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Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

reuters.com

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Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#111

Post by stordoff »

cortesoft wrote: post #104
wang_li wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think that the authors/rights holders of the music really should get the majority of the revenue. The underlying technology is of little interest to the end user. Who would really install and pay for spotify if the entire library consisted of a two minute track of street sounds from Los Angeles and thirty seconds of doorbells? Basically no one. Nobody really cares about the technology, what they want is the m…

Yes, but without the underlying tech, there is no way for the end user to access that content. So the question is, which is more scarce? The infrastructure, tools, and millions of paying customers using your streaming service, or the music itself? There are a lot of music producers and publishers. There aren't many streaming services that have a large customer base and the tech to service it.

> many streaming services that have a large customer base

And arguably Spotify only has a large customer base because it has the content people want. It's very similar to a chicken and egg problem.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#112

Post by adventist »

spuz wrote: post #109
agrippanux wrote: post #96

I was one of the original engineers on MP3.com. Shortly after our music locker service debuted, we got sued by all the major labels. I spent 4 months writing tools to pull all the discovery data for their lawsuits. When it was apparent our court case was going south, the major music publishers sued us as well (lead by Harry Fox Agency). I spent another 4 months pulling discovery data for those lawsuits. When those co…

What does "pulling discovery data" mean? Why did MP3.com get sued?

I take it that "discovery" is the process of communicating with the people who are suing providing the raw data and facts as to their basis for suing. This could be a giant spreadsheet of the songs that were sold and what was paid on it.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#113

Post by davis »

spuz wrote: post #109
agrippanux wrote: post #96

I was one of the original engineers on MP3.com. Shortly after our music locker service debuted, we got sued by all the major labels. I spent 4 months writing tools to pull all the discovery data for their lawsuits. When it was apparent our court case was going south, the major music publishers sued us as well (lead by Harry Fox Agency). I spent another 4 months pulling discovery data for those lawsuits. When those co…

What does "pulling discovery data" mean? Why did MP3.com get sued?

In a legal case, discovery means evidence/data https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_(law)

This person was probably writing scripts/tools to grab data from email servers, databases, code, etc.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#114

Post by sirmarksalot »

spike021 wrote: post #102
agrippanux wrote: post #96

I was one of the original engineers on MP3.com. Shortly after our music locker service debuted, we got sued by all the major labels. I spent 4 months writing tools to pull all the discovery data for their lawsuits. When it was apparent our court case was going south, the major music publishers sued us as well (lead by Harry Fox Agency). I spent another 4 months pulling discovery data for those lawsuits. When those co…

If you don't mind me asking, is there any particular reason you didn't just leave? I'd imagine this fits the kind of situation where you aren't obligated to stay.

Depending on the timeline, this may have overlapped with the dot-com crash, in which case a programmer would be happy to have any job they could get.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#115

Post by bogomipz »

agrippanux wrote: post #96

I was one of the original engineers on MP3.com. Shortly after our music locker service debuted, we got sued by all the major labels. I spent 4 months writing tools to pull all the discovery data for their lawsuits. When it was apparent our court case was going south, the major music publishers sued us as well (lead by Harry Fox Agency). I spent another 4 months pulling discovery data for those lawsuits. When those co…

>"we got sued by every 2 bit operation that owned a partial percentage of the country-based rights to a song"

Were these these each each country's performing rights societies then? I am confused on why these are partial percentages. I would have though that they would be 100% owned in each country. Does the performing right society divide up 1 pie amongst all its affiliates in each of the countries.

Do you have any idea what the final amount Vivendi paid out to straighten everything out? I am guessing they had good idea of that before the acquisition, so I am guessing it was still a good investment for them.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#116

Post by DrJokepu »

cortesoft wrote: post #97
bambax wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is replay; you can search many radio stations playlist for a specific title and play it. What about Youtube? It seems most / all music is on YT, what licence do they use? Streaming services seem a lot like YT.

I think only music owners are allowed to post to YT, so they don't need a license like Spotify would.

But you see, the thing is with commercial music is that the music owner is not a single entity. There is a composer, if there are lyrics there is a lyricist, if it was translated then there is a translator, if it’s a cover or remix there is an arranger, there is a publisher that published the music, there might be a sub-publisher, then there is a record label… One of the main reasons behind the existence of this complex system of rights is the complex ownership structure of the copyright and related rights.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#117

Post by bogomipz »

intopieces wrote: post #108
basseq wrote: post #65

This article reads like a press release from the plantiff (Wixen) and took a little googling to unwind. Long story short, it sounds like there's disagreement about what type of license Spotify needs. Spotify has previously claimed that streaming is not "reproduction" and is more akin to "performance"... and they (may) have those licenses. What they do not have (in some cases?) is a "mechanical" license[1], which carr…

> Spotify has previously claimed that streaming is not "reproduction" and is more akin to "performance"... and they (may) have those licenses. Doesn't having an offline mode run counter to this claim? That's clearly reproducing it. It once lived as a copy on their servers, now it lives as a copy on their servers and on the subscriber's device. I could see, however, the argument going this way: a true reproduction is…

>"Doesn't having an offline mode run counter to this claim? That's clearly reproducing it."

I agree with this. Even if it only lives an encrypted cache you are effectively doing a bit by bit reproduction when you offline sync. They do expire once the user hadn't logged in for some amount of time, I believe it's something like after 30 days of not logging in or refreshing a token.

Before streaming when someone bought a CD they bought just that copy you weren't permitted to make a copy of that CD at any time.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#118

Post by sideshowb »

QAPereo wrote: post #91
thomastjeffery wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also the reason behind ridiculous things like DRM. The idea that there is a difference between broadcasting and copying, and that computers can emulate that difference is a pipe dream; nonetheless shared by most music labels.

It’s an endless boon to piracy, which should have largely died if not for the rampant greed and incompetence of publishers.

I agree publishers were incompetent (in clinging onto old models rather than adapting), but has streaming really helped the average artist?

Having the option to distribute music for free has been good, for sure

Setting the expectation that music should be near enough free, less so

You could argue this is one of those public good situations universal income is designed to address, but it certainly hasn't yet.

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#119

Post by gt_ »

behringer wrote: post #95
gt_ wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When an artistic pursuit is personal, it seems like it could maybe be passed on in a will or something similar. This might be a ridiculous idea, but I guess I find complaining about someone’s artistic endeavors not being free to be absurd in it’s own way.

Tell that to Disney when he made snow white.

Elaborate

Re: Spotify hit with $1.6B copyright lawsuit

#120

Post by iaw »

agrippanux wrote: post #96

I was one of the original engineers on MP3.com. Shortly after our music locker service debuted, we got sued by all the major labels. I spent 4 months writing tools to pull all the discovery data for their lawsuits. When it was apparent our court case was going south, the major music publishers sued us as well (lead by Harry Fox Agency). I spent another 4 months pulling discovery data for those lawsuits. When those co…

I've done two reconciliations in my career, each lasting a month.

Never again.

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