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Pandora Sued By Sony Over Copyright Infringement

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/pandra-music-lawsuit-permission-sony,26592.html

By Kevin Parrish APRIL 18, 2014 4:40 PM- Source: The New York Times

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/18/business/media/lawsuit-against-pandora-seeks-royalties-for-golden-oldies.html?hpw&rref=technology&_r=1

By BEN SISARIO APRIL 17, 2014

 

 

This may be a re-post not sure yet, but this makes me mad i really love Pandora, I'm listening to it right now, I just don't see why Sony has to do this, It wasn't hurting anyone and what does Sony expect to get out of it?

 

 

On Thursday, Sony, Warner Bros, and Universal filed a lawsuit in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan against Pandora, claiming that the streaming music service is using recordings of older songs without permission.

In their lawsuit, the Big Three music companies argue that Pandora is violating New York State's own common-law copyright protections by using recordings of older songs without permission. Thus these companies believe that Pandora must not only have permission to play those songs, but to cough up the appropriate licensing feesicon1.png.

"This case presents a classic attempt by Pandora to reap where it has not sown," the labels say in the suit. "Pandora appropriates plaintiffs' valuable and unique property, violates New York law, and engages in common law copyright infringement and misappropriation and unfair competition."

As explained by the New York Times, federal copyright law dictates that onlineicon1.png and satellite radio must get licenses to use recordings that were made after the February 15, 1972 date. Payments are made in the "hundreds of millions" to SoundExchange, a branch of the RIAA. Songs that were recorded before 1972 aren't covered under federal copyright protection, but instead are covered by "a patchwork" of state laws.

Pandora has more than 70 million regular users, followed by Sirius XM, which has around 26 million subscribers. These two popular music listening services contributed to most of the $656 million in performance royalties collected by SoundExchange in 2013, the paper reports.

Currently, it's unclear if Pandora, along with Sirius XM, will be made to license the older music. As the New York Times points out, the current wave of lawsuits reflects the current mess the music industry is in, and could shape how the industry charges for music playback.

"Just because Buddy and the other '50s musicians recorded songs before 1972 doesn't mean their songs have no value," said the widow of Buddy Holly via the RIAA. "Thesecompanies'icon1.png failure to pay the rock 'n' roll pioneers is an injustice and it needs to change."

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Spotify>Pandora

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Spotify>Pandora

yeah, i have some friends who listen to Spotify and really like it however i prefer Pandora its just an opinion

"Anything that makes a console more like a PC, makes it better" 

-Linus Sebastian

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Looks like Sony is getting really desperate to keep themselves alive by finding each and every source of income they can obtain. Oh dear... but then again they have the right to sue, if Pandora is using recordings of older songs without permission.

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So you're telling me Pandora flat out put songs without any sort of permission? I hope their lawyer has "bullshit" on his speed dial to immediately call it. Seriously though they're likely going after an hyper technicality (oh you licensed the 1979 version of the song but unbeknownst to you the version you actually have on your server is the 1978 alternate take studio version with 1.3 seconds of extra silence and static noise at the end, lol fucking pay up!)

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Copyright-an excuse for  big corporations with lots of money to pay lawyers and buy politicians to bleed the public dry.

      The cake is a lie!!! -- but the muffins are genuine.

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Copyright-an excuse for  big corporations with lots of money to pay lawyers and buy politicians to bleed the public dry.

 

While the entire copyright and patent system in the US is several kinds of fucked you can't write them off like that. Copyrights are needed even if our current system doesn't do what it is supposed to do. However let's say the accusation is true why is it wrong for them to demand the money they are owed?

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@Derangel Exactly

"It seems we living the American dream, but the people highest up got the lowest self esteem. The prettiest people do the ugliest things, for the road to riches and diamond rings."- Kanye West, "All Falls Down"

 

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local music>internet poop

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While the entire copyright and patent system in the US is several kinds of fucked you can't write them off like that. Copyrights are needed even if our current system doesn't do what it is supposed to do. However let's say the accusation is true why is it wrong for them to demand the money they are owed?

Our copyright and patenting system is quite flawed all we can do is progressively move forward and try to fix it the best we can. 

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Sony needs some of dat doe.

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While the entire copyright and patent system in the US is several kinds of fucked you can't write them off like that. Copyrights are needed even if our current system doesn't do what it is supposed to do. However let's say the accusation is true why is it wrong for them to demand the money they are owed?

That's a totally different system; they have no legal groundwork for a federal-level lawsuit, as the songs aren't covered by federal copyright protection (but they might be eventually). They are suing Pandora in NY because they must have found some clause in NY state law that gives them some basis there.

 

As to why songs before 1972 weren't copyrighted, there weren't nearly as many records owned by the general public back then.

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason and intellect has intended us to forgo their use, and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them. - Galileo Galilei
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That's a totally different system; they have no legal groundwork for a federal-level lawsuit, as the songs aren't covered by federal copyright protection (but they might be eventually). They are suing Pandora in NY because they must have found some clause in NY state law that gives them some basis there.

 

As to why songs before 1972 weren't copyrighted, there weren't nearly as many records owned by the general public back then.

 

Apparently they have some kind of local operations in New York as well (at least according to Wikipedia) so that might give the studios some leverage.

 

They're still owned by the copyright holders or their descendants however (We can thank Disney for that mess, but that's a debate for another time) so there is an argument to be made for someone getting royalties for these songs being played.

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Copyright-an excuse for  big corporations with lots of money to pay lawyers and buy politicians to bleed the public dry.

 

Why? So everyone can steal the hard work of others? How would you feel if someone ripped you off and you only got paid half of what you should have?

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Music labels are the biggest C*****  I have had the displeasure of living on the same planet with.

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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Because $656 million extra dollars in listening royalties via free services isn't enough. Lol Oh, US of A, how can extortion by corporation be legal?

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Except you don't mention the other two companies in the article, and by law pandora is bypassing proper licensing to save money by using older recordings that have been slightly modified to bypass filters? That's right, keep feeding the Ltt kiddies kool-aid

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So you're telling me Pandora flat out put songs without any sort of permission? I hope their lawyer has "bullshit" on his speed dial to immediately call it. Seriously though they're likely going after an hyper technicality (oh you licensed the 1979 version of the song but unbeknownst to you the version you actually have on your server is the 1978 alternate take studio version with 1.3 seconds of extra silence and static noise at the end, lol fucking pay up!)

 

Fucking great lmao I just died. ^_^:)

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So you're telling me Pandora flat out put songs without any sort of permission? I hope their lawyer has "bullshit" on his speed dial to immediately call it. Seriously though they're likely going after an hyper technicality (oh you licensed the 1979 version of the song but unbeknownst to you the version you actually have on your server is the 1978 alternate take studio version with 1.3 seconds of extra silence and static noise at the end, lol fucking pay up!)

 

The case doesn't seem to be related to that.

 

It seems to be more like Pandora puts on a few songs from the Rolling Stones early catalogue like Satisfaction or Paint It Black and is not required to pay what the recording companies want.

 

It's for recordings prior to 1972 that Pandora currently can use without paying royalties to the companies that own the property to the songs. At least that is what I understand from it and I could be completely wrong. If that is true, I don't see how this wouldn't be a legitimate case.

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"Just because Buddy and the other '50s musicians recorded songs before 1972 doesn't mean their songs have no value," said the widow of Buddy Holly via the RIAA. "These companies' failure to pay me is an injustice and it needs to change."

 

Fixed.

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There's a big difference between what copyright should be and the aborted satan-spawn we have now.

Why? So everyone can steal the hard work of others? How would you feel if someone ripped you off and you only got paid half of what you should have?

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Looks like Sony is getting really desperate to keep themselves alive by finding each and every source of income they can obtain. Oh dear... but then again they have the right to sue, if Pandora is using recordings of older songs without permission.

Don't just blame Sony. There are 2 other huge companies doing the same thing here. I just wished that all song's older than 10 years old should have their copyright rights removed. No one gets anything at that point. So anything new you have to pay for and anything old it's free. Not to mention most things new aren't very good.

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Don't just blame Sony. There are 2 other huge companies doing the same thing here. I just wished that all song's older than 10 years old should have their copyright rights removed. No one gets anything at that point. So anything new you have to pay for and anything old it's free. Not to mention most things new aren't very good.

I completely disagree.  I think that the copyright system is broken, but setting a 10 year limit to copyright would cause a lot of different problems....Take Harry Potter for example, it took 10 years to write the entire series so you could effectively start producing Potter books prior to even the final book being published...I know this next example might be a bit silly, but what about Rick Astley, he was famous for a very brief time and yet due to Rick-Rolling he became popular again.  Under a 10 year cycle, he would have not profited from the meme.  Or perhaps a better example of 10 years being too small of a time, Wizard Of Oz....it was effectively a box office flop, and it took years before it caught on and became the classic it is now.

 

I actually think the current system is completely broken, as it stands it is 50 years past time of death.  My concept of copyright is it should be more like 20 years minimum time or death.  So if you die right after writing your next of kin get 20 years...but after 20 years if you are still alive you still maintain the copyright until you die (that way I feel it is fair).

 

 

 

In terms of the topic, I actually don't have a problem of them suing if they aren't being reimbursed for the music...if it is based on some technicalities though then it is a horrible move, but if Pandora really didn't pay any royalties on it then I agree with the lawsuit....it should be noted that the $656 million mentioned in the article is from the post '72 era, and it is distributed not only amongst the 3 suing but also to subsidize the collection program and the other studios.

0b10111010 10101101 11110000 00001101

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There's a big difference between what copyright should be and the aborted satan-spawn we have now.

 

Yes and no. Yes things are bad and they could be better, but that doesn't means there ever will be. If you listen to somebody like Richard Stallman, the fundamental issue is that copyright will always lead to corporate abuse and never actually protect the creators, simply because the entire system is designed so creators never actually have the means to create and profit from their inventions themselves. Instead we should be thinking about content creation as a cultural contribution to mankind and strive to support content creators themselves and not just the products of their labour as objects. Just like Education and Health should be universal rights available to all so should software and artistic endeavors. 

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