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Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

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Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#21

Post by jollybean »

otterley wrote: post #11
BitwiseFool wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really have no clue. Playing music in public isn't considered copyright violation. Otherwise playing the radio would be unlawful. Edit: Wow, it really is considered unlawful. I reflexively hate the idea that playing a song can be considered violating copyright. Yes, I know there's more to it than just that, but wow.

Wrong. One of the rights in the "copyright bundle" is public performance rights, which are reserved exclusively to the copyright holder and their licensees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performing_rights Generally speaking, "public performance" means outside a small social group consisting of friends and/or family.

More likely the opposite.

Someone working on the job, like a taxi, driving a truck, or even in the office, listening to music is not going to be in violation - unless the music were played as part of entertainment for customers/patrons.

The cop will unlikely be found to be in violation.

The person filming in uploading, that production would probably be in violation under the 'Transmission Clause'.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#22

Post by jollybean »

otterley wrote: post #16
scotuswroteus wrote: post #5

Isn't that video evidence that the police officer is violating the copyright?

It would be hilarious (and also poetic justice) if Taylor Swift (or whomever the copyright holder is) sued the Alameda County Sheriff's department for copyright violation and demanded maximum statutory penalties. EDIT: Bummer, it looks like this route is not available to the copyright holder, since states have sovereign immunity against copyright infringement claims. See _Allen v. Cooper_, 589 U.S. ____ (2020).

It would be poetic justice of a kind, because I'll bet that they find a cop playing music for himself, even while interacting with others is probably not breaking copyright, whereas the person filming and publishing the situation probably is, i.e. an attempt to 'press' the police would end up more than likely just affirming the situation with a specific judicial ruling. It'd be interesting to see how a judge ruled however.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#23

Post by akersten »

015a wrote: post #20

To some degree I understand the cop's position. The internet is an insanely dangerous echo chamber. The vast, VAST majority of police interactions are not that. The vast majority of police interactions are well-meaning officers maintaining public order. This doesn't excuse the interactions which are unrighteous and deserve to be exposed, possibly including the interaction that these people were protesting. The office…

> when the officer flat-out says "yeah you can record, that's fine" (good on him!);

The fact that he plays the copyrighted track is evidence that his statement about "oh, sure, of course you can record ;)" was not made in good faith. I give the officer zero benefit of the doubt here. Transparency is necessary in all police interactions in public, not just the ones that are "bad enough to excuse a little Taylor Swift." Cops can cry me a river about the internet outrage machine.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#25

Post by mannerheim »

DevKoala wrote: post #19
scotuswroteus wrote: post #5

Isn't that video evidence that the police officer is violating the copyright?

I don’t think so because the officer isn’t posting the video online. Unless you think it violates copyright to play music in public spaces.

Public performances violate copyright.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#26

Post by kube-system »

akersten wrote: post #18
oh_sigh wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need a public performance license to personally consume music in public. Public performance licenses would be for things like playing a song in a restaurant you run, or in a retail store.

He's not personally consuming - he's playing the music in public for the purposes of performance (the audience) and broadcast (he knows it is being recorded)! This is willful and flagrant infringement.

Eh, knowing that something is being recorded is not broadcasting.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#27

Post by lucideer »

DevKoala wrote: post #19
scotuswroteus wrote: post #5

Isn't that video evidence that the police officer is violating the copyright?

I don’t think so because the officer isn’t posting the video online. Unless you think it violates copyright to play music in public spaces.

IANAL but this typically comes down to the definition of broadcast and one could certainly argue that the officer's intent is to broadcast if they're playing it specifically because they know they're being recorded for public broadcast.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#28

Post by SpaceManNabs »

akersten wrote: post #18
oh_sigh wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need a public performance license to personally consume music in public. Public performance licenses would be for things like playing a song in a restaurant you run, or in a retail store.

He's not personally consuming - he's playing the music in public for the purposes of performance (the audience) and broadcast (he knows it is being recorded)! This is willful and flagrant infringement.

That might be hard to prove unless there is an unofficial department email going around on tips and tricks to avoid pesky recorders. Sorry for the cynicism.

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#29

Post by frumper »

babyshake wrote: post #8
gumby wrote: post #3

Would be simpler to simply play 4’33” on a continuous loop. For those who’d not know the song: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4′33″

I don't think it would be possible to verify this when making a copyright claim. But along these lines, if you could play a loop of audio that would not be recognized by people around you or not recognized as music but could be recognized by an algorithm, then you could use this strategy without anyone knowing.

verification doesn't seem to be very high on the priority list of copyright claims

Re: Police officer plays Taylor Swift song to keep a video off YouTube

#30

Post by mannerheim »

jollybean wrote: post #21
otterley wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wrong. One of the rights in the "copyright bundle" is public performance rights, which are reserved exclusively to the copyright holder and their licensees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performing_rights Generally speaking, "public performance" means outside a small social group consisting of friends and/or family.

More likely the opposite. Someone working on the job, like a taxi, driving a truck, or even in the office, listening to music is not going to be in violation - unless the music were played as part of entertainment for customers/patrons. The cop will unlikely be found to be in violation. The person filming in uploading, that production would probably be in violation under the 'Transmission Clause'.

> like a taxi

Taxi drivers do have to pay license fees in some countries.

> or even in the office

According to the RIAA, you need to license music in order to play it in the office.

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