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by jchw 1953 days ago
If your phone has an FM radio, sure. However Internet radio doesn’t offer the same broadcast exemptions that traditional radio does, so you still need to deal with licensing when it comes to playing internet radio in public.

Now on one hand, every day people will find this absurd. However, I am pretty sure it is not a defense that it’s not enforced evenly in all circumstances. A lot of people go 5mph over the speed limit without consequences; means nothing if you’re in court for it.

However, if you are acting in bad faith, you can expect people to become more creative with their use of the law against you. The police do this all the time.

And I really, really don’t think we need to argue that the police officer here just really wanted to share his taste in music while being uncooperative and has no idea what’s going on.

P.S.: IANAL.
1 comments
mc32 1953 days ago
Copyright holders often act in bad faith, non-copyright holders as well. We see both all the time on YouTube. Yet people continue to proceed in bad faith without repercussion.

I do know lots of small businesses (pop-ups) use streamed media -so do company picnics and so on. It’s a thing. Officially I’m sure ASCAP frowns on this. On the other hand it’s a fruitless pursuit.

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jchw 1953 days ago
It’s obviously up to rights holders to decide what they would like to do. ASCAP is probably largely not interested in policing mundane and mostly personal uses of music in public places; especially a one-off event like a company luncheon, where relevant legal exemptions (at least for broadcast radio) exist. Seems like a case of not much to gain with a bit to lose.

However, it might possibly become a different story in this case. Here is a pretty objectionable use of copyrighted music on a small scale. It makes copyright holders look bad because the system they lobbied for could now possibly be used to help corrupt or abusive police officers escape accountability and censor opposition. Ordinarily, a copyright holder taking action against a small scale case like this would seem like a David and Goliath situation, but in this case the “little guy” is not the person playing the music.

Acting in bad faith is, of course, one thing, when you are an individual and you are acting against a large conglomerate. It doesn’t justify the action, but the optics of enforcement are not great. Just remember issues like Mike Rowe Soft for example. (P.S.: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/11/trademark-law-does-not...)

This case is more complicated because the perceived wrong is not exactly the use of copyrighted music but how copyright systems are being used against a citizen exercising their rights.

It remains to be seen what happens, but if this sort of behavior continues I can at least bet on musicians not being very happy to hear when their music is used for this purpose.

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