Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)





Last November, a Congressional aide named Mitch Glazier, with 
the support of the RIAA, added a "technical amendment" to a bill 
that defined recorded music as "works for hire" under the 
1978 Copyright Act.



He did this after all the hearings on the bill were over. By the 
time artists found out about the change, it was too late. The bill 
was on its way to the White House for the president's signature.



That subtle change in copyright law will add billions of dollars 
to record company bank accounts over the next few years -- billions 
of dollars that rightfully should have been paid to artists. A 
"work for hire" is now owned in perpetuity by the record company.



Under the 1978 Copyright Act, artists could reclaim the copyrights 
on their work after 35 years. If you wrote and recorded "Everybody 
Hurts," you at least got it back to as a family legacy after 35 
years. But now, because of this corrupt little pisher, "Everybody 
Hurts" never gets returned to your family, and can now be sold to 
the highest bidder.



Over the years record companies have tried to put "work for hire" 
provisions in their contracts, and Mr. Glazier claims that the 
"work for hire" only "codified" a standard industry practice. But 
copyright laws didn't identify sound recordings as being eligible 
to be called "works for hire," so those contracts didn't mean anything. 
Until now.



Writing and recording "Hey Jude" is now the same thing as writing 
an English textbook, writing standardized tests, translating a novel 
from one language to another or making a map. These are the types of 
things addressed in the "work for hire" act. And writing a standardized 
test is a work for hire. Not making a record.



So an assistant substantially altered a major law when he only 
had the authority to make spelling corrections. That's not what 
I learned about how government works in my high school civics 
class.



Three months later, the RIAA hired Mr. Glazier to become its top 
lobbyist at a salary that was obviously much greater than the one 
he had as the spelling corrector guy.



The RIAA tries to argue that this change was necessary because 
of a provision in the bill that musicians supported. That 
provision prevents anyone from registering a famous person's 
name as a Web address without that person's permission. That's 
great. I own my name, and should be able to do what I want 
with my name.



But the bill also created an exception that allows a company to 
take a person's name for a Web address if they create a work for 
hire. Which means a record company would be allowed to own your 
Web site when you record your "work for hire" album. 
Like I said: Sharecropping.



Although I've never met any one at a record company who 
"believed in the Internet," they've all been trying to 
cover their asses by securing everyone's digital rights. Not that 
they know what to do with them. Go to a major label-owned band 
site. Give me a dollar for every time you see an annoying "under 
construction" sign. I used to pester Geffen (when it was a 
label) to do a better job. I was totally ignored for two years, 
until I got my band name back. The Goo Goo Dolls are struggling 
to gain control of their domain name from Warner Bros., who claim 
they own the name because they set up a shitty promotional Web 
site for the band.



Orrin Hatch, songwriter and Republican senator from Utah, seems 
to be the only person in Washington with a progressive view of 
copyright law. One lobbyist says that there's no one in the House 
with a similar view and that "this would have never happened 
if Sonny Bono was still alive."



By the way, which bill do you think the recording industry used 
for this amendment?



The Record Company Redefinition Act? No. The Music Copyright 
Act? No. The Work for Hire Authorship Act? No.



How about the Satellite Home Viewing Act of 1999?



Stealing our copyright reversions in the dead of night while no 
one was looking, and with no hearings held, is piracy.



It's piracy when the RIAA lobbies to change the bankruptcy law 
to make it more difficult for musicians to declare bankruptcy. 
Some musicians have declared bankruptcy to free themselves from 
truly evil contracts. TLC declared bankruptcy after they received 
less than 2 percent of the $175 million earned by their CD sales. 
That was about 40 times less than the profit that was divided among 
their management, production and record companies.



Toni Braxton also declared bankruptcy in 1998. She sold $188 
million worth of CDs, but she was broke because of a terrible 
recording contract that paid her less than 35 cents per album. 
Bankruptcy can be an artist's only defense against a truly 
horrible deal and the RIAA wants to take it away.



Artists want to believe that we can make lots of money if we're 
successful. But there are hundreds of stories about artists in 
their 60s and 70s who are broke because they never made a dime 
from their hit records. And real success is still a long shot 
for a new artist today. Of the 32,000 new releases each year, 
only 250 sell more than 10,000 copies. And less than 30 go platinum.



The four major record corporations fund the RIAA. These companies 
are rich and obviously well-represented. Recording artists and 
musicians don't really have the money to compete. The 273,000 
working musicians in America make about $30,000 a year. Only 15 
percent of American Federation of Musicians members work steadily 
in music.



But the music industry is a $40 billion-a-year business. One-third 
of that revenue comes from the United States. The annual sales of 
cassettes, CDs and video are larger than the gross national product 
of 80 countries. Americans have more CD players, radios and VCRs 
than we have bathtubs.



Story after story gets told about artists -- some of them in their 
60s and 70s, some of them authors of huge successful songs that we 
all enjoy, use and sing -- living in total poverty, never having 
been paid anything. Not even having access to a union or to basic 
health care. Artists who have generated billions of dollars for 
an industry die broke and un-cared for.



And they're not actors or participators. They're the rightful 
owners, originators and performers of original compositions.



This is piracy.





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