Agreeing with Ross, and more...

Ross Gardler wrote:

> Debbee Williams wrote:
>
>> OK...to quote my frustrated 5 year old nephew, "I need help."
>>
>> I work for a non-profit organization, we have recently started providing
>> digital arts programs. Creating movies, music, photo manipulation, etc.
>> As part of the movies and some of the multi-media presentations we are
>> doing, we are using music from copyrighted CD's as background. We
>> started doing slide shows at an event highlighting activities for the
>> year, while playing a CD in the background. Now we have advanced to
>> creating short videos of the same thing, which are not only shown at a
>> conference, but shared at board meetings and other gatherings where we
>> want to showcase what we are doing.
>>
>> I have tried to locate if this is legal, if it falls under fair use, or
>> what...but really haven't been able to navigate the US copyright laws
>> very well.
>
>
> This is not legal. You are publically broadcasting copytighted
> material. To do this you need license (in the UK it is called a
> Performing Rights Society license, I think that in the US the
> equivalent is ASCAP http://www.ascap.com/about/).
>
> However, if you contact the copyright owners and explain your use you
> will probably find that most will be willing to allow you to do this.
> But to be legal you *must* have this in writing.
>
> Ross

Concur. In fact, any country with a TRIPs agreement (I think the whole
world...), these laws stick. As Ross suggested, there is a need to get a
legal 'license' from the owner of the copyright - which is usually not
the creator (artist, etc) of the work.

But there is another option: CreativeCommons makes all sorts of material
available under Creative Commons copyrights licenses which allows the
uses you appear to need, without having to keep a big stack of letters.
Video, audio, text... http://www.creativecommons.org

-- 
Taran Rampersad

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http://www.linuxgazette.com
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"Criticize by creating." — Michelangelo

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