New IFPI Boss Vows to Extend Recording Copyrights

JamesD_UK writes "John Kennedy, President and COO of Universal Music is to succeed Jay Berman as Chairman of the IFPI, the worldwide equivalent to the RIAA. Andrew Orlowski of The Register has written an article covering John Kennedy's views on copyright infringement and the public domain. Although Kennedy's thoughts on the former are predictable, he has vowed to fight hard to extend European recording copyrights past the current fifty year term. An extension of the European term to match the US would be particularly damaging to the public domain and efforts such as the Internet Archive as well as increasing the control that the recording industry holds over performers. For those interested, I run a small blog of articles regarding copyright recordings."

Re:What I don't understand is...

[real_smiff]

I know someone who works as an accountant in BMG NZ (or rather did, before they laid off most of their staff). I can confirm Elvis is one of their biggest sellers, and certainly most profitable. it costs the label almost nothing to put out a new compilation/greatest hits. I'm not even talking about remixes! She often joked that all their biggest earners are dead. Mind you, this could also be something to do with why BMG were having problems..

Founder's Copyright?

[MenTaLguY]

You mean something just like this [creativecommons.org]?

O'Reilly has released a number of titles [creativecommons.org] under this arrangement.

What the hell

[hackronym0]

The Recording Industries keep mentioning how much money that they have to spend to market their music... Well, let me explain why. If you play a crappy song for me and then ask me if I like it, I'll say no. And if you play a crappy song for me 1000 times, I'll still say I don't like it. BUT..., if you pay people that I or my peers respect to say that they like it and then play it 1000 times, I will LIE and say that I like it.

That is part of their problem, they need to get the songs that people like without any payola. That is what I thought they used to do. That is why so many artists never make it to "big time".

I say, no one buy a damn thing from them because no one really likes their music anyways

like taking quizes, take them for money [itpaystolearn.com]

Re:Why, again?

[darkstar949]

Well as it turns out 'Happy Birthday To You' is still copyrighted. For more information head over here [snopes.com] and read the article. From the looks of it the song will be copyrighted until 2030.

Re:The Empire Strikes Back

[jafuser]

Don't just stop buying things yourself. Convince other people to do so as well, and for god sakes, please support the EFF [eff.org] by becoming an active member.

It's quite obvious that the best way to be heard in the US government today is by founding or joining a large group which supports your cause, and the EFF is the group that we need to support if we want to see progress toward fair intellectual property rights.

Re:What I don't understand is...

[cpt kangarooski]

That's incorrect. Trademarks are not functional equivalents for copyrights. Thus, it can't prevent you from creating derivatives. There was a case that dealt a little bit with this. You can read it here [cfac.org]. It doesn't come up much, however, since the situation is rare.

Re:Extension? Why Not?

[hyphz]

Ummmm..

Copyright term is 50 years. Are you suggesting that your song is going to be successful for the first time, 50 years AFTER it's been released?