From the BBC. This is getting quite ridiculous.

Song sites face legal crackdown

The music industry is to extend its copyright war by taking legal action against websites offering unlicensed song scores and lyrics.
The Music Publishers' Association (MPA), which represents US sheet music companies, will launch its first campaign against such sites in 2006.

MPA president Lauren Keiser said he wanted site owners to be jailed.

He said unlicensed guitar tabs and song scores were widely available on the internet but were "completely illegal".

Mr Keiser said he did not just want to shut websites and impose fines, saying if authorities can "throw in some jail time I think we'll be a little more effective".

Bitter battles

The move comes after several years of bitter legal battles against unauthorised services allowing users to download recordings for free.

Publishing companies have taken action against websites in the past, but this will be the first co-ordinated legal campaign by the MPA.

The MPA would target "very big sites that people would think are legitimate and very, very popular", Mr Keiser said.

"The Xerox machine was the big usurper of our potential income," he said. "But now the internet is taking more of a bite out of sheet music and printed music sales so we're taking a more proactive stance."

Music publishers and songwriters will consider all tools under the law to stop this illegal behaviour

David Israelite
National Music Publishers' Association
David Israelite, president of the National Music Publishers' Association, added his concerns.

"Unauthorised use of lyrics and tablature deprives the songwriter of the ability to make a living, and is no different than stealing," he said.

"Music publishers and songwriters will consider all tools under the law to stop this illegal behaviour."

Sandro del Greco, who runs Tabhall.co.uk, said the issue was not serious enough to warrant jail time and sites like his were not necessarily depriving publishers of income.

Learn

"I play the drums mainly but I play the guitar as well. I run the website and I still buy the [tab] books," he said.

"The tabs online aren't deadly accurate so if someone really wants to know it they'll buy the book.

"But most of the bands I listen to don't have tab books to buy so if you get them online, that's the only way you can really learn it unless you work it out yourself."

The campaign comes after lyric-finding software PearLyrics was forced off the internet by a leading music publishing company, Warner Chappell.

'No alternative'

PearLyrics worked with Apple's iTunes, searching the internet to find lyrics for songs in a user's collection.

"I just don't see why PearLyrics should infringe the copyright of Warner Chappell because all I'm doing is searching publicly-available websites," PearLyrics developer Walter Ritter said.

"It would be different if they had an alternative service that also provided lyrics online and also integrated [with iTunes] like PearLyrics did. But they don't offer anything like that at all."

A Warner Chappell statement said the company wanted to ensure songwriters were "fairly compensated for their works and that legitimate sites with accurate lyrics are not undermined by unlicensed sites".

"We have requested that PearWorks provide us with information regarding the sources of their lyrics, and have further asked that they discontinue the service if these sources are operating without a licence."

I'll give you another example:

Here in Belgium (and in other countries) we students have 'always' had our traditions and culture: songs, evenings where there is singing but organised in a very special way called 'cantus'.
There is actually a description of it in in Wikipedia:
Cantus on Wikipedia
Although it's not quite accurate...

Now, to make my point: Some of these texts have been printed in a book that's has been copyrighted. No problem with that. But some of the songs were almost forgotten and somebody looked up how they were sung. He did a lot of work for that all right. But he copyrighted the melodies! I mean: It is our common heritage, it's not for sale! That's problem 1.
Problem 2 is that on those nights where we have a 'cantus' (we all sit along and drink and sing, so no music), we are actually susceptible to being fined!! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wacko.gif) Why? Because we are singing songs with copyrighted melodies on a public event! It's 20-50 (mostly) people singing, drinking and having fun in a hall... All 'baptised' students are in principle mostly welcome, so they call it public.
I know a 'president' of a student's club who once had a visit by a controller of the music industry and was fined because they were singing copyrighted songs!!! I think that's outrageous...

Do you actually know that when you are singing a song in public (just think about football fans e.a.), you can actually be fined?? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ph34r.gif)

I think it's a typical thing of our modern world and it's sick desire of commercialising every single thing on this globe and around. In developing countries, the WTO is forcing third world countries to privatise the distribution of drinking water. What's next? Pay for the last bit of unpolluted air you inhale because you emit CO2??

All right: Downloading is stealing, but the music industry is all so a bunch of conmen regarding how they deal with their artists and customers... Not to mention their mad prices...

There is also another point of view from the artist's side: In Belgium there is a popular pop/rock band (and many others in other countries) who's encouraging the downloading of their music, they even added a blank CD to their latest album. Just to make a statement: Copy our music. Let everybody hear it! Share it with everybody...

Culture should not only be for the minority that's able to pay for it... Sadly, everything in this world is about cash. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)