smeighan Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 Hi all;I wrote an email to Judy asking about using her "House on Christmas Street".Here is her response that she asked me to share:Hi Sean,It was great talking with you on the phone the other day. I'm so glad you took the time to call to get this stuff straightened out. Following is a note you can pass on to the decorating sites. I really appreciate your doing this as I am SUPER busy right now and just don't have time to do it!Here's the note, let me know if you think it's okay or if I should change anything.Hello Everyone,Sean kindly contacted me with questions about using music in videos, sequencing and all that jazz. I really appreciate him giving me the opportunity to share my thoughts on this issue and the offer he has made to post this message for me. I'm super busy right now finishing my second Christmas album and also working on a brand new live show, so this is a big help.LEGALLY:YOUR HOME DISPLAY:ASCAP, BMI and SESAC are Performing Rights Organizations. Their job is to license the music of their member songwriters. Businesses which use copyrighted music in venues where ADMISSION is charged or businesses that use it to increase sales (like MUZAK in stores. music in bars and amusement parks and such) are required to purchase a license from the performing rights organizations to use that music. From those licensing fees a "pool" is established and writers are paid according to how much their music is used. From there it's a really screwed up system as to how they figure out what to pay each writer and I don't even understand. Let's just say I've made less than $200 in my WHOLE career from ASCAP.The bottom line is, if you are using the music in your display at your house then that is a personal, not a business use, and you do not need to purchase a license. If you do these things then you are okay:You get the song (hopefully by purchasing it, and not illegal file sharing),You sequence it for your own useYou don't charge admission to see your display.On the question of your lo-frequency radio station, I have no idea. ASCAP can't even seem to keep proper track of music plays on regular stations, so I don't know how the heck they would monitor you guys. I wouldn't worry about it.VIDEOS:This is a different matter. If you are making a video that uses music and plan to show it publicly (i.e. on the internet) you are supposed to purchase a synchronization license from the writer/publisher. You are synchronizing the music to your video, basically. This is just like making a movie. You can usually find all the information you need on licensing just about any song at The Harry Fox Agency. They are at www.harryfox.com.SEQUENCING:According to my intellectual property attorney, when you design a sequence for a particular song, you are essentially re-creating that song on a different platform. Your sequence can only be used with that song. If you do this for your own personal use, or you share your sequence for FREE, then in my opinion you are safe. HOWEVER, should you decide to sell your sequence then you must license the music that you use and that means giving a share of your profit from the sale of your sequence to the writer/publisher. Yes, you have done a lot of work and that's why you get the lion's share of the profit. The amount you pay the licensor is miniscule. I have licensed with three businesses that sell sequences of "The House on Christmas Street": Light-O-Rama, WOWLights and Superstar Lights. All of them have purchased legal licenses from me, and all of them pay a very small fee per sequence sold. And when I say small, I mean you can't even buy a cup of coffee with it. And that's no matter how much they sell the sequence for! You could sell it for $100 and I would still get a tiny tiny tiny fraction of that per sequence sold.When I have stated this before on forums I got a storm of HATE messages, accusing me of being a money grubber trying to make money off from people's hobbies and USING decorators for fame and fortune. That couldn't be further from the truth. I am a full-time musician and my music is how I pay the bills. If someone is making money using my music then I am supposed to get paid. I really don't understand how anyone could have a problem with that, but some do.Also, I think I'm a really nice person and a good person and it hurts me to have people say those things about me.THAT BEING SAID, I speak now for myself, personally, and not for any other writer, musician or publishing company or record company (I am independent, which means I have my own publishing and record label): I want to say that I am ETERNALLY grateful for the fact that decorators discovered "The House on Christmas Street" and use it in their displays. It seriously has been so exciting and wonderful for me to hear from people and meet so many wonderful people who are making so many other people happy with their displays. I've tried to get out to as many conventions as possible to meet you and sing for you. Yes, I am promoting my music but for me personally it's just been a wonderful, wonderful experience to meet so many really good people.For several years now I have offered the mp3 of the original mix (there is a re-mix coming up on my new CD to be released this year) to decorators for free; all you have to do is email me and I'll send it right out to you. I've asked every decorator I've given it to if they would please post a video on YouTube in exchange for the free song, because, yes, it helps the song become known, and I APPRECIATE the help in spreading the word about my songs!!So, here and now and forevermore...I hereby give a blanket license for FREE to any decorator who produces a FAMILY FRIENDLY video using ANY of my music and wants to post it on your own website or ANY video sharing site that is not pornography (!). ( Sorry, I've gotta say that just to be on the safe side...there are some weird people out there!!)Recently I did learn of a way that YouTube is making it possible for songwriters to make a little money off from videos which use their music. If I opt-in to this program, then YouTube will place ads on the pages of videos that use my music, and I will make a few cents from each "hit." IT WILL NOT COST YOU A DIME. I hope you don't mind my doing this.If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask me. You can email me on my website or call me on the number listed there as well. I'm ALWAYS happy to talk with you and correspond with you.God bless you all,Judy Pancoastwww.judypancoast.comJusy mentioned one other thing. She knows there have been videos posted of her music on youtube abd vimeo. She is fine with us posting her songs. Seh said that she has been approached by a company that offers a service where they scan all youtube videos, find the signatures of a song and then add a small add to the youtube video. Judy then gets a small revenue stream through that ad. If any of you notice an ad show up on your posted videos maybe other artists are using the same servicethanksseanFYI:Status on RGBSB I have now added a mysql database to my tool for creating math models and projecting them onto an RGB device. I have the form done that will prompt for enough information to build the models and store them in the database.http://meighan.net/seqbuilder/index.php Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Rise Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 Oh crud....you had to go there.(biting my tongue)... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveMaris Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 Along with "Ice Ice Baby", One of the best songs ever! yup, uh huh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smeighan Posted February 10, 2012 Author Share Posted February 10, 2012 Jeff Spooner wrote:I say screw them. I will use it and change the pitch just abit and that auto crap wont flag it. I am so tired of them everytime a new format comes out you have to buy it again. If I purchased the music bite me. cant get money out of someone that is broke.Hi Jeff; I am not sure why you are so angry? We have established that you can play any music on your home Christmas show. The only issue is getting permission from the publisher of the music to upload a video. Judy has given permission to upload any of her music in any videos we make.The legal process is to request a synchronization license from the publisher if you want to upload it. It is highly unlikely that you would ever get caught, so go ahead an twink the video.I was trying to get clarity to the various parts of our hobby: show, sequencing and uploads.Let me give you an example; i have thought of a software tool that would be able to process a video file and reverse engineer the sequencing that went into it. I would identify parts of the video that are the trees, bushes, megatree .etc. After processing the video, i would have your sequence. If i released this tool, people could rip off all of the work you did for your show.I don't think such a tool would be fair to the authors of the sequences, so i am not going to develop it. It was just a technical challenge to figure out how to do it.I appreciate Judy's approach. I really do wish all of the composers/publishers would realize that uploading our videos is like free advertisement for them. But, its is their property and they can decide if they will follow Judy's lead.thankssean Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 Jeff Spooner wrote: I say screw them. I will use it and change the pitch just abit and that auto crap wont flag it. I am so tired of them everytime a new format comes out you have to buy it again. If I purchased the music bite me. cant get money out of someone that is broke.Hate to tell you this, but changing the pitch, tempo or even the speed of the song won't change the song to where it still can't be found out. I tried experimenting with that for a bit, just to see what would happen. I did it on videos I made private when I had a youtube account.Sure enough, the audio was stripped out and a notice stating that the music belonged to ASCAP or whomever was noted on the video, with a suggestion to follow a link for free music that could be put in place of the song.So what I'm telling you is, don't waste your time changing song speeds, tempo, pitch, vocals or anything else, as there is still something in the music that somehow tells these folks information about it. And they still get pulled!:shock: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 BTW: Even though this song is not mentioned, "The Good Times Goosebumps Motel" by Judy Pancoast, and one I use every year in my Halloween display, should also be covered in the statement above for "House on Christmas Street", which I still haven't got done for my Christmas Display yet.Maybe I'll get in done for 2012. I keep working on it, but seem to get sidetracked from always getting it in and done. LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jerrymac Posted February 11, 2012 Share Posted February 11, 2012 smeighan wrote:Hi all;I wrote an email to Judy asking about using her "House on Christmas Street".Here is her response that she asked me to share:Hi Sean,...............VIDEOS:This is a different matter. If you are making a video that uses music and plan to show it publicly (i.e. on the internet) you are supposed to purchase a synchronization license from the writer/publisher. You are synchronizing the music to your video, basically. This is just like making a movie. You can usually find all the information you need on licensing just about any song at The Harry Fox Agency. They are at www.harryfox.com.............http://meighan.net/seqbuilder/index.phpHarry Fox agency discontinued synchronizing licences nearly 10 years ago. see below post from their site:SynchronizationThe Harry Fox Agency, Inc discontinued synchronization licensing services in June 2002. However, you may secure synchronization rights by contacting the publisher directly. You can search for publisher information using databases made available through the following third-party websites:http://www.ascap.comhttp://www.bmi.comhttp://www.sesac.comhttp://www.loc.gov/copyright Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smeighan Posted February 11, 2012 Author Share Posted February 11, 2012 Yep, this is exactly the process. Find out who the publisher is (Use BMI/ASCAP/SEACAM web sites) and then contact the publisher for a synchronization license.To find out what this would be like for a TSO song I made a synchronization request last week throughhttp://www.warnerchappell.com/TemplateAction?system_action=getsync_departments¤ttab=licensingThey are the publisher of all the TSO music. I wonder what the price will be for the license since that they ask for how long do you want the license (1 day, 1 week, 1 month, 6 mo, 1 year, 2 year, 5 year .etc). They have not yet quoted a price. When i get the price (I requested 1 year license to be able to post a video of my Christmas display with Wizard of Winter), i will share the price and process time.Has anyone else gone through the process of getting a synchronization license to be able to post their videos?Judt Pancoast has her own publishing company so her original letter suffices to be able to post her works.thankssean Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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