Ktf Website: Question Probably Best Answered

[Guest Dan]

Two questions:

1) I understand and agree with the anti-bootleg arguments, where records are pressed up and sold with none of the proceeds going to the original artists/writers/publishers.

I also understand why people like Napster were forced to stop what they were doing (ie providing free access to currently-available tunes, which obviously stopped people paying those artists etc, either by buying the record or paying for an official download.

However, there seems to me to be a legal, or at least a moral, gap when it comes to a site like KTF which is only providing free access to songs which are no longer commercially available.

This is, as far as I can see, no more or less than a modern version of tape swapping (which I don't think anyone on the 'scene' can be against, surely?).

Someone like Ady probably knows the legal position (and it's probably that, strictly, you can't actually even tape deleted records).

2) Secondly, if the legal position is as I suggest above, what would it cost to do it legally (ie to allow people to download, say, Baby Don't You Weep?

Ady, anyone??

Dan

[Dayo]

Can of worms.....

A record may be deleted but the intellectual copyright is still held by the songwriters (publishers). There is also the question of mechanical copyright, which will be held by the record company concerned or whoever bought those rights.

I'm no expert but you can bet that in 99 per cent of cases, someone somewhere still owns the rights. And so they should!

[Guest Dan]

Can of worms.....

A record may be deleted but the intellectual copyright is still held by the songwriters (publishers).  There is also the question of mechanical copyright, which will be held by the record company concerned or whoever bought those rights.

I'm no expert but you can bet that in 99 per cent of cases, someone somewhere still owns the rights.  And so they should!

link

yes, I say that above essentially, but if correct this means that strictly taping of sounds is illegal. what I'm really asking is what's the difference between that and downloading from KTF or whatever.

is it really just that a download is traceable and so someone can be caught?

or is the legal position different?

and do people think the moral position is different (ie as between taping and downloading, which are both, essentially, free sharing of music)?

as i say, someone like Ady is probably best placed to advise on the legalities...wonder if anyone has any views on morality side of things?

Personally while being against bootlegs I'm in favour of free distribution of sounds, by tape or other means, as long as it's not for profit and there's no question of writers etc being ripped off.

this position may not be intellectually or logically sustainable but it's where I'm at.

(I accept it may also be a load of boring headwank, by the way.)

[Guest in town Mikey]

Hi there boring headwank.

Reading that has just triggered a childhood memory of taping the new chart on radio one every sunday evening. Some of the older guys might rememeber this, but didnt they give out irregular warnings about taping songs off the radio??

I'm sure it was just so that the Beeb couldnt be prosecuted if large scale selling of tapes was uncovered.

[Guest Dan]

Hi there boring headwank.

Reading that has just triggered a childhood memory of taping the new chart on radio one every sunday evening. Some of the older guys might rememeber this, but didnt they give out irregular warnings about taping songs off the radio??

I'm sure it was just so that the Beeb couldnt be prosecuted if large scale selling of tapes was uncovered.

link

i remember going underground going to number one and walking round school like i was the king with all the status quo fans muttering in corners

don't remember your warnings mikey but i was probably too hard to care about things like that

[Guest]

Hi there boring headwank.

Reading that has just triggered a childhood memory of taping the new chart on radio one every sunday evening. Some of the older guys might rememeber this, but didnt they give out irregular warnings about taping songs off the radio??

I'm sure it was just so that the Beeb couldnt be prosecuted if large scale selling of tapes was uncovered.

link

When most people on here were kids/teenagers it was 'Sing Something Simple' on the Light Programme on Sunday nights and cassette recorders hadn't been invented. Or colour telly.

[Dayo]

When most people on here were kids/teenagers it was 'Sing Something Simple' on the Light Programme on Sunday nights and cassette recorders hadn't been invented. Or colour telly. 

link

My God - didn't you just HATE the theme tune to that programme? Apart from being the most insipid piece of cornball guff, it also signalled the end of our pop ration for the night - unless you were lucky enough to get Radio London or Caroline!

[Guest Dan]

My God - didn't you just HATE the theme tune to that programme?  Apart from being the most insipid piece of cornball guff, it also signalled the end of our pop ration for the night - unless you were lucky enough to get Radio London or Caroline!

link

some of us weren't even foetuses at that point, dayo

[mischief]

I remember trying to tape off the radio, when I was little... but the dj's would always talk over the intro and before the end. I used to think they was doing to upset me. Now I know.

Edited May 5, 2005 by mischief

[Billy Freemantle]

I remember trying to tape off the radio, when I was little... but the dj's would always talk over the intro and before the end. I used to think they was doing to upset me. Now I know.

link

My first cassette tape off records involved unscrewing the speaker panel on a Dansette (or something similar) and attaching crocodile clips s tp the speaker and then in to the input of a tiny Bush Tape Recorder.

That tape consisted of stuff like A Quitter Never Wins, Heaven Must Have sent You, Scratchy, Helpless, Working on Your Case. the Spoiler,Determination, Tell Her, Angel Baby.