Irish Collection Society Wants Music Bloggers To Pay Up To Promote Music
from the foot,-gun,-aim dept
After recently covering how an Irish performance rights society wanted to charge hotels for public performance fees because people could listen to music in their rooms, comes the news (sent in by eoinmonty) that a different Irish music organization, the Irish Music Rights Organisation (IMRO), is demanding popular music blogs throughout Ireland pay up to keep promoting music — even when that music is sent to the bloggers by the record labels and musicians directly for the sake of promotion. They apparently have already hit up some of the most popular Irish music blogs, even though some of them make no money at all (have no ads) and are done purely for the love of the music.
The issue, of course, is that IMRO covers the songwriting/composition rights — like ASCAP or BMI in the US — rather than the performance/recording rights. So, in IMRO’s short-sighted view, it doesn’t even matter if the musicians and labels want the music playing for free on those blogs, it has to collect for the songwriters. Apparently, no one has stopped to realize that in demanding hundreds of pounds from some popular hobbyist sites that those sites will likely go away, and the songwriters will get significantly less exposure for their music.
Filed Under: ireland, music bloggers, songwriters
Companies: imro
Comments on “Irish Collection Society Wants Music Bloggers To Pay Up To Promote Music”
Just like slavery, IP laws will be abolished one day, IP abuse will only accelerate and strengthen their abolition, and the public will be better off because of it (and before someone says something stupid, I am not equating IP with slavery).
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The Underground Railroad: LAWBREAKERS!
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what a great name for a webLocker, VPN, proxy, file sharing, P2P, or torrent app … “The Underground Railroad”
Thanks 🙂
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I can’t believe you just equated IP with slavery….
After all, slavery only acted to the detriment of Africans in half our country. IP abuse acts to the detriment of us all….
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Slavery, too, acted to the detriment of all. To quote Frederick Douglass:
No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.
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Hi sehlat. My name is Dark Helmet. I make what are normally silly comments designed to illicit nothing but perhaps a laugh occasionally punctuated with long, drawn out rants designed only to express ire and cause trouble.
Oddly, this is neither of those. I’m just trying for a long-winded way of letting you know that I do indeed realize that what you’re saying is correct….
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tl;dr
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No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.
and in the same way intellectual property ends up possessing those who seek to possess it.
The sad cases of people like the Wright brothers are testimony to this point.
Personally I seek the abolition of copyrights and patents because of the psychological harm they do to those that hold them.
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You know who else equated IP with slavery?
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“IP abuse acts to the detriment of us all….”
Well, not the rich people who abuse it, at least not in the short run (though by hindering technological advancement and by hindering the progress it does act as a detriment to everyone in the long run).
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“IP abuse acts to the detriment of us all….”
Well, not the rich people who abuse it,
Yes it does harm them, it is to them as the One Ring was to Gollum.. “me precious…”
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You could’ve at least equated to prohibition, both waste resources better used elsewhere. For christ’s sake, slavery. Why not just go for broke and compare file-sharing with the holocaust.
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“Why not just go for broke and compare file-sharing with the holocaust.”
See, file-sharing is the exact equivalent of the holocaust. Here you have groups of raporist heathens running around, cataloguing artists and essentially forcing them to work for free by not paying for their artistic endeavors. They then list all of these works on torrent sites, catalogued and searchable, not unlike the Nazis did with the Jews on their IBM punchcard computers.
And just as the Nazis spread throughout Europe and had their eyes on Africa, Asia, and the Americas, so to has this nefarious practice of forcing artists and musicians into slave labor. What is the difference between a torrent site and a concentration camp, really? So what if instead of putting artists to death quickly through the gas chambers and firing squads they do it slowly by removing their livlihood? The end result is the same!
And because of this, most of these artists must be represented by labels who have a brand….aha! Not unlike the branding of the Star of David, no?
The truth is that pirates are Nazis, and there is no difference between stealing a song or movie and stealing Polish land. There is no difference between listening to a downloaded Lady Gaga song and murdering a Jew. You are all holocausting culture simply because that cultre holocausts more than you’re willing to holospend.
(Seriously, that was an absolutely excellent creative writing exercise….)
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Wow…. I actually teared up from laughing at that. Well played, Lord Helmet.
Cure
The quickest way to make these organizations go away would be to make them pay the majority of what they collect to the people they are supposedly helping. With that much of a revenue loss it wouldn’t take them long to close up shop.
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You know how third-party organizations rate charities on how much of the donated money actually goes to the intended recipients versus what goes to administration? If there isn’t already, it’d be nice if there were organizations who published similar stats for collection agencies.
“Oh, you represent the starving artists, now do you? Well [shuffling some printouts] it says right here that only 15% of the money you collect actually goes to the artists. Hmmm. Interesting.”
I never did understand how its even possible to charge some one who simply writes about music you have a license to. How can a legal challenge to these situations even stand up two seconds to judicial scrutiny? All we need is one challenge and this sh*t should collapse like a house of cards.
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Oh, that’s easy.
You see, the only people who are allowed to write about music are called “journalists.” A journalist is someone who writes for an “established publication,” which needs to be recognized by the government as such.
Any other (unapproved, unrecognized) media outlet will not be considered to be an established publication unless it is purchased by an established publication, which at that point it will be recognized.
Any and all unapproved media outlets (including all owners, management, employees, volunteers, contributors, suppliers, fans, followers, devotees, and hangers-on) shall become liable for any and all violations of intellectual property owners rights.
Such violations, usually given innocuous terms such as “piracy” and “fair use,” are a very egregious form of theft. The perpetrators of such heinous deeds are of the class of scum and villainy generally associated with murders, rapists and terrorists. In fact, studies have shown that most of these “IP rapists” regularly commit all of the aforementioned crimes, as well as such atrocities as human sacrifice, genocide, and kitty porn.
That’s why we, as fine, upstanding citizens of the world, must act, and act quickly and decisively. Contact your local Congressman and let him know that you’re mad as hell, and you’re not gonna take it anymore! Do it for the starving actors and music artists. Do it for yourself and your loved ones. But most of all, do it for the kitties!
Or maybe ...
“Apparently, no one has stopped to realize that in demanding hundreds of pounds from some popular hobbyist sites that those sites will likely go away, and the songwriters will get significantly less exposure for their music.”
01/01/2020 – In the end the only blogs that survived were those that covered indie bands and the CC scene.
been like this in Germany for ages
That’s nothing new for Germans. Hotels, restaurants, bars – in short: any public place with loudspeakers has to pay GEMA royalties. GEMA is Germany’s collecting society.
The very same is true for music blogs. I’m running a small record label and of course, I ran the company’s blog offering podcasts, snippets of new releases and the likes. Actually, I’d have to pay royalties for all this – truth is that just a fraction would arrive at the artist’s account so I prefer to to promote my artists in the best possible way while doing illegal things (such as not paying royalties).
I’m just waiting for the day when GEMA will ask for license fees for the youtube videos I’m putting up to promote a release. Hey, I’d even had to pay for the free downloads the label offers from every release. Sick world, innit?
It's The Worst Day Since Yesterday
Well so much for my Flogging Molly fan site.
So The Leprachaun wants all of the gold at the end of the rainbow
I guess they’ve forgotten that we can, have and will continue to keep writing our own music. If they are that miserly and mean spirited, they aren’t really Irish anyway! They are just another version of the RIAA in leprechaun suits. Just remember, we are not above throwing a pair of overhauls in their chowder and starting our very own pot of nail soup! I’ve got the nail if you’ve got the errr ummm, cauldron! Didn’t want any unfortunate double entandres sticking out there. Honestly, don’t they know that the Unicorn was written by a Bald Jewish Guy (his own words) anyway? (Shel Silverstein) Unfortunately the only thing they truly have a monopoly on is Blarney, and this is one more example!
A Word About Congress
During World War II, at the behest of the Knights of Columbus, Congress decided to coopt an oath written by a Methodist Minister who was defrocked for being a Christian Socialist. They added the words “Under GOD” to the oath, and decided to use it without attribution, probably because parents who found out it’s origins would be mildly horrified! It has been used that way ever since, without the permission of the Author’s Estate, and our students stand up and invoke this oath every single day. If Congress doesn’t have to follow Copyright law or give proper attribution (display the Author’s name) when it isn’t convenient, what good is the law in the first place?
So, who is the author, what is the oath, and since this is the second time it was changed without the Author’s or the Authors estate’s permission, what was the first time? Incidentally, the author objected the first time and the Estate also filed a complaint, to no avail! So much for Democracy in action, so much for the separation of Church and State, and so much for the Federal Government following the same copyright law they put on the books in the first place!
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Paul Harvey, is that you?
So, if I had a music blog in Ireland I would be sure to not write about any corporate ass music.Just write about indie bands who would love to be reviewed on a blog.
DOWN WITH CORPORATES !!!
Ireland have the Euro not the Pound.