The way the licensing companies redistribute their collected fees back to songwriters is arbitrary. A cafe could play 90% independent music, but BMI, etc. are banking on the possibility of a business playing their tunes, not the actuality. So even if my cafe never plays Justin Timberlake, he will get some of my money if I pay BMI. It is legalized extortion. It's not always a $1 a day as you say, either. They want $1800 from us, and that's just one company! There are 3. If all came collecting, we would be out of business. It is NOT affordable. From my standpoint, customers ask all the time what we are playing. Are we not then, ADVERTISING the music for free?! We don't sell coffee for four dollars either. Our prices are fair. But now they have to go up because of this. If music creates atmosphere, and you should have to pay for it (on top of already purchasing it), why isn't there an art mafia? Painings on your wall constitute ambience, yet you don't pay a yearly fee to hang them. You buy them and it's done. You obviously don't operate a small business. Most musicians would be honored to hear ther music being played in a cafe, out of all the choices in the world. If they knew it was costing the business an inordinate amount of money that caused hardship, I'm guessing they would be uncomfortable with that.
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Re: Re: AScap,Bmi, etc.
I meant paintings, not painings...
Re: AScap,Bmi, etc.
The way the licensing companies redistribute their collected fees back to songwriters is arbitrary. A cafe could play 90% independent music, but BMI, etc. are banking on the possibility of a business playing their tunes, not the actuality. So even if my cafe never plays Justin Timberlake, he will get some of my money if I pay BMI. It is legalized extortion. It's not always a $1 a day as you say, either. They want $1800 from us, and that's just one company! There are 3. If all came collecting, we would be out of business. It is NOT affordable. From my standpoint, customers ask all the time what we are playing. Are we not then, ADVERTISING the music for free?! We don't sell coffee for four dollars either. Our prices are fair. But now they have to go up because of this. If music creates atmosphere, and you should have to pay for it (on top of already purchasing it), why isn't there an art mafia? Painings on your wall constitute ambience, yet you don't pay a yearly fee to hang them. You buy them and it's done. You obviously don't operate a small business. Most musicians would be honored to hear ther music being played in a cafe, out of all the choices in the world. If they knew it was costing the business an inordinate amount of money that caused hardship, I'm guessing they would be uncomfortable with that.