I think there's quite a bit of misinformation going on there. As far as i know Thinner wasn't contacted nor warned by the GEMA. Sebastian was aware of these circumstances and due to the recent GEMA developments on the digital domain he doesn't want to take any risks.
It's currently not the situation that the GEMA is hunting netlabels in order to shoot them down. I doubt they'll ever have the internal capacities to handle it like this. If you were member of the GEMA for many years with several requests such as i had, you know that the left hand doesn't know what the right hand's up to there. Netlabel owners have to watch out and prepare themselves. Clear the situation between you and your artists. Now for the important part. IF YOU'RE GEMA MEMBER AND NETLABEL ARTIST THERE'S SOMETHING YOU CAN DO TO IMPROVE THE SITUATION IF YOU WANT TO KEEP YOUR TRACKS ONLINE. You can restrict your membership contract by limiting it to physically reproduced media only. This means that only "hard" media will be taken into credit by the GEMA. I was about to limit my contract this way in correspondence with GEMA authorities but decided to quit anyway. Last not least i think we as Artists and netlabel owners should RISE AND PROTEST. It can't be that we have to suffer under an ancient system that keeps looking backwards. I believe that every artist should have the right to decide how his copyrights are being handled and i regard the situation as is as inacceptable. Join the chant. Ronny >This just dropped into my inbox from the netaudio group, directed to >netlabel owners: ><snip> >================= >The German Institution GEMA www.gema.de (German equivalent to RIAA) >will NOT allow GEMA Acts on Netlabels for free, because they will bill >your DOWNLOADS (12,5 european Cent per Download) for their protecting >rights, because these Acts are members of the GEMA organisation. > >To all Netlabels of Switzerland: >ask your SUISA Organisation, if you have the rights to offer >downloadiong tracks of SUISA members. >I think, they have similar rules like the German Organisation GEMA. > >Thinner was the first Netlabel, they receive a warning from GEMA, so >read this on mnml.nl: > >http://www.mnml.nl/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=10615 ><http://www.mnml.nl/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=10615> > >Ask your Acts, if they are registered members of the German >Institution GEMA. If yes, its the only way to sell this stuff for a >minimum price on internet (on your pages/shop section, Beatport etc.) >and announce/register this tracks with GEMA) or to delete it. > >Its only allowed to stream Stuff of GEMA Members on the Original Page. > >Its also NOT allowed to offer some "Promo" DJ-Mixes or Podcasts with >GEMA Stuff in it (without registration to GEMA). > >Here are (sorry, only in German) a good information site about music >rights on internet: >http://irights.de/index.php?id=461 <http://irights.de/index.php?id=461> >http://www.urheberrecht.org/news/ <http://www.urheberrecht.org/news/> ><snip> > >....................................ugh. > > jeff >
