[BC] BMI back on the prowl

[David Kaye]

--- On Wed, 6/20/12, Tom Taggart <tpt at literock93r.com> wrote:

> Years ago BMI used to go around to small restaurants and
> bars & threaten them for having any kind of radio on in
> the > place.  Followed shortly thereafter by Muzak, who would
> play > "good cop" & promise to keep those nasty BMI folks away
> (for > a small monthly fee).

I'm surprised it was BMI and not ASCAP.  ASCAP has always been notorious for its site visits.  Well, there have always been many alternatives to Muzak.  Seeburg was one.  I forget the others back in the day.  But today, there are mountains of companies that license music for commercial venues: Sirius/XM, DMX, Muzak, Pandora, Comcast, to name a few.  

> Well, BMI is back--and now they are after folks with TV's.
> Hit two sports bars in our area, demanding to know how many
> TV;s they had, arguing they could put them on VH1 or some
> cable music channel.  The place that is more bar than
> restaurant told them to go to...well, where the preachers
> say we are all going.

The law is very specific about how many TVs and speakers you can have in your venue before the licensing is mandatory.  Go look up the law or have the licensing company explain the law to you.

If you don't qualify for non-licensed service then just run public domain material on your TVs.  The Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org) has boatloads of public domain material from old travelogues to Hollywood movies that have slipped into the public domain, to curiosity pieces.  Yeah, it's not major league baseball, but heck, you gotta pay for what you use.