After all the copyright issues i had that were caused by the licensing of song “memories child” to a fox film, via Beatpick. I went back to Beatpicks website just tonight and explored, company says that its based in the UK, yet is really based in Italy, why?
to go on: Creative Commons license deal with both the sound recording and the publishing rights as one. The music business does not deal with rights this way. This means that for “music” the creative commons licenses are mostly good for the use of the public and not on any commercial level. Yet even with photo’s its kind of the same, how can the user of the license be sure that the person has got a model release or they really took the picture and who is liable?
Also: Beatpicks contract is a copy of the Magnitude contract, yet Magnitude is based in US. In the US competition exists between BMI and ASCAP, contracts the artists sign are non-exclusive, this means that artists are able to collect and publish direct. Example: song is played on TV, yet i can also license the song to a telephone answering machine company and collect for both uses, to do so would need to control 100 percent of the copyright. This is not possible outside the US for artists that are with the local rights organisations. Artists that are serious about art have to consider effects of Beatpick, rights organisations are often tied into many aspects of how the music business works in each country, going with the US business model and not being based in the US can create conflicts with other artists that you might have associated your copyright with. Also ASCAP tend to deal with artists that are not with a publisher as if they are a communication’s company that somehow does not have to care how they deal with you.
Beatpick in my instance made the choice to license the mechanical rights for the use of my song without all parties being in agreement, in other words not having 100 percent control of all the copyright, yet telling Fox that they did. In reality 100 percent of the copyright means you have the producers, all writers and the song taken care of. Once an artist is in an exclusive copyright situation its not really possible to change to a none-exclusive situation.
The fox film generated 20 million dollars in DVD sales, although my mechanical rights are under exclusive management, Fox were able to get around having to pay anything for the pressing of the song or the sound recording to DVD. Even though they knew prior to pressing that those rights were exclusively managed. I refused to take payment from Beatpick, as the license they negotiated was so small and so not in my favor. As soon as i told Beatpick that i would not give them my publishing rights, Beatpick created a contract that did not take into consideration my situation. Yet Beatpick is not a publisher.
Having a company take care of both the publishing and recording rights to your songs, is a really personal thing. Sure a lot of music does not get used, when it could be used. When i joined with Beatpick it advertised itself as a fair play music label, at least they have fallen off that trip.
Its interesting that Beatpick says on its website, Non-commercial projects use our music free of charge. Where can a non-commercial project be broadcast with out commercial royalties having to be paid. Any public performance of music is considered a commercial use. The license is good if you want to use the song at home.
I used to be a big supporter of creative commons, things change though. I like the idea of some kind of middle ground, so the artist gets to make up her/his own license, when commerce arrives that artist might then integrate into the regular system. The licenses seem best for the user of content not the creator, better ways for creators exist to give what they create away freely. Yet who is going to create these licenses, for sure not Creative Commons, and for sure not the industry of music. The regular system is not good, if you want to make your music free, the artist needs to build it free from the word go.