selections of sound recordings from the same featured artist, or up to four (4) different selections of sound recordings from any set or compilation CD’s, but you can transmit no more than three (3) consecutively.”

************

[Jim Alfredson]

So who thought up this brilliant rule?

[Guest]

So who thought up this brilliant rule?

←

It is a part of the DMCA, signed into law during the Clinton Administration. You should definitely go the route of the waivers.

[Lazaro Vega]

That's the Digital Millennium Copyright Act..i.e. Congress, under lobbying pressure from the RIAA and others.....hey, artists are getting checks for these extra plays. I've heard they're as high as .33 cents a play per 100 people listening on the web...so if you get someone to play five cuts by you in less than a three hour period, or play more than two in a row from the same CD, and there are 500 listeners on the stream, that's around $165 (?) the station would pay in royalties to Sound Scan to have done that one extra play ouside the restrictions. Or, the station could be punished and have their statutory license to stream revoked.

WDET in Detroit just got this issue together and they’re on the web. Ed Love has an incredible series of live music planned for the fall.

Where this runs into trouble is when programming historic jazz, i.e. the 78-rpm era. It turns a featured artist into a game of "Where's Waldo?"

Blue Lake has the ability to turn on or off the web stream according to what waivers we have, who's featured, etc. Some labels won't grant a blanket waiver, but they will go on a case-by-case basis, which means a programmer needs to be even more organized but that's life in the big time.

Last night we played Louis Armstrong for July 4th and it is very important that our regular listeners who've heard us play music without these restrictions hear what they've come to expect for more than 20 years on the FM. The FM audience is far larger than the web stream audience so, if we don't have a waiver, the FM listeners get the good stuff, and then we program to the restrictions while streaming.

Riffin’.

Edited July 6, 2005 by Lazaro Vega

[rostasi]

RIAA

[Claude]

I think the purpose of these rather paranoic rules is that the webcast listeners should not be tempted to record the broadcasts instead of buying the CDs.

There are also provisions which prevent the webcast radios to publicize detailed playlists before the broadcast takes place, so to keep listeners from preparing to record specific songs.

SEC. 405. SCOPE OF EXCLUSIVE RIGHTS IN SOUND RECORDINGS; EPHEMERAL RECORDINGS.

Edited July 6, 2005 by Claude

[jazztrain]

Jazztrain,

I contacted the Vice President of RIAA and though he legally can not council us what he did say is you can get around these restrictions by obtaining a waiver from a copyright owner...So, I wrote up a waiver for the times we broadcast jazz which asked that we be able to broadcast more than 4 recordings by the same artist in such and such period of time, etc.

What you want to be clear about when talking to the labels is that your station pays it's flat rate royalties to Sound Exchange (by either being a CPB Qualified station, where CPB takes care of it, or on your own) and that this waiver effects only the "extra" plays you'd be giving an artist.

Also, as this involves the legal departments of the record companies, where such things exist, you'll want to make sure if your station has a lawyer that they are involved with what you are doing.

Here's an example of the waiver I circulated...

From the hours of 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. Saturday morning, and 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Sunday evening, Blue Lake Public Radio, WBLV FM 90.3/WBLU FM 88.9 as streamed on the Internet via www.bluelake.org is hereby waived of following these provisions of the Sound Recording Performance Compliment, 17-USC-114 (j) (13) for copyrighted sound recordings published by (name of record company)                  : “In any three (3) hour period you can transmit up to three (3) different selections of sound recordings from any one CD, but you can transmit no more than two (2) consecutively. Additionally, in any three (3) hour period you can transmit up to four (4) different selections of sound recordings from the same featured artist, or up to four (4) different selections of sound recordings from any set or compilation CD’s, but you can transmit no more than three (3) consecutively.”

                                                      ************

←

Lazaro: Thanks for the information. I've started to hunt around based on the information you provided and have a few follow-up questions for now:

(1) When you refer to the copyright owner, are you referring to the owner of the composition or the performance? If it's the performance, do you need permission from the label, the performer or both? And if it's the label, it's not always obvious where to go, especially if you're playing music from 78s, from LPs issued by companies that are no longer in business, or from CDs issued outside of the U.S. Any suggestions?

(2) Have you seen any guidance or information on what constitutes a "featured artist?" Does this cover just the credited leader or sidemen as well?

(3) Is there an "easy" way to determine the copyright owner on the performance?

It appears that stations affiliated with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (which we're not) are exempt from at least some of these as a result of a private deal that they negotiated with RIAA and/or other parties. However, this doesn't help non-affiliated noncommerical stations.

This all sounds like an enormous amount of work, especially at an all-volunteer, noncommercial station. In my case, there's no indication that the station would devote any resources to help pursue or obtain the needed waivers.

[rostasi]

This all sounds like an enormous amount of work...

Yup. There's a reason for that.

---

Now playing: Iancu Dumitrescu - Ouranos II

[Michael Fitzgerald]

I think instead of making the artist the limiting factor, they should make the recording copyright owner - so now that there are only what - four? - big labels, you play one by Sony/BMG, one from Universal, one from EMI, one from Warner Bros. After that you leave the remainder of the hour as dead air as a memorial to the fallen. I mean, does the RIAA actually know of the existence of the little labels? Do those guys ever get a piece of the pie (or even a crumb)?

Mike

[Lazaro Vega]

For what it is worth, Michael, the little and even mid-sized labels do, with some effort, hear you and ultimately want their music played. And they're business people. If you're hitting a many, many times larger on-air audience than a streaming one, why go with restrictions which will hurt you (?).

Jazztrain,

When the man at RIAA said "copyright owners" to me, I asked, "you mean the record companies?" and he said, "Yes." Again, he's not our lawyer, and he didn't want to directly oppose RIAA's own mission of protecting artist's income, but he allowed for this option.

I also sent it to some artists, local and regional, who have been public about maintaining rights to their own music.

As far as the 78 rpm era I'm afraid that is a hard row to hoe as the majority of jazz 78's are in the hands of companies who lobbied congress via the RIAA for these restrictions. You might want to turn your web stream off during a 78 rmp program, or play the game: When featuring Benny Carter you skate in and out of his recordings as a leader (playing no more than 4 in a three hour period, and no more than two in a row from the same disc, unless it is a compilation, then you can play up to three pieces in a row).

Since the Spike Hughes Negro Orchestra is often anthologized under Carter's name I would not "count" it as Carter appearing as a sideman. Even though he is a sideman, true, unless you had a record under Spike Huges name that contained that material...but I don't -- it's in the Carter Time-Life set, and on the Carter Chronological Classics..In other words I don't want to take that risk.

But you can find lots of Carter with Fletcher Henderson, Lionel Hampton and Billie Holiday (in two different eras), as well as that Jam Session at Verve with Bird and Hodges, plus Jazz at the Philharmonic. So that's the thing: if you want to play lots of Benny Carter, you can. If you want to play what you think are Benny's "best records," you might not get to all of them. Benny recorded more than 4 sides as a leader which have stood the test of time.

And then I would say "A Love Supreme" is a single work, a la Classical music. Check that out: if you can't play more than three cuts in a row by the same artist there are a lot of left over last movements from symphonies. Suites have to be considered single works and can't be segmented by movement.

A "featured artist" to me means the leader. So when Red Norvo recorded with Sinatra, I don't count that in the four pieces total for Norvo, but Sinatra. You only report the leader, tune, album title, label -- I think. There's an exemption on reporting to Sound Scan for station's with a staff smaller than 10, which would be us. What Sound Scan and CPB negotiated was a flat fee on royalties for all the station's under CPB qualification. Anything outside the agreement you pay for, or possibly lose your statutory liscence to stream, unless, according to RIAA, you have a waiver in writing that you can submit with the airplay sheets. We have hard copy waivers on file should any kind of audit be requested.

If there's one place that Benny Carter issued music which we have a blanket waiver for, anytime that's played it won't "count" in the four cut total.

And if Blue Lake had a live recording of Benny Carter, say from a broadcast with our big band live at Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp, we can do whatever we want with that as the copyright owner (unless there was a contract which said differenly at the time of the performance/broadcast). (We don't have such a recording. This was an example).

This is all for potentially 70 listeners on the internet -- the maximum who can log on at any one time to our web stream. More than that and we were worried the web stream would degrade and not sound too good.

A radio is the best way to listen to the radio. Low tech as it gets, and the most equitable broadcast media in the world.

We'll be streaming at 10 p.m. next Monday, though, for Arno with Organissimo live from our woodland studios.

Hope that helps keep your choo choo chugging Mr. Jazztrain....