If there were in fact hundreds of thousands of figure skating fans, we might have more clout. Unfortunately, with limited viewing opportunities (competition highlights only on NBC, no replay on Peacock), that fan base is only going to decrease. And I loathe Knieram and Frazier for what they have wrought.
It's not really KniFraz's fault, IMO. They had been skating to that music all season and it was only during the Olympics when the cover artist heard it did they decide to sue for copyright infringement. If their attorney/father and team had been doing their job and really monitoring for any and all uses of their material, they would have found that program on YT well before then and done their due diligence. Either they knew about it and decided to wait until the Olympics to make a stink about it (because they thought that making a stink during the world's largest sporting event would draw more attention to them), or they didn't and they just decided to be unreasonable assholes about it. And, regardless of that, as Dave Lease observed in a recent TSL, the stark contrast is Elton John who, during his concerts last spring, on more than one occasion mentioned Nathan Chen's gold-medal winning performance to his music (and he's hardly the only artist who gets excited about the use of their music for figure skating programs that are seen by millions around the world - a first cousin once removed of mine PMed me on FB last winter to tell me how a friend's daughter or in-law was Jennifer Thomas and that she was sharing on her social media that Karen Chen was using one of her pieces for her SP). You make a choice to either celebrate and embrace the fact that YOUR music is being seen and heard by a global audience or you be pissy, little brats about it. The KniFraz cover artists chose to be the latter and I hardly find fault with KniFraz or their team for the issue.
There are over 330 millions people in the US. 500,000 people are .15% of that and, unfortunately, no clout at all.
There is nothing unreasonable about wanting to be paid for your work. Elton John is a millionaire. If he didn't get paid for Nathan using his work, it's not as big a deal. However, I find it highly unlikely he didn't get paid. I'm sure his sounds are covered under the normal automatic mechanisms where the fee paid to the licensing groups gets spread around to him. Heavy Young Heathens are not millionaires and have decided to use a different mechanism that pays them (slightly) better. There is nothing wrong with this and there is nothing wrong with getting paid.
So, how does that explain why other, much lesser known artists, like Jennifer Thomas, who I also referenced in my post, who is most definitely not a millionaire, are happy with the promotion they get when a figure skater uses their music for a program that is then seen by millions of people around the world? Heavy Young Heathens might be using a different mechanism that they believe pays them better, but again, their attorney wasn't doing his job to ensure that their copyright was being enforced prior to the Olympics. It's funny how much they cared about the money (not at all) before the Olympics. All they saw were dollar signs, suddenly.
LOL - this analogy is so broken it's making me cry tears of laughter. The mortgage industry isn't comparable to the music industry and you know it, and even if it was, what happened isn't KniFraz's fault since they did give the proper attribution of their music in their ISU bio last season. It was up to the NBC graphics crew to include the full credit in their on-screen graphics.
They are not completely in the wrong here. Yes, the support team managing the Great Parks Ice pairs teams and the USFS should have considered the issue of checking and clearing copyright for, at the minimum, the skaters in their International Selection Pool as well as any and all skaters/teams that qualify for Nationals. And, if they couldn't reach an agreement with Heavy Young Heathens, then, yes, they should have found a different version of HotRS to use. However, NBC should have also been ensuring, with the choice to archive and offer on-demand all of the skating competitions, the legality of music copyright for those events when viewed as entertainment rather than live sports.
Absolutely right, MacMadame.
They are probably also getting paid. Even if they aren't, that's their decision. It doesn't mean everyone else has to make the same one.
That is beside the point. The point is: you do your job for money but resent a band from trying to get paid for doing theirs. As someone with a former creative business, I am so sick of people who think I should do my work for free for "exposure." They all have a very inflated idea of what their exposure is worth too.
First of all, giving proper attribution would not have saved KniFra. They had to get permission and pay the rights fee. They did not do that. It's also their responsibility to check because they are the ones using it. It's not the band's responsibility to scour the internet, watch every program on tv or streaming, etc. It's not NBC's or USFS's or the ISU's. It's theirs.
What we know from the lawsuit is that they did not obtain the rights to the music. We also know that they chose to continue skating to the music even after the lawsuit was filed, so they can't plead ignorance. So yes, I blame them and their team. Maybe it's a snap judgment, but I'm pretty angry at the outcome so I'm not inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Absolutely. They didn't have the rights to the music. After the Olympics they knew that and then they skated to it anyway.
This has been covered extensively in the thread about it that popped up in GSD between the Olympics and Worlds. There are some great articles linked there and a lot of discussion about music rights in general and this situation in particular.
This.
And, again, what does this have to do with the current issue with Peacock? Even if we can look at the initial issue and attempt to find KniFraz completely at fault, what is stopping NBC Universal/Peacock from archiving the livestreams and providing them on-demand on their platform?
Im quoting Karen here because i agree with her.
(a) The internet is HUGE. (b) how do you know they don't look at what they can when they can? (c) how do you know who they do and do not contact about using their music as soon as they find out about it?
I didn't say they were greedy. I do think they are assholes. As are every single person who tells any creative person that they should be happy for the exposure and not try to get paid. (And also for every single person who thinks teachers are greedy to want to be paid enough to live on because they should do their job 'for the kids' but I digress.)
Of course, they do. Not liking their decision and thinking it's an overreaction is not the same thing as thinking they don't have the right to do so. I don't see a single person saying they have not right to decide what they do or do not put on their streaming service.
Blood money? Are you ****ing kidding? Are they writing their music with the help of child slaves?
Usually when this happens, it's with the knowledge and approval of the choreographer. It's actually expected that some changes will be made and I'm sure choreographers work that into their prices. If the program gets changed too much so that it's unrecognizable, then it's new choreography. If the person making the small changes claims the work as their own, then they can get in trouble because that is plagiarism. (And therefore not relevant to this particular issue.)
Not sure who we can blame but likely a combo of copyright laws for musicians, a US pair who did not follow through for permission to use a song, and tv/streaming networks that may be obligated to pay royalties every time a band’s copyrighted song is played.
It's irrelevant whether or not there are lyrics. A lot of Classical music is in the public domain but any particular recorded performance is still copyrighted.
Because live sports can use the music, as far as I know, without issue. It's the ability to keep the music during streaming later.
This has been my thought too. Unless I missed it, no one has gotten an answer to NBC/Peacock dropping replays. People have jumped to this happened so that happened so it was because of that we no longer have skating.
Why would the streaming be the concern of the skaters who use the music? Don't they have to get the rights for their live performances?
