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.