Beatles' First Single Enters Public Domain -- In Europe

from the when-I'm-64 dept

The Beatles remain the iconic pop group, so news on VVN/Music that their very first single has now entered the public domain is something of a landmark moment in music:

The Beatles first single, Love Me Do / P.S. I Love You, has entered the public domain in Europe and small labels are already taking advantage of the situation.

The European copyright laws grant ownership of a recorded track for fifty years, which Love Me Do just passed. That means that, starting January 1 of 2013, anyone who wants to put out the track is free to do so.

Unfortunately, if you're in the US, you'll probably have to wait until 2049 or so. And things are about to get worse in Europe too. As Techdirt reported, back in 2011 the European Union agreed to increase the copyright term for sound recordings by 20 years, despite the absence of any economic justification for this theft from the public domain (yes, this is theft, because it's taking something away that people had.)

Once the relevant legislation is passed around Europe, that means that most of the later Beatles singles -- and many other famous pop music hits from the 1960s -- won't be in the public domain there until the 2030s, rather than in the next few years. It's not yet clear whether the new 70-year term will be applied retroactively to works that have already entered the public domain, so Europeans may want to enjoy their right to distribute free copies of "Love Me Do / P.S. I Love You" recordings legally while they can....

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Filed Under: copyright, europe, public domain, the beatles

EMI: Legitimately Afraid That Aliens Might Listen To The Beatles Without A License

from the wtf dept

Ah, life imitating art (or art accidentally imitating life). Earlier this year, we had Rob Reid post an excerpt and discuss his new novel, Year Zero, concerning aliens listening to Earth music for free, without a license... and then realizing that they've been infringing our copyrights for years, and owe the record labels more money than exists in the galaxy. Funny story, right?

Except... as Joe Betsill points out, apparently at least EMI really was afraid that aliens might listen to music without a license. In the Wikipedia entry for the Beatles' famous song, "Here Comes the Sun" it notes the following bit of trivia:

Astronomer and science popularizer Carl Sagan had wanted the song to be included on the Voyager Golden Record, copies of which were attached to both spacecraft of the Voyager program to provide any entity that recovered them a representative sample of human civilization. Although The Beatles favoured the idea, EMI refused to release the rights and when the probes were launched in 1977 the song was not included.

Of course, just a few weeks ago, we also discussed Sagan and the Voyager Golden Record, in noting how the world is changing in that we no longer have to wait for the modern Carl Sagans to decide what gets sent into space any more. So, perhaps the story in Year Zero isn't so far-fetched after all...

Filed Under: aliens, carl sagan, copyright, golden record, here comes the sun, the beatles
Companies: emi

The Ridiculous Hoops Mad Men Had To Jump Through To Use Part Of A Beatles Song

from the or-how-we-kill-culture dept

This story has been making the rounds about how Lionsgate, the studio behind the hit TV series Mad Men, paid somewhere close to $250,000 to license a Beatles song to use in a recent episode of the show. While the money is the part that everyone focuses on, the article talks about how involved the process was to actually get the approval of the Beatles to use the song:

Weiner, who says he once met Paul McCartney at a party but didn’t broach the subject of licensing, zeroed in on “Tomorrow Never Knows” last summer, when he got the idea for a story about “how people think they know what the Beatles are. Of course the Beatles are one step ahead of you at least.” That started a process he’d been through before, of sending “impassioned letters” to the band’s representatives, including primary gatekeeper Jeff Jones, head of Apple Corps.

This time, as Weiner cleared that initial hurdle, he continued to make his case for placing the Beatles “in a new context” by sharing story outlines and script pages with the team—“things I don’t usually do,” he says. Permission was finally granted based on the merit of the show and his plan for the song, not the amount of money on the table, he says. “The idea is that this is a financial arrangement, there is nothing further from the truth. This is completely an artistic collaboration.”

But, here's the thing, as the article notes elsewhere, part of the appeal of the show is the very, very, very thorough attention to detail to make everything about the show accurate to the time. In fact, we noted a story (that not everyone agreed was true) that suggested that copyright had gotten in the way of historical realism on the show in the past. But here, as the show's producers noted, the Beatles are such a huge part of the 60s, it's a little crazy that they can't have the music on the show without jumping through this series of hoops. It basically means nobody can accurately depict an important period of cultural history without permission from the band.

If anything, it seems like (once again) copyright is being used to stifle culture, rather than to enable and encourage it. It also highlights one of the more ridiculous parts of copyright law: the vast differences in the way different rights and licenses work. If this were merely being performed live in a venue, the venue could get typical ASCAP/BMI licenses and play whatever music they wanted (with a few limitations). But, since it goes on TV, you're suddenly dealing with new issues like sync licenses. That seems silly. If we're going to allow public venues to play whatever they want with a blanket license, why shouldn't that apply equally to a TV show like Mad Men, which is using the music to accurately portray a time?

Filed Under: jeff jones, licensing, mad men, paul mccartney, the beatles
Companies: apple corps, lionsgate

Would It Really Be So Bad If The Beatles Were In The Public Domain?

from the probably-not dept

In our earlier coverage of Friday's hearings on how to fix the broken setup for copyrights on pre-1972 recordings, there was one point that I skipped over, because I thought it deserved a more focused discussion. In trying to make the point in favor of the RIAA's belief that the longer the copyright, the better, Jennifer Pariser pointed out that the best selling album from two years ago was The Beatles box set, and she asked: "Are we saying that should be in the public domain?"

Clearly, the point she was trying to make was that you never know what amazing works of history the major labels are suddenly going to dredge up and repackage in a profitable way -- and that's the reason why such works should remain under copyright (and under the control of the major labels) for as long as is humanly possible.

But does this make any sense?

I don't think so, and I think that a very strong argument can be made that things would have been just dandy if The Beatles' tunes had been in the public domain at the same time. The specific work that Pariser is referencing is The Beatles Stereo Box Set, which was released with a ton of fanfare in September 2009, at the same time as The Beatles in Mono box set, and The Beatles: Rock Band. And while it sold well, many people complained (reasonably) that they were basically offering the same songs all over again, in the RIAA's never-ending quest to make you keep on buying the stuff that you've already bought. In fact, many of the buyers almost certainly had all the works already. So why did they still buy it? Because the set itself was historic, complete and collectible in all sorts of ways that made it worth buying for fans of The Beatles.

The amount of work that went into making some of the early mono recordings stereo was apparently incredible, and the box set included a ton of valuable extras, including a DVD with narration from all four of The Beatles. There was additional footage from recording sessions, photo sessions and various other features as well. In other words, there were many reasons why people bought this box set, but I'd argue that access to the music wasn't near the top of most people's lists. They already had much of the music.

Furthermore, let's assume that The Beatles' works were in the public domain in 2009. Could EMI have still made a ton of money on such a box set? You bet. Again, by noting that it was the official version, remastered from as much original material as possible, and including all sorts of extras from The Beatles themselves, it means that there would be all sorts of reasons to buy the official version. If anything, having the recording be in the public domain might have resulted in more people working on attempts to turn the mono recordings into stereo recordings, which could have made such a box set available sooner, as EMI could have benefited from the work of others in the public domain as well.

The problem, yet again, is that Pariser and the RIAA keep pretending that the only reason people buy is directly for the recording. That's simply not true. They're also pretending that you can't make money from the public domain, which is also totally untrue. What bothers me is that Pariser and the RIAA are making these obviously untrue statements to policy makers, who might not be sophisticated enough to know that these statements are untrue.

Filed Under: copyright, jennifer pariser, public domain, the beatles

As Expected, Bluebeat's 'Psycho Acoustic Simulations' Of Beatles Music Still Infringe On Copyrights

from the too-smart-for-your-own-good dept

About a year ago, we wrote about the somewhat bizarre case of a website called Bluebeat.com that claimed to legally be selling Beatles MP3s for $0.25. Of course, EMI disagreed and sued. Bluebeat's explanation was that it wasn't selling actual copies of the original music but had re-recorded the songs using "psycho-acoustic simulation," which made it a totally "new work" in their eyes. But not, of course, the eyes of the law. Basically, Bluebeat was trying to misread a section of copyright law and a court is having none of that. In a move that will surprise almost no one, the lawsuit against Bluebeat succeeded on summary judgment, with the judge noting that "BlueBeat fails to provide any evidence...showing how or why its purported 'simulations' are anything but illicit copies of the Copyrighted Recordings."

Filed Under: copyright, mp3s, psycho acoustic simulations, the beatles
Companies: bluebeat.com, emi

Bluebeat Claims It Owns Beatles Copyright By Re-recording Songs; Judge Disagrees

from the but-the-copyright-office dept

In the US, if you really want to "protect" your copyrighted works, you have to register the works. Unlike for a patent or a trademark, it's pretty much a rubberstamp process. Every so often the Copyright Office will reject a registration, but it's rare. It does still go through them all, though. Or at least it's supposed to. However, we recently wrote about the weird case of the site Bluebeat.com selling Beatles MP3s for $0.25. We noted that nowhere on the site did the company explain how it had the rights to do so, but in its response to the lawsuit filed by EMI, it explained its bizarre logic.

Basically, the company claims it somehow re-recorded the songs via a "psycho-acoustic simulation" (don't ask) and then added an image to the file, making it a totally new work (um... yeah). And then it registered the copyrights on those new recordings, claiming that the re-recording is a new work where Bluebeat.com actually owns the copyright. Its "proof" is that the Copyright Office okayed the registration -- suggesting that the rubber stamp at the Copyright Office is a bit too quick at times. A judge isn't buying it and has barred the sale of the MP3s for the time being (i.e., almost certainly forever). While it's amusing to see Bluebeat's tortured explanation, perhaps some of the blame needs to go to the Copyright Office for allowing these registrations in the first place. Of course, you have to wonder if this now also opens up Bluebeat to additional charges of false representation in registering the copyright...

In the meantime, some readers have noted that this is not the first time that the folks behind Bluebeat.com have had ridiculous interpretations of copyright law. Two and a half years ago, it sued Apple, Microsoft, RealNetworks and Adobe for not using the DRM created by Bluebeat's parent company, Media Rights Technologies. Basically, the company claimed that by not preventing the ability to rip files, these companies were violating the DMCA. Of course, that makes no sense.

Given that it's now twice that we're seeing totally foreign interpretations of basic copyright law, it almost makes you wonder if the company is doing this to make a point about the ridiculousness of copyright law, rather than for any legitimate reasons. Either that, or the company actually thinks that filing lawsuits as publicity stunts is smart. I would imagine that a judicial slapdown might correct the folks behind Bluebeat and MRT of that notion.

Filed Under: copyright, copyright office, registration, the beatles
Companies: bluebeat, media rights technologies

EMI Sues Music Site Offering Beatles MP3s

from the no-surprise-there dept

Last last week, a bunch of music blogs started noticing that a previously unknown site called Bluebeat.com was selling MP3s for $0.25, including numerous acts that still haven't officially authorized online sales -- such as The Beatles and AC/DC. There was a lot of headscratching among bloggers and reporters who wondered how this could possibly be legal. The answer, of course, is that it wasn't. The site didn't even make any attempt whatsoever to claim that they had licensed this music. They just said they thought that $0.25 was a better price for music. Not surprisingly, it took just a few days before EMI sued the site, and I'd imagine other lawsuits will quickly follow as well. It's not clear what the folks at Bluebeat were thinking -- other than that they were about to get a ton of publicity in the form of lawsuits, but it's hard to see what good that publicity is if the site is forced out of business.

Filed Under: mp3s, sales, the beatles
Companies: bluebeat, emi