Get a licence to sing while you work

Meridian said:
Not new though: this has been in place for more than twenty years. If you play music for general listening then you need a licence. The law if clear, if not necessarily sensible.


M
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Not new, but I suspect it is only relatively new last decade or so they have been enforcing it, on premises where public generally aren't on site and if they are, aren't for long.
 
they can't stop her singing if she's singing songs shes made up herself or pretty much anything that's not actually owned by the companies/artists that are members of that organisation.
 
If they wanted to be pedantry, they could probably fine someone for having their headphones up too loud when on the bus, because other people can hear it.

Seems stupid to me because it is free advertising for the music company/artist.
 
stockhausen said:
Copyright, Design & Patents Act, 1988 I believe?
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which, AFAIK, doesn't require you to have a 'license' to play music per say....

PRS is just an organisation working on behalf of the record companies - AFAIK they want to charge you a fee in order to play copyrighted material where the copyright is owned by one of their members - as this pretty much covers the entire music industry then that means anyone who wants to say put a radio on in their business will need to buy a 'license' - if you say owned a small business and wanted to play a CD your mate's band playing their own songs (with your mate's permission of course) then this organisation can basically be told to do one when they tell you to get a license.....

basically what I was trying to get across is that singing, playing music - isn't necessarily breaking the law - nor does it require a license - playing music someone else has written/copyrighted and charges money for however does require permission from them and in this instance you get it by paying money to a fee to an organsiation they belong to in return for a 'license'
 
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indyskyz said:
Clackmannanshire = LOL
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I thought that the first time Alan Titchmarsh said it (Ground Force)! :)

Anyway, playing radio/CD/whatever in public is considered a public performance, which requires a license. This has been the case for a long time, but how well it got policed in the past is another matter. I remember at Uni (17 years ago) having to be careful about that.

Interesting point - if someone drives down the street with music blaring out of their car, doesn't that count as a public performance too? License please!

Saying that someone needs a license to sing a tune is, however, ridiculous and it seems the PRS (eventually) applied common sense to that one.
 
Berserker said:
Anyway, playing radio/CD/whatever in public is considered a public performance, which requires a license.
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no it requires the consent of the copyright owner

buying a PRS 'license' gives you the consent of pretty much the majority of the music industry so you can basically play just about every comercially available CD/ public radio station etc...

Playing some music by some unsigned band etc.. has nothing to do with the PRS and so doesn't require one of their licenses.

Elevator music is royalty free for a reason - ditto to the ice cream man - he doesn't want to fork out for a PRS 'license' so he plays a bunch of royalty free jingles rather than the UK top 40.....
 
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