[AQ]

It is not April the first is it ??

This email has just been circulated by the site management -

" Due to copyright law and cost, the playing of radios/cd's or any must now stop on site. Please ensure that all radios are switched off. If you need any further clarification, please come and see me "

Radio - copyright !!!!!

I know it may be classed as heresy to say it but hopefully someone in the management team has screwed up (again )

[AQ]

I found this on Google. Apparently Management did not make a mistake

Business owners are receiving calls from the Performing Right Society (PRS) asking whether they allow their staff to listen to music while working. If they answer 'YES', they are then advised that they are liable to pay a licence fee. According to PRS, a tariff for 'music in the workplace' applies "to the mechanical performance of copyright music within the Society's repertoire as a background to work, meals, 'stand-down times' and breaks at work places such as offices, factories, canteens and rest rooms. It does not apply to, for example, telephone music on hold or music at staff social or sports clubs chargeable under the appropriate PRS tariff."

and there is even a published tarrif see
http://www.mcps-prs-alliance.co.uk/S...Tariff%20I.pdf
from which I copied

Example calculation:
Shift 1 - music for 250 days, for 4 hours each day, for 115 employees:
250 days x 8 half hours x 5 units of employees x £0.0755 £755.00
(no proportionate reduction)
Shift 2 - music for 250 days, for 4 hours each day, for 16 employees:
250 days x 8 half hours x 16/25 of 1 unit of employees x £0.0755
(proportionate reduction; see paragraph 3.1.1) £96.64
Total royalty (before VAT) £851.64

[Dave]

Unfortunately not. You need a special license to play a radio to more than x number of people & I heard in the news a few months back , about local businesses being checked on by the Authorities & penalties being issued accordingly

[Steve]

This is correct, at my old place of work we had to buy a licence so that the staff could listen to radio broadcasts and their own cd's in the warehouse. Like Dave has said it is triggered by the number of people who could be listening and once you reach that number it is illegal not to have a licence.

[sejanus]

Well, with a bit of luck, the EU is going to sort this nonsense out once and for all. There's a draft directive on this very subject, which aims to provide an absolute right to enjoy any performance that you have paid for, whether directly or indirectly.

As I understand it, 'indirect payment' will include advertising that people have paid for by buying the product, which in turn paid for the material around the product. It will also cover national broadcasters like the Beeb.

In other words, if someone paid the greedy swine for broadcasting it, they can shut up and eat their swill!

It's alarming when all that stands between us and insanity is the Brussels Beaurocracy.

[orangepeel]

kwik-fit have been done for it: -

Mechanics sued for listening to radio - The INQUIRER

[silkstone]

The stupidity of all this beggars belief. Record companies want airtime on the radio so that people hear the music and may be encouraged to buy the record. So now they won't hear it and therefore won't buy. The PRS really needs to find a friend for its brain cell.

[Dave]

Making it even worse, the advertisers that finance the commercial stations , will take a dim view of paying the same amount for Adverts, when less people will be listening. End result the station may well go under, meaning even less outlets for the music