Copyright Cops Target Kids’ Schools and Community Centers
Written by enigmax on October 15, 2008The Performing Rights Society, the UK outfit collecting royalties for the music industry, seems it will stop at nothing as it demands money from small businesses, charities, playschools, and now, kids’ community centers, all so that they can listen to music without fear of prosecution.
The UK’s Performing Rights Society (PRS) is a non-profit organization, setup to ensure that the music industry continues to make plenty more profits on an on-going regular basis. For years now, they have collected license fees from companies that use music as part of their businesses, such as pubs, clubs and restaurants. Some might argue that these type of companies benefit commercially from playing music to the public, so a license fee, although not particular popular, can be absorbed as a legitimate business expense.
However, recently the PRS has been getting more and more aggressive in its quest to funnel cash to its paymasters. It now sees every UK organization – commercial or otherwise – as a legitimate target to intimidate with threats of legal action, should they dare to play a radio, TV or DVD within earshot of the public without a license. Small businesses playing the radio for personal entertainment to pass the working day, charities, tea rooms, corner shops and even community centers are being targeted by this outfit. Bizarrely, they are currently going after the British police, who have been refusing to pay. It’s clear, they care about just one thing – money.
To get this money the PRS go after people like the 61 year-old mechanic Paul Wilson, who has worked alone at his garage for 23 years since he was 15. He can’t afford the PRS license, so now he has to work in silence. “When I was first contacted by the PRS I thought somebody was having a laugh with me,” he said. But really, this is no laughing matter. After the demands for money, Mr Wilson told the PRS to take his radio to prove he wasn’t listening to it, but the PRS warned that the police could come round to do spot checks. Meanwhile, the garage next door to Mr Wilson also received a PRS letter, so they are maintaining radio silence too. Just regular people trying to earn a living, being chased down for money to listen to a radio at work. It’s astonishing.
When the small guy gets hit by these type of issues it really annoys people in the copyright debating community. However, if you really want to widen the debate and spread some really bad PR, it’s going to take tactics which show how low you are prepared to go. For instance, you could go after a charity trying to raise funds via a tea-room, discover their staff radio can be overheard, and demand money from them.
But it is possible to further outrage people. And this is what these type of collection outfits are doing, by widening their campaigns to start going after the softest most impressionable target in the country – kids. Last week we reported how the MPLC, a Hollywood royalty collection outfit, (illegally) demanded money from kindergartens in Ireland, so that the kids could watch DVDs there.
But going after children isn’t exclusively an MPLC tactic, the PRS are doing it too. Part of the claim against the tea-rooms mentioned above was that the kids there needed to be licensed to sing carols in front of the public and now, to add insult to injury, the PRS ‘non-profit’ copyright cop is going after a kid’s non-profit community center in Glasgow, Scotland. The Yoker Resource Center is faced with a £3,000 bill, it if wants to carry on using its TV, radio or CD player, that is.
Elizabeth Busby, the after-school supervisor at the center said: “We can’t afford to pay this money. Although we have a TV license for the center, under these rules we cannot let all the kids watch it.”
Wondering (like the rest of us in the sane world) why people have to pay twice or more for using the same product, Ms Busby added: “If the children are watching a DVD then I have gone out and paid for it, so whether it is one person or twenty-five I still paid for it. It’s not as if I’m buying pirate copies or downloading them illegally. Soon it will be the Halloween party and what do we do for music?”
Asked to comment, the PRS declined. I’d like to think that the silence is down to shame, but I doubt it. I’ll leave you with some comments from Steve Pendlebury, writing in The Bolton News:
“Radio stations pay large amounts of money to licensing organizations PRS and PPL for the music they play, and music has been on the radio for many years. During the war, there were programmes like Workers Playtime and Music While You Work. Now, many radio stations have features about workplaces. If the PRS force people to switch their radios off then how are these stations going to survive?
Music has to be heard before people go out and buy it.”
Previously: Donate Your Piracy Savings to Reduce Poverty
Next: The Pirate Bay Removes Fake Trackers from Torrents
59 Responses
and this shows you exactly what is wrong with current copyright policy.
Seriously, kids need to pay royalties to sing a carol?
WTF has happened to the world, well, let’s see if the copyright police are watching
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday dear so and so
Happy birthday to you
oops, i pirated that song, better come ask me for some mooolahh
“Radio stations pay large amounts of money to licensing organizations PRS and PPL for the music they play, and music has been on the radio for many years.?
if that is true havn’t these people been payed (at least for the radio) .. sounds like they are double dipping
double dipping? I’m so glad you mentioned that.
All blank media (vhs, cd, dvd) has a built in piracy tarrif. That’s right, a percent of the price goes to the mpaa/riaa to combat loss of revenue from piracy.
that means, my friends, if you bought blanks to burn your pirated warez, you technically already paid a piracy tax. Bring that up when they as for $3000 a song.
I’m thinking that this is the perfect kind of opportunity to be pimping the free online music feeds and sources. Pandora for the daycare? How much does it cost to get an internet connection and start exploring the streams?
They want to start billing us for their music and media in public spaces? Their music can start fading from our public spaces.
The tax on Blank media is only imposed in sane countries like Canada. The U.S. isn’t so fortunate to have such a convenient way to escape from their alleged “copyright infringement”.
These people are going WAY too far! If I buy a copy of a movie on DVD or Blu-Ray and I bring my friends over so that they can watch it with me, do I have to pay another fee for each person that I show it to? No! Why would this not apply to everything else?
I am really fed up with this whole copyright thing and the fact that companies like this take things way out of bounds.
@ Person singing happy birthday:
THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF THIEF
YOU ARE STEALING, YOU DIRTY THIEF, AND YOU KNOW IT!
Sounds like desperation is kicking in, all their regular water holes are drying up and they see “dying or thirst” on the horizon.
Imagine the stampede to dance on their graves once they are totally belly up… hmm, I do wonder if we will have to dance on their graves in silence… or if we are going to be charged to sing and dance on their graves…
:D
Heck! I wouldnt mind paying a small royalty charge to Freddy Mercury’s family while stomping on their graves shouting “another one bites the dust”
Cheers!
http://www.eZee.se
Back the lorry up! I thought the radio in the UK was state-subsidized BBC broadcasts! How can you have to buy a license to play state-sponsored radio? That would be like playing NPR in public in the USA. Isn’t British tax money going to underwrite BBC broadcasts? Does the UK even have private stations?
Cool:)…So do I get caught if I hum or whistle any tune in public? How about the popular tune which goes like “do re me fa so la ti do”?
Well, use earphones then!
LOL, i guess they want to kill music in deed, stoping people from listen to.
It’s totally insane, radio is public, there is no extra fee!
Any novice eletronic can built a simple radio… Long wire + soundbox is enough to catch something, now what?
Insane
How would they ever know? And surely this is illegal. Just plain refuse – they can’t take you to court and mount a good offence on an NPO.
Fuck the PRS.
I stay in Cyldebank!!!!!!
“The Performing Right Society is a not-for-profit company operating under the auspices of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 but it is not a statutory body and has no power to bring criminal proceedings against anybody caught infringing copyright. That power rests with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).”
WIN: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performing_Right_Society
Fact is they’re turning the art of music into a luxury not everyone can afford. It is indeed a RIGHT we all have and should fight to keep.
At some point, after they kill themselves and the music industry completly, itll be up to us to make our own music…anyone know how to play drums?
PRS : Who says crime doesn’t pay?
INSANE! Have they lost ALL sense of judgement? What happens if i play music @ a party then? pooopers!
I say open content for everyone! Artists should boycott them too. Heck, they’re already multi billionaires..what more do they want? Don’t they make music for the sake of music and not money? (or so they claim)Private gigs and concerts alone can get them more than that.
@15 I can play drums and keyboard but can’t sing for buttons lol
Then again I’m the kind of person who would get caught for singing by the PRS. I’m only 2 :-)
the artists deserve to be paid for their work.
steal – get caught – pay up
Sounds like black mail of the lowest kind. Stories like this and that of the MPLC are just boosting the fact these organizations are part of an international crime syndicate to rape the world for cash they don’t even legally deserve.
Notice how they went after small business’, this is no doubt because of the high cost of litigation that the PRS knows these companies cant afford. Simply Disgusting.
@19 when the artist gets a fair slice of the profits say 90% then I will pay up.
The MAFIA are the ones screwing us AND the artist. It should be us who are pissed NOT them!
@ 8
The BBC is funded by TV licence fees, they cost £139.50 ($240 USD). Almost every household in the land has one. If you don’t have one you get nice men knocking on your door who can give out court ordered fines of £1000 ($1720 USD). The BBC is the highest funded TV broadcaster in the world (talking BILLIONS of £££ here!!!!) and they don’t have any product adverts on any TV or radio station. They run most of the good radio stations here, though there are a few good privately own ones about.
So to claim that people listning to radios at work is stealing music or some such shit is bloody mental.
I could bang on for pages about how fucked up the copywank/MR Brown situation is in the UK…
Some people are just sick, but these are mentally disabled! This is probably the most extreme thing I’ve ever heard of. First the radio pay a lot of money to be able to play the song, but then the person that listen to the radio has to pay as well. It makes NO SENSE AT ALL!
Some people deserve to be hung upside down with a vicious dog trying to get a bite of that person.
How about we stop playing all music these sleezeballs represent? There’s plenty of artists out there who produce great music for the sake of the music and would love to have it heard by anyone. Sure it won’t have the most “popular” songs, but it will free music!
The end is nigh, PRS are the Templar Knights!!!!
Hear me out … The “Ban the Bomb” icon was formed by combining the semaphore for N & D – “Nuclear Disarmament”, well, turn that into “Radio Disarmament” R & D and the resulting icon would form a cross, like the … wait for it …
TEMPLAR CROSS!
AAAARRRRRGGGHHH THEY’RE GOING TO KILL US ALL JUST LIKE THEY TRIED WITH ALTAÏR IN ASSASSIN’S CREED!!!
… that, or they’ll just wither up and die … which would be my bet.
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday dear so and so
Happy birthday to you
oops i dont have a license i guess that makes me a very baaad person. xD
hah heh heh suck it prs, riaa, mpaa,etc
Taking pointers from the Irish now eh?
Also;
“”To get this money the PRS go after people like the 61 year-old mechanic Paul Wilson, who has worked alone at his garage for 23 years since he was 15. He can’t afford the PRS license, so now he has to work in silence”"
23+15=38 not 61? And if you’ve ever been to a garage, they are far from silent, well unless he’s got no work. Pedantic I know.
The PRS is lunacy run amok. Seriously, they want royalty fees for playing a movie at a daycare? it’s idiotic they want to make people who play the radio pay a fee. At least in America nobody throws a fit at you for playing the radio at work, unless it’s ridiculously loud. Its lunacy, pure lunacy.
It is never too early to feed kids with overpriced, sub-par, formulaic corporate “product”.
“And if you’ve ever been to a garage, they are far from silent, well unless he’s got no work. Pedantic I know.”
He has to work in silence: Other than his work, he is in silence.
@1
WALT DISNEY IS AWAKENING FROM HIS GRAVE TO COLLECT HIS ROYALTIES!
I’m sorry, but this is the biggest BULLSHIT organization i’ve ever seen.
This is literally BULLSHIT. I don’t know why organizations like these are LEGAL under British law.
Is money the only thing we care about today?
I ask me…
Is the average citizen in the UK so weak and submissive that allows these abuses?
WTF?! Since when is listening to the radio illegal without paying to some morons for it? If every person in the uk can listen to the radio at home then why the fuc* cant they listen to it at work with other people there? That makes no sence to me, just insane greedy bastards demanding money for something they allready get money from.
If this kinda greedy shit continues we will all need to buy one cd per familymember if we want to listen to music at home or the morons will demand money. “John bought that cd so jane cant listen to it, give us money if she wants to listen to it”.
Forgot to ask, anyone in UK seen this kinda shit reported in any newspaper? People should make as much noise as they can about this kind of extortion, dont think any court will make kindergartens pay licenses to these morons. Drive the PRS out of UK.
This is atrocious…
Words fail me.
Petitions should start in the streets…
Hand out slips of paper to get publicity, playing music loudly. Maybe you’ll even make the news if you get arrested, which would cause a little more awareness about the issue.
wtf…
Money from children? For singing carols? It’s supposed to be the other way around. The children get given the money.
How low can these scum get?
Please don´t call them Copyright Cops.
Assholes will do just fine!
/Pantonamia
What a pathetic JOKE. I wish EVERYONE around the world would suddenly STOP buying ALL CDs and ANY form of Music to set these MORONS straight!
JIff
http://www.privacy-tools.at.tc
i always lol when i remember that the happy birthday song is copyrighted.
Are You effin’ kidding me? Hahaha! That’s just friggin crazy…..Greed is what will kill the industry…..just like greed is killing the financial market….sad humans, when will you ever learn?
How do you think Im going to get along,
Without you, when you’re gone
You took me for everything that I had,
And kicked me out on my own
Are you happy, are you satisfied
How long can you stand the heat
Out of the doorway the bullets rip
To the sound of the beat
apparantly on their website they define a public place as anywhere that is outside of the home!! I should imiagine a great number of places would disagree with that. I guess that means I can go anywhere I please aslong as it is outside my home and so I am off for a nice nap in the PRS offices.
OK everyone, I found their site with a contact page:
http://www.mcps-prs-alliance.co.uk/contact_us/pages/default.aspx
Let the flamewar commence! Bonus prizes given for irrefutable evidence of PRS server hardware burning due to thorough slashdotting.
I want to ask a question see if anyone knows the answer.
If I played Creative Commons music in a manner similar to that described by the article…would I be punished too.
I think using podcasts and CC music would be a great way for the more savvy of us to avoid paying for something we shouldn’t have to pay at all.
The PRS are like SOCAN here.
This attitude is also why I have not bought ANY music since vinyl LP’s went out of style.
Personally I’d tell them to go …. themselves.
is this a joke?
This is fake… radio is free… what a load of garbage
everyone has to see this if they haven’t… Is a link to google video… Is legal to distribute for free, not for profit… It addresses the money these phags are addicted to… There is a quick torrent for it here: http://www.mininova.org/tor/1900850
whoops… googlevideo link… http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7065205277695921912
I officialy declare that it is a crime to purchase music ‘legaly’.
Same as supporting terrorist. Make no mistake, THEY ARE TERRORIST.
Buying music = Supporting terrorist.
http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/ <<–subs
@ 36 It is not in any newspaper because this article is 80% bullshit & way over exagerated
I’m a loss here what copywrite laws have been broken if someone is listening to music? No where did this article indicate to me that any of the accused companies or institutions tried to lay claim to the material being played. No where did I notice in the article any mention that these companies were making money from passersby that might have heard their tiny hollow radios playing a tune. It is clear to me these companies have too much time on their hands.
Time for some of the people in the UK to stand up and tell the PRS and MPLC to stuff it and file a claim with the courts. Maybe the cops could do some research and go after the MPLC and PRS for harrasment and extortion.
If the people of UK are breaking the law, then it is the duty of the MPLC and PRS to file suit with the courts and seek compensation that way. It is legally considered extortion to seek monetary reimbursements when no monies were lost by MPLC or PRS. This “pay up or we will have your charged” by definition is indeed Extortion. Why can’t any of the authorities with REAL authority see this?
broadcasting copyright content for public consumption without paying for the right is criminal piracy and must be stopped
the mechanic in his garage, the brick layer, the dude in his office, listening to the radio while they work is not a criminal offense because the purpose and audience is not public even if the workplace is public. these dude need real advice, which clearly torrentfreak cannot provide
enigmax you dilute the issue by giving weak examples
music in a kindergarten must be licensed because kindergartens are commercial ventures and the music is broadcast to the paying clientele. there is a fat capitalist running that business
enigmax you trying to pull my heart strings by making a false case using babies?
weak
http://www.h33t.com where we think torrentfreak has fallen off
H33t its like you have the understanding of a 4 year old.
You can interpret his articles however you feel, doesn’t mean its true. Fact is, TF tells people what these evil people are doing. Does he claim to be a lawyer you idiot? No, so hes not going to have the correct ‘advice’. He is a news reporter.
Your website sux, your an idiot, f*ck off.
(And when I say your website sux.. holy crap that thing is pathetic..)
11 references to this post
Responses are closed
All remaining responses will continue to be archived. Use the TorrentFreak forums if you want to discuss something.