getting crushed by a fine for playing non-licensed music just like Foster's did

do we care about this

5/22/2015 3:10:21 PM

More like paddy o'dabney's amirite?

5/22/2015 3:13:20 PM

isn't this medford's place?

5/22/2015 3:14:32 PM

yeah Zack is pissed

5/22/2015 3:20:47 PM

I don't know what this place is. It sounds made up.

5/22/2015 3:32:38 PM

Quote :

" getting crushed by a fine for playing non-licensed music just like Foster's did"

If thats true then I have zero sympathy for them.

5/22/2015 4:06:09 PM

this reminds me of that joke involving "Paddy O'Furniture"

otherwise, meh

5/22/2015 4:06:47 PM

Quote :

"I don't know what this place is. It sounds made up."

5/22/2015 4:08:52 PM

Its been a while since I've heard of those fines...but I don't remember them being that pricey. Maybe they were repeat offenders.

5/22/2015 4:48:15 PM

5/22/2015 5:57:35 PM

$60k

5/22/2015 6:56:57 PM

They have a great location, but they realllly should have chosen a different name. It is so lame.

5/22/2015 9:17:07 PM

Foster's only got hit with $30k

5/22/2015 9:40:13 PM

So is this place actually closing? Because the only source of information I've found so far is this thread.

5/23/2015 1:58:26 PM

What the hell is non-licensed music?

Why should you need a license either to play music or to book bands? Just have a noise ordinance in place, any licensing fees is just more governmental pickpocketing.

[Edited on May 23, 2015 at 3:15 PM. Reason : kh]

5/23/2015 3:15:27 PM

Its not a government license. You're purchasing the rights from a company to play their music for third parties (customers).

Most musicians you listen to have agreements with these companies that protect their rights. They don't have to pay this fine, but if they don't they will face a lawsuit, and they most certainly will lose.

In the case of Fosters, I believe the copyright licensing company tried multiple times to contact Fosters about their infringements and were ignored. It wasn't until afterwards that they sent someone in to record the infringements and slap them with a penalty.

5/23/2015 3:35:42 PM

Ahh, so it's an IP fine. I thought this was some kind of live band licensing from city of Raleigh or some kind of licensing fee to play music from the city.

No different than PPVs costing 100s of dollars for commercial establishments.

5/23/2015 3:51:10 PM

Pretty much, and the fines are extremely excessive (Foster's had $30k fined for 4 songs.....FOUR), which wouldn't be bad if they also protected smaller content creators.

Alas, you can only levy that kind of penalty if you've got the corporate backing of a building full of lawyers. Most smaller content creators don't get to enjoy that kind of retribution for theft.

5/23/2015 3:56:04 PM

Yeah, I'm torn on IP law. I think there needs to be protection for content creators, but copyrights should not be extendable indefinitely and we need to seriously strengthen fair use laws and update what is considered in the public domain.

I mean, the happy birthday song example is the classic one, but there are plenty of other things that should be in the public domain that are not. Hiring a DJ shouldn't mean that you have to pay all the bands that he spins either.

IP is very interesting, especially as more and more of what we produce is not physical as much as it is informational. Patents on living things, formulas, etc. should be of extremely short duration. There should be some limited period of exclusivity to allow inventors or companies to recoup R&D costs and profit off of their creation, but once something is sufficiently common there should not be sole ownership of the concept. No one should have exclusive production rights of say... scissors or even the internal combustion engine. At a certain point we shouldn't have to pay the estates of writers to publish their works, etc.

5/23/2015 4:04:09 PM

maybe I'm missing something, but it looks like the licenses (which include 10 million songs) only cost like $4/day

http://www.ascap.com/licensing/types/restaurant-bar-grill-tavern/restaurant-bar-grill-tavern-individual/restaurant-bar-grill-tavern-individual-a.aspx

pretty dumb'/poor business practice not to have pickedup this license

still, I DO wonder who regulates the size of fines like this...$60,000 seems fucking exorbitant (as if Blockbuster charged you $50 for returning a movie late.) I hope there's some government agency out there that decides whether such fees are reasonable.

5/23/2015 4:53:01 PM

good night, sweet prince...

5/23/2015 7:17:17 PM