0010: Using That Music On Your Podcast: Three Rights You Should Know About

well hey there hero it’s David H
Lawrence the seventeenth and today in
this episode of the vo Heroes podcast I
want to talk to you about rights I had a
conversation the other day with a young
lady who was adamant that she should
have the right to use whatever music she
wants I mean come on who are these
artists that create music so I want to
talk to you about that and three rights
that you should be aware of and we’ll do
that in just a moment
[Music]
so that little piece of music you just
heard no lyrics no beat just a little
electronic stinger that for those of you
watching the video version of the
podcast see under the titles and those
of you listening to the audio version of
the podcast just here as a little break
between my intro and what’s happening in
the rest of the episode that little
piece of music has rights attached to it
and no we don’t have the right to use
whatever music we want because somebody
took the time to create that music and
they get to decide what rights we have
to use that music that’s the way it
works in a civilized society when a
creator comes up with something they’re
given privileges to decide how others
can use it and usually for a certain
period of time now I’m gonna say I’m not
an attorney but this is one of my
passions copyright is one of my passions
rights in general and yeah it was a bit
of a passion of mine until Napster
showed up and Napster really fueled me
to say look hold on a second
you’re doing something wrong and you
don’t even realize that you are and in
those days I was working on CNN radio
and I had my own syndicated show about
technology and I was one of the few
journalists in the space that was
actually crying out look you may think
that you’re being all revolutionary and
stuff and sharing as opposed to doing
things that are what the funny daddies
do you know respecting rights and things
like that but it’s important to
understand that it could happen to you
as well and so that’s why in an age
where the democratization of the
creation of content is so rampant we
need to know even more about the rights
that we are do is create errs and that
we must adhere to as consumers and so
the three rights I wanted to talk to you
about today was number one copyright
number two performance rights and number
three mechanical rights now again I’m
not an attorney but I’ve been
party too many contracts regarding the
execution and exploitation of both
available and unavailable rights and I
was also a party to a 10 million dollar
copyright infringement lawsuit when I
worked at a company that made fun of a
jingle tell you more about that in a
future episode of the podcast but let’s
talk about copyright first of all when
you create something and according to
the law a fix it to a medium write it
down on paper record it as a sound or as
a visual what happens is at that very
moment you’re afforded by the government
a copyright what’s called a statutory
copyright to that work that means it’s
yours it’s somewhat protected you might
want to register that copyright to make
that protection even deeper and stronger
but you have from the moment it’s
created and placed on a medium you have
a version of copyright protection now
that in and of itself is about the work
that you’ve created there’s another
right that we often associate with
hearing a song or watching a video or
reading a book being read aloud a
performance right so when I used to work
in nightclubs ASCAP and BMI were the two
people that would come around to the
nightclub sit in the bar for a while and
then go to the owner and say hey you’re
gonna need an ASCAP license or a BMI
license to be able to play all this
music you’re playing that deejay up
there me is playing and it’s gonna cost
you about two hundred bucks a year so
that’s how ASCAP the American Society of
Composers and producers and BMI the
broadcast music Institute I think it was
or industries I don’t know what the I
stood for I don’t remember it’s been a
while
and SESAC to a degree which is the
Canadian group that does the same thing
that’s how they would operate when it
came to public performance rights they
did the same thing with radio stations
radio stations had asked cap and BMI
licenses in fact BMI was created
because radio stations got sick and
tired of ASCAP getting money and they
wanted some music they could play that
wasn’t part of a scaps
group of composers and producers so
that’s money that’s being paid to the
artist for a piece of work being
performed their version of a piece of
work being performed also money is
likely going to the writer and the
producers of that music via the record
company it’s one of the things that
record companies have been responsible
for and sometimes suspected of not doing
a very good job of administering for
years and years and years but that’s
just for the performance that’s just for
that moment when you hear it you enjoy
it you consume it somebody gets paid for
that privilege right that’s the
performance now there’s one level above
that and that’s where podcasts come in
when you take a piece of music and use
it in a podcast you are not just
allowing that piece of music to be
performed and enjoyed by the people who
listen to the podcast but you’re
actually embedding that song in another
product and for that you require
mechanical rights whether you resell
that product or not back in the day when
I worked at the American Comedy Network
we did a parody of a song by Neil Sedaka
called breaking up is hard to do we did
a song about the AT&T breakup in 1983
called breaking up is hard on you in
those days everybody was scared that we
would have nothing but MCI quality long
distance and it would all sound all
awful like it was AM radio now it sounds
great but you know that was the fear in
those days we had to obtain the
mechanical rights to use the melody of
that song in our product and it’s a very
similar not exactly the same but a
similar process when it comes to
podcasts if you wanted to use the Beach
Boys I get around you know because you
take you know walking tours of a city in
your podcast and you think oh that’d be
a great song this is actually what she
the I went to San Diego this past week
and I saw the people that create ECAM
live created ECAM live and I met Adrian
Salsbury who makes me look fantastic on
video and while I was there a podcaster
was complaining that she couldn’t just
use that song as her theme song and I
tried to explain it to her so I figured
I’d spend more time doing it today
that’s why this episode of the podcast
so say you think that’s a great song
to put in your podcast now it’s not just
performance rights which are also part
of what podcasting platforms pay but
it’s also mechanical rights to take the
actual
product the Beach Boys version of that
song and insert it into your product you
need to do that mechanically so those
are mechanical rights and the writer is
involved the publisher is involved the
artist may be involved if there are a
writer on the project the performers may
be involved we had to pay Neil Sedaka to
use breaking up is hard to do as the
melody for our song so that we can then
resell it and some rights are compulsory
so for example any cover band can
perform any song by any artist without
asking permission first up on stage or a
radio station can play whatever song
they want if they have a performance
license but a mechanical write is not
compulsory you have to ask permission
for that
and so what rose up and has risen up a
great deal our creative commons and
other means for people who write music
to say look i’m giving you permission to
use this piece either for free or for a
payment and that little tiny electronic
stinger that you hear in this episode
after i do the little 25 30 second intro
on the show i actually paid for and i
paid as i’m sure a lot of other people
who have used that particular piece of
music and what they’ve done that money
goes to not only the people distributing
the music for them but also directly to
the artists themselves
so what are the penalties the penalties
can be really severe and if you can’t
afford to go to court and would like to
remain an honest human being just know
that all of these things point in one
direction and that is don’t minimize the
creative efforts of a musician of a
performer of a writer of a producer of
an engineer of a distribution system
because you think it’s no big deal it is
a big deal and for those of you looking
to use very popular music on your
podcast just know you can’t use it
usually as a theme and you also want to
be really really careful about a whole
bunch of other things before you delve
into that range so what I would say is
go to places like play sitcom or
videohive
or even youtube if you go to youtube.com
or if you search google on youtube.com
and search for licensed free music or
free music on youtube they have whole
libraries that you can use for anything
you want they have taken care of paying
the license fees or had people compose
the music for you and yeah it’s not I
get around by the Beach Boys it’s not
yesterday by the Beatles it’s not a
Taylor Swift song but it’s just as
useful and it’s a fight that you should
be fighting on behalf of the artist not
your own uninformed selfishness about
how you should be able to do whatever
you want and that music wants to be free
that’s an old and invalid argument and I
hope that it will soon be a dead one if
you’re listening or watching to this on
vo heroes com I’d love to hear or see
your comments on this I’m sure I’m
bringing up emotions for some people who
went through the whole download wars in
the early 2000s and I’d love to know
what you think about all this and if
it’s something that you’ve come up
against and you’ve just made peace with
or if it’s something that you’ve you’re
vehemently opposed
I just let me know let me know I
understand it’s an emotional thing
if you’re not on vo hero’s comm go there
because that’s where the conversation is
sane and lovely and moderated I’d love
to hear what you have to say and if
you’d like to be on the list and get
notified when these videos and audio
podcast episodes come out well right
there on vo heroes calm at the bottom of
every page is a little form that you can
fill out that says join the list get on
the list and we’d love to have you on
the list and while you’re here if you
want to hit the like button or share it
or join us subscribe we’d love to have
you do that however your your hearing or
viewing this podcast we do a video
version and we do the audio separate so
you can consume it however you want
I’m David H Lawrence the seventeenth
this is the vo Heroes podcast I thank
you so much for watching and for
listening and I will talk to you soon
[Music].