More than 100 artists launched musicFIRST last week. MusicFIRST is a lobbying group with the single agenda of trying to get Congress to enact copyright legislation to force radio stations to pay royalties when broadcasting music.
Under current US legislation, although artists and music labels are compensated whenever music is played on satellite, cable or internet radio, the US does not require AM and FM radio stations to pay compensation. This state of affairs contrasts that of most other Western countries where radio broadcasts are considered as public performances and royalties are paid. The lobbying group aims to correct this aberration.
Creative artists deserve comensation for their works being played. Generally these issues are determined by how to apply concepts such as ‘public performance’ to radio transmissions where the listener may be a single person or clients at a commercial entity such as a store or coach, who may be actively listening to the music or may merely having it played in the background.
I certainly think it makes sense to design legislation to collect royalties from radio stations whenever music is broadcast on the radio, rather than to sue hairdressers, bed & breakfasts, supermarkets and the like whenever a radio is played in what can arguably be construed a public performance.
In general broad law with clear principles is probably better than particular legislation for different technologies. US Copyright law appears to be particularly fluid in that it forever being amended and tweaked. What I am not happy about, is that the term of protection for creations by American artists has been lengthened a number of times retroactively. Lobbying is a legitimate democratic activity of course. Personally, I would prefer rules to be written coherently and clearly, based on simple principles.
