Advice on ownership issue

Stripping the lossy, compressed audio from a youtube video and releasing that as an album is pretty lame.
 
I spent about an hour going through internet searches earlier today and it seems even the lawyers can't agree on who owns the recordings. And this is in the US; it might be different in the UK. I was pretty certain from scouring the copyright law a few years ago that I understood most of it, but maybe not. So I'll rescind a bit of my opinion and say maybe both have rights to the recordings.

Still, the law defines a copyright protection for songs and sound recordings as two separate things. They do this because they are two separate things. If a band goes into a studio to record their songs, the studio owns the tapes unless agreed upon otherwise.

But, like we all said, it's YouTube, I think the OP doesn't have much of a leg to stand on.
 
The guy is the host of the gig, not some random dude with a camera. The band agreed to be filmed for the purposes of it being on YouTube. I can't imagine why they didn't just ask - especially if it's for sale on bandcamp. Their customers may not be happy with the quality.

Make peace is my advice. Approach them and offer them the real audio and cut some percentage deal. You probably shouldn't have to but sounds like they're being a tad juvenile.

Small business opportunity for all concerned if approached with goodwill. OK, very small business opportunity, but still.;)
 
This reminds me of that photographer guy that got all butthurt because the band he took pics of used one of the pics and cropped it. Oh the horror!

Shit like that is why big acts make photographers sign a release that keeps ownership with the acts.
 
I wouldn't get too bent out of shape.
They arent going to make any money off of this and the audio won't be good anyway.

Why not play nice? Contact them, offer to do a 'proper' live recording for a nominal cost, and get an agreement regarding profit sharing off of any sales.

If you or they don't want to do that, forget them.
Cover yourself in the future.
 
This reminds me of that photographer guy that got all butthurt because the band he took pics of used one of the pics and cropped it. Oh the horror!

Shit like that is why big acts make photographers sign a release that keeps ownership with the acts.
Photography is a little weird in that the photographer explicitly owns the copyright unless some other agreement is struck (at least in the U.S.) The only rights the subject has is to refuse to grant the photographer the right to use their likeness; even then there are cases when you can publish someone's photo w/o their permission. (probably has to do with "newsworthiness" or something, but IANaLb...)

Speaking of not being a lawyer (or Irish), I also recommend contacting the band and offering to sell them the high-quality masters. If they refuse, just cut your losses; they probably won't make any money off the recordings anyway.
If you're concerned about these things, get an actual contract next time (contact a real lawyer rather than us schlubs on the Internet!)
 
I'm really not sure it's worth 29 posts trying to figure out the proper way to divide the $25 that the recording is likely to generate...assuming the band has more than 3 fans that are willing to pay for music.

This is more about the OP feeling taken advantage of. Yes, he was. But the discussion of "rights" and "profits" are pretty pointless until someone figures out a way to monetize any part of this to the point that anyone can hire a lawyer to sort it out.

Without enough profits to fuel a lawsuit, it's all about hurt feelings, since no one is getting screwed out of their share.
 
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And now you see why you don't ask legal advice on an internet forum. Have fun scrolling through that.

I work at a patent/trademark law firm. If you want me to inquire, PM me. Otherwise, do some research on your own without asking legal questions on a home recording forum.
 
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I work at a patent/trademark law firm. If you want me to inquire, PM me.

But you're not a lawyer, right? I thought it was considered a really bad idea to offer anything resembling legal advice if you worked in the industry but weren't actually a lawyer?
 
If it's a choice between the law and ethics (which is too often the case) I go with ethics. What the band did was unethical. The ethical thing would have been to contact the OP and negotiate a mutually acceptable arrangement.
 
This is pretty common ground, and is not difficult to navigate. The problem is that there isn't a perfect solution that works for both parties. Without any agreement to the contrary, the band own the copyright to their performance. You own the copyright in the recording, and somebody else (if the songs are covers) owns the copyright to the composition of the material. Or of course that bit could be theirs too - if they wrote it rather than somebody else.

The practical upshot of this is that they cannot use your recording without your permission and you cannot use their performance without theirs. Over the years I have a big collection of recordings that I can't use. One I know I'd 100% be sued for using, because it's not a good performance by somebody now with pots of money.

The solution is to talk to the other party and see if you can work something out. Why not start with an offer to share the net profit from any sales either side make, on a 50/50 basis. So if you sell thousands, they get half, and if they sell thousands, you get half. Maybe they think they will sell more, so maybe 60/40 in their favour, or you doing the same - loads of promotion and wanting more.

That's really it. Unless either party waived or assigned their rights and both parties agreed, then you both have the power of control - and if agreement cannot be gained, then both of you have the right to prevent the other exploiting it.

Not the best of news, but how it is.

Rights can be bought and sold like any commodity.
 
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