[geeks] Legal Corporate Music Servers

[Lionel Peterson]

On May 26, 2009, at 4:37 PM, Patrick Giagnocavo <patrick at zill.net>  
wrote:

> Rick Hamell wrote:
>> Does any one on the list work for a company that does, or  
>> implemented a
>> corporate level music server that was legal in the eyes of the RIAA  
>> and
>> their clients?
>>
>> I'm finding several companies that provide overhead ambiance music,  
>> but
>> I need something that streams to individual desktops.
>>
>
> I think what you could get away with, would be a license for your
> "cafeteria" that follows the pricing of the ASCAP model.  That is,
> ignore the part about them each listening to separate music and just
> focus on a license for a company cafeteria with x number of seats.

You would likely get an a for effort, but would likely still be afoul  
of the RIAA, and your contributions to the RIAA (license fees) would  
help fund your prosecution!

The cafeteria license (I assume) is for n hours of music times one  
stream, what you need would be n hours of x threads, where x is  
approaching the number of employees in the company.

Close only counts in horseshoes and handgrenades...
>
> Then, set up a big server with a couple of TB disks to store the music
> and let people bring in their CDs to rip to the server.
>
> http://www.ascap.com/licensing/generallicensing.html

I think the easiest way would be to have all users have a file share  
on one server, and somehow "de-dupe" the shares, that way people can  
only access music they upload, and file space is minimized.

I think you clearly run afoul of the license on the CD packaging  
(which you agreed to when you opened the shrinkwrap) as soon as  
everyone plays the new Elvis CD I just uploaded to the common file  
share...

Lionel