The Copyright Office #2 03/31/12

        Before I started with the two forms about submitting an application to the United States Copyright Office, I had to go over the fact that, as stated at one of the US Copyright Office website, "Although they are separate works, a musical composition and a sound recording may be registered together on a single application if ownership of the copyrights in both is exactly the same. To register a single claim in both works, give information about the author(s) of both the musical composition and the sound recording.
Filing an Original Claim to Copyright with the U.S. Copyright Office An application for copyright registration contains three essential elements: a completed application form, a nonrefundable filing fee, and a nonreturnable deposit—that is, a copy or copies of the work being registered and “deposited”
with the Copyright Office."
        By reading this statement I could see the fact that it is good for the person and the Office to process the intellectual property to get it officially protected by the copyright faster and very economically. On the other hand, I also came across to the question about one of the copyright law I went over few days ago: which was about the fact that music sheets have the right to public performance, but not the sound recordings. I thought, "If I turn my sound recording with a music sheet and by any chance gets very popular, then I could I get the right for public performance?"
        This bothered me very much because this erases the whole problem of the copyright law of not giving the sound recordings the right to public performance, because everything can be fixed by just turning an application with not just the sound recording but also with the music sheet of that song.
        On the other hand, it is clear that, for whatever reason, this particular problem is yet to be solved. Therefore, I would look through if my theory is correct, and if it's not then I would try to answer why I am wrong.

The Copyright Office 03/30/12

        Today, I want to show my viewers about the steps on making some of my songs public. To make sure your music or any kind of intellectual property public and safe under the protection, you have to go through the United States Copyright Office. I do not mean that if you are in the other country and must have to turn an application; it only goes with people in the US, but anyone can feel free to do so. Nonetheless, according to the copyright office, the protection of any kind of intellectual property is usually covered without the submission of the property to the copyright office, and starts when it was created in fixed form; if it has a clear authorship and date it was created.
        There are many kinds of applications for any kind of intellectual property except those that cannot be covered by the copyright law which are: 1. Works that have not been fixed in a tangible form of expression. 2. Titles, names, short phrases, and slogans; familiar symbols or designs; mere variations of typographic ornamentation, lettering, or coloring; mere listings of ingredients or contents 3. Ideas, procedures, methods, systems, processes, concepts, principles, discoveries, or devices, as distinguished from a description, explanation, or illustration. 4. Works consisting entirely of information that is common
property and containing no original authorship. On the other hand, for me, I am trying to publicize my music and it is perfectly fine because it goes under the intellectual properties that are covered by the copyright law.
         For the application of music copyright there are two forms: one is the online registration form, and a registration with paper form. Instead of using the paper form I am going to use the online registration because Online registration through the electronic Copyright Office is the preferred way to register basic claims. Also, Advantages of online filing include "a lower filing fee, fastest processing time, online status tracking, secure payment by credit or debit card, electronic check, or Copyright Office deposit account, and the ability to upload certain categories of deposits directly into electronic Copyright Office as electronic files.
        More of this process will be upload on my next post!

Copyright Protection 03/24/12

        I have finally found a document about the copyright protection in the US at the website of United States Copyright Office, while I was trying to make my own authorship of couple of songs that I made. This document not only showed me more about how can one become the owner of the intellectual property, but also specific intellectual properties that are protected under the law of the copyright.
        According to the United States Copyright Office, for example, copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S.Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works. Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act generally gives the owner of copyright the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:
• reproduce the work in copies or phonorecords
• prepare derivative works based upon the work
• distribute copies or phonorecords of the work to the public by sale or other
transfer of ownership, or b  y rental, lease, or lending
• perform the work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audio­
visual works
• display the work publicly, in   the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural
works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other
audiovisual work
• perform the work publicly (in the case of sound recordings*) by means of
a digital audio transmission

The document not only talks about the copyright in great detail, but also goes through how does the intellectual property start as one's property and how and what is protection under the copyright. This was a great information to obtain as my Senior Honors Project, and I believe it will be a great use for my presentation.

Covered Song vs. Plagiarized Song 03/21/12

        My dear friend, John, asked me about the difference between a covered song and plagiarized song. I answered him with the most basic difference of two things. The biggest difference between a plagiarized song and a covered song is the form of acknowledgment of the original author or the person who has the ownership of the song. However, this short answer was not enough for me and I am sure it was the same for my friend, John. Therefore, I have decided to write a blog about the difference between plagiarized song and covered song after I have researched thoroughly about them.
        Plagiarized song is usually almost the same or exactly the same as the original song. That is why we notice or obviously state that this song is very similar to a particular song or do not categorize it as a new song. However, sometimes plagiarized songs take quite some time to get notice as a plagiarized song due to the infamous nature of the original song. In addition, it is very hard to get public attention and support from general audience when the original song is not familiar to the wide range of people. On the other hand, what I have not done that is very important is the government or the prospective of the law on this particular issue such as what is the penalty for the plagiarized song and how does the court get a case of the plagiarized song and is it not possible to sue a plagiarized song if the owner of the original song does not or could not sue the court because of the unawareness of the crime.
        Nonetheless, I am still trying to find some cases and legal information about the plagiarized songs. Therefore, it might take quite some time, but I hope my viewers be patient! On the other hand, I believe I should also focus on what are other ways in distinguishing between covered songs and plagiarized songs.

Plagiarized Music 03/17/12

        Last time on my blog, I have researched about the realm of going agianst the law of intellectual property and the copyright law. However, what I have learned so far about the crime agianst the form of intellectual porperty as music is that it is very hard to detect or even distinguished what is actually copied or just inspired by the song. Other times, it can be just a similar song or similar style of song. Nonetheless, the copyright law distingiushes the extent of plagiarizing the lyrics very well. The reason is very obvious because we can physically hear and see the lrics when we compare them. However, the rhythme, the beats, the solos, the chorus, etc are all not as much physical to distinguish with another or we can only see the difference very small compared to the lyrics.
        On the other hand, there are some very obvious songs that are known to be plagiarized. I believe by sharing with my viewers one of the examples of plagiarized songs, it will make us better on understanding the difference between plagiarized song and inpired song. More over, it will make us easier or clearer to difine the extent of violation of copyright law and intellectual property.
        The music that is popularly known as a plagiarized song in Korea is "I YAY!" This song was  a big hit and was one of the songs that lead the popularity of KPOP's early stage. The song copyright owner is SM Entertainment and sang by group called H.O.T. Nonetheless, the song that SM Entertainment copied is Mozart-Symphony No.25. I have nothing much to say about this plagiarized music because it is very obvious. On the other hand, I haven't researched about the copy rigtht case of this paticular song. Therefore, next time I will write about the case on my blog.

Plagiarism 03/16/12

        The common form of going against or committing a crime on copyright law is commonly known as plagiarism. However, plagiarism is very hard to describe or even define its area and domain due to its complexity. Therefore, today I will take the first step of getting to know or some what learn what is exactly defined as plagiarism in the music industry. This specific area is the hardest domain to able to define the extent of plagiarism. On the other hand, once we get to distinguish the realm of plagiarism and its limitation, I believe it will be easy for us to detect other forms of plagiarism later on in our lives and resolve one of great issues of intellectual property.
         Music plagiarism is the use of copyrighted music or lyrics without the consent of the legal copyright holder. Plagiarism is the legal term for copying another person’s or an entity's creative work and passing it off as original material. This generally is considered a violation of ethical standards and might be punishable by law in some areas.

Like other art forms, music is made of many individual elements, and it is often inspired by prior works of art. A simple progression of notes in a song can seem very similar to what is heard in other familiar songs, but this does not necessarily mean that the work has been plagiarized. The judges who oversee music plagiarism cases must weigh these factors when making their decisions. Some claimants are simple opportunists seeking a portion of the fortunes made by successful songs. This only makes it harder to decide those cases where actual plagiarism has taken place.

Today, I haven't really found the exact law or warding or even the clear definition of plagiarism. However, I will not give up and try to find a document that defines plagiarism and some cases that dealt with music plagiarism. Nonetheless, I have had the chance to glance at the problems and execution of the law on plagiarism and look for to get to know more about it in the near future.

Reason Behind the Limited Protection for Sound Recordings 03/11/2012

        When I came across the limitation of the protection for sound recording, I had a hard time to understand the reason behind the limited protection. However, what I understood from is that I first have to understand more about the laws specifically on sound recordings. Therefore, I read some law papers written about the sound recording laws.
        According to George M. Borkowski, "The reasons for the exclusion of sound recordings from the Copyright Act until 1972 are not entirely clear.  To protect sound recordings created prior to 1972, record companies and other rights holders had to rely on a variety of state statutory and common law, which is specifically permitted by the Copyright Act.  In California, for example, Civil Code section 980 grants the author of an original work of authorship consisting of a sound recording initially fixed prior to February 15, 1972, exclusive ownership of the sound recording until February 15, 2047. This situation obviously makes it more difficult for owners of pre-1972 sound recordings to protect their rights to those recordings.  State laws that may offer some protection have been described as a patchwork of often vague and inconsistent rights.  In addition, there is no presumption of validity that is accorded by a copyright registration from the Copyright Office, and chain of title thus may be more difficult to establish.  This is a significant limitation, given that these are older works and include, for example, recordings of old radio broadcasts."

        Therefore, the reason behind limited protection is unclear. However, I believe there is a journal out there that states one of his of her opinion on why the law protecting sound recordings was limited in 1972. So, I will continue to find and learn about it. On the other hand, what came across my interest was the recommendation of how to improve the protection by the copyright office.

        The study has now been completed, and the Copyright Office has released several recommendations based on its results. These recommendations include the following:

  §  Federal copyright protection should apply to sound recordings fixed before February 15, 1972.  (Special provisions will be needed to address ownership issues, term of protection, and registration.)

§  All rights and limitations of the Copyright Act applicable to post-1972 sound recordings would apply to pre-1972 recordings, including a public performance right for digital audio transmissions, fair use, DMCA safe harbor for Internet service providers, and the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA.

 § Authors of pre-1972 sound recordings would have the right to terminate grants of transfers or licenses of copyright that are made after (but not before) the date federal protection starts.

§ The term of protection for pre-1972 sound recordings would be 95 years from publication, but in no event beyond February 15, 2067.

§ A transitional period would be instituted during which owners of pre-1972 sound recordings would be able to seek statutory damages and attorneys’ fees in infringement litigation notwithstanding the lack of registration of those works prior to filing suit.

Music Talk Show 03/08/12

        Yesterday, I have been to a music talk show and the talk show host was Youngsup Thomas Shin. Yes, the host was not another person who has the same name as me, but it was actually me who held the show. I didn't want to tell my viewers beforehand in order to be a surprise and I wasn't sure if my show would be as successful as I hoped it would be. Nonetheless, I am glad to tell you that my show was really great and I want to share with my viewers what I learned from a life time experience of being in a musician's point of view or position.
        The theme of my show was telling the audience of the songs that help me through tough situations in life and help to become a bigger person. This experience not only gave me a closer step towards getting to know other artists for my project but also I got to on stage where lots of famous song writers started their music careers and somewhat be in there shoe.
        The songs that helped me become stronger were: "A Watchful Guardian" by Hans Zimmer, "Vienna" by Billy Joel, "Time" by Badelt, "Running" by SES, "He's a Pirate" by Hans Zimmer, and "Blessings" by Laura Story.
        Nonetheless, by doing this show, I want to tell my viewers that I have practiced the law of intellectual property on music. Last time when I went over the copyrights of the sound recordings and sheet music, what I have covered was that the sound recordings can be played publicly unlike sheet music.
        It was not only a great experience to have a show by myself, but also it was truly a different experience to play a song publicly knowing the law of copyright and that I am practicing it in front of my audience.

       

MUSIC COPYRIGHT LAW 03/03/12

        Last time on my blog, I have shortly talked about my interview with the songwriter/singer Baek young kyu and came to a question of copyright protection not just on intellectual property but this time specifically on music. To tell you the truth, I have not found an answer to how will the law protect the process of making an intellectual property and from being stolen. On the other hand, I have learned quite some information about the music copyright law in the United States of America.
         I have specifically learned about the copyright law on sheet music and sound recordings. One of the facts that made me interested very much was the letter from the U.S Court of Appeals wrote in 2003. The letter was about the limited rights for sound recordings. The letter says, "The creator of a musical composition has long had a right of exclusive public performance of that musical piece. Therefore, every time you hear the ubiquitous refrain from "Happy Birthday" in a public performance, a subsidiary of AOL/TimeWarner cashes a royalty check. However, the owner of a copyright in a sound recording of a musical composition has long had very little copyright protection. Until 1971 there was no copyright protection at all. With the Sound Recording Amendment of 1971, a limited  copyright in the reproduction of sound recordings was established in an effort to combat recording piracy. However, there was still no right to public performance of that sound recording. Therefore, while playing a compact disc recording of "Happy Birthday" in a concert hall for the paying public would still enrich AOL/TimeWarner, the person or company that owned the copyright on the CD recording of the music would earn no remuneration beyond the proceeds from the original sale of the recording. This dichotomy of the copyright protection has a significant impact in the radio broadcasting industry."
        Therefore, what I learned from this letter was that the owner of the copyright in the sheet music is paid a royalty when a sound recording of that music is broadcast on the radio, but the owner of the copyright in the sound recording is not paid. As explained by the U.S. court of Appeals, the copyright owner of sound recordings has no exclusive right of public performance, except in the case of "digital audio transmission". But, what I don't understand is the reason behind the limited protection for sound recordings. I am having a difficult time seeing the prospective of this situation. Therefore, I plan on discovering this reason and further look for the question I have not answered yet.