May Cost You a Bundle in ASCAP Bills
Fresh off a court victory against Google's YouTube, ASCAP tells us it is setting its sights on users of the video-sharing site. Welcome to the exciting world of copyright licensing, blogger; you may already owe gobs of money!
ASCAP licenses the performance rights for music, collecting royalties for its songwriter members when their songs are played in certain contexts.
Those contexts now include a YouTube video embedded on your blog or website, assuming your site is not "purely" non-commercial and is deemed large enough by ASCAP. The group just sent a collection letter to internet entrepreneur Jason Calacanis (pictured) for YouTube videos embedded on his Mahalo reference site. Based on what the group told Valleywag, other startups should be worried:
"ASCAP does not offer licenses to – or require licenses from – those who simply make their personal blogs available on purely noncommercial Web sites. Mahalo.com is a larger venture than simply a personal blog, and therefore ASCAP is engaged in discussions with Mr. Calacanis concerning the use of ASCAP members' music on the site."
ASCAP sent collection letters to other website owners in the spring; YouTube told recipients to refer the group back to YouTube. But then a judge ruled Google owed ASCAP $1.6 million while a court fight between the two sides over licensing drags on. At some point, website owners are going to start wondering how much longer Google will offer to handle all the legal complaints over YouTube embeds — and just how many songs they've embedded over the years and now owe royalties on.
I'm not worried; they can't get blood out of a turnip, and my own defense would be this: How am I to know whether someone posting a YT vid has permission or not?
YouTube does a pretty good job of policing this stuff as seen in so many videos I've posted being taken down.
You Tube has this to say:
There have been a few questions in the forum regarding ASCAP and we wanted to provide our perspective on the issue. We have become aware of yet another misguided effort on the part of ASCAP to double dip--this time by pressuring third-party websites which embed YouTube videos to pay royalties to ASCAP. We believe there is no legal basis for ASCAP's position because YouTube itself is currently licensed by ASCAP pursuant to its application made under the antitrust consent decree that governs ASCAP's operations. The license requested by YouTube covers all US public performances of ASCAP music in YouTube videos from YouTube's servers all the way through to the end user, regardless of whether a third-party website is embedding the YouTube player. We believe that YouTube has already cleared any necessary public performance rights for US playbacks of ASCAP songs, and ASCAP's attempt to collect an additional payment from another party for the very same stream is not credible.
Regards,
YouTube Team
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