To get some clarity on this subject I went through " Indian
Copyright Act 1957".Though not a legal person I am presenting some
salient clauses with my interpretations in quotes.
16.No copyright except as provided in this Act:- No person shall be
entitled to copyright or any similar right in any work,whether
published or unpublished, otherwise than under and in accordance
with the provisions of this Act.
"This would mean that a concert has to be registered for copyright
as per this Act with the registrar of copyrights ".
17 First owner of copyright:- Subject to the provisions of this Act,
the author of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright .....
c) in the case of a work made in the course of the author's
employment under a contract of service or apprenticeship, to which
clause (a) or clause (b) does not apply, the employer shall, in the
absence of any agreement to the contrary, be the first owner of the
copyright therein;
" As per ( c) above , the sabha which pays the artistes can be
deemed to be the First owner unless there is any other agreement to
the contrary."
19.Mode of assignment:- No assignment of the copyright in any work
shall be valid unless it is in writing signed by the assignor or by
his duly authorised agent.
"The sabha or the artiste who has copyrighted the performance should
assign in writing the rights to the recording company".
"Though not directly addressing our case , the following seem to
indicate that no copyright violation is made when we are dealing
with nonâ€"paying audience and are a non profit group".
52.Certain acts not to infringement of:- (1) The following acts
shall not constitute an infringement of copyright, namely : ---
a)----- -----
(k) the causing of a recording embodied in a record to be heard in
public by utilising the record, ---
(i) at any premises where persons reside, as part of the amenities
provided exclusively or mainly for residents therein, or
(ii) as part of the activities of a club, society or other
organisation which is not established or conducted for profit;
( l ) the performance of a literary, dramatic or musical work by an
amateur club or society, if the performance is given to a non-paying
audience, or for the benefit of a religious institution;
Looking at above, I feel that sharing of concerts especially of old
masters performed decades ago should not prick our conscience as
violations of Law.
But this requires some thought and caution when dealing with present
day performing artistes and their concerts.
I request rasikas in this forum with legal background to offer
guidance.
Regards
GVR Shyam
Definitely needs a further thorough look into the nooks and corners especially in the light of the fact that a company Rajeshwari Recording is now bringing out concerts uploaded in different forums as copyrighted concerts.
My Three cents
1.In this forum, The Law of the Administrator over rides The Law referred to , above.Since it is more conservative.
SrKris has made thisclear , time and again.
2.Whenever the benefit of doubt has to be given , it has to be in favour of removing the links and not the other way around.
3.Lastly Kaumaram gave us the option of dicussing with Five Lawyers in his team on these issues.
Obviuosly No one has done so.
It only means that almost all of us are keen to keep this forum alive with its primary intention of spreading the good word around ,and in this process upload tracks which we feel will meet the guidelines of Srkris
And in the rare case of such tracks being objected to , we would delete these with no sense of frustration.
What XYZ Company does should not be a matter of interest to this forum.
I agree with the principles enunciated by coolkarni.
This Forum is owned and operated entirely by the webmaster. We have to abide by his guidelines
Also as users we have to bring to his attention issues that may jeopardize the health and survival of this Forum (such as 'decency of language', 'copyright issues', 'slander or gossip', 'misrepresentations'...)
His ruling is Final for the users!
Large number of live concerts has already been uploaded by several good souls so far. I understand that some of the contemporary artistes have objections to uploading their concerts.
1. Do uploading of concerts by the present day artistes enhance their reputation or result in loss of their earnings? It is unrealistic to compare them with a Thyagaraja or a Papanasam Sivan. In any case what should be done before uploading?
I think we should ask the concerned artiste’s permission before uploading. It will at least satisfy their ego.
2. What is the policy for the concerts of artistes already uploaded and who are unfortunately not with us any more but their families’ object?
Again I think we should respect their objection, though a comical situation arise when the concerts are already available in the public domain.
3. One area, which is very clear, is the case where someone holds the copyrights.
Here I think the sabhas need to become more professional and make it clear on the copyright aspects even before a concert starts. All said and done I think it is the prerogative of the organisers on the ownership of copyrights.
What is the future and what are the views of fellow members on this subject?
vinayo wrote:2. What is the policy for the concerts of artistes already uploaded and who are unfortunately not with us any more but their families’ object?
Again I think we should respect their objection, though a comical situation arise when the concerts are already available in the public domain.
Surprisingly I was thinking about copyrights only yesterday. If vidwans of yesteryears had been smart enough in obtaining copyrights for their music,then some of our current day artistes might be fined for lifting korvais/ kanakkus or pallavis straight from old recordings
In contrast, today's artistes seem to be so concerned about copyrights. Any special reason?;)
-bhaktha
Last edited by bhaktha on 11 Jul 2007, 23:42, edited 1 time in total.
Vinayo,
We can all have our views on this issue and wax eloquent about them. But, there are 2 issues that need to be separated here: 1. A debate on the advantages to CM from disseminating music through sites such as ours; 2. Legalities of doing so. We can debate about issue 1, but as far as issue #2 goes, the forum has certain views that are as follows:
I understand that the laws on this may even be murky, but as a reuslt of a storm or a tsunami in a tea-cup that errupted in the initial days of this forum, we have decided to not upload full concerts (of current or former artists) and to honor the wishes of those among our contemporary artists who do not want their tracks disseminated in this way. We have traditionally used tracks to highlight a point being made or as a 'teaching aid'. Tracks posted by the composers/artists/artist-composers themselves are another matter!
