San Francisco – Performing rights organization ASCAP has
urged its members in a fundraising letter to send donations so ASCAP can battle
groups it deems to be undermining copyright, which ASCAP listed to include the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Public Knowledge and Creative Commons.
ASCAP, which represents the interests of some 380,000 songwriters and music
publishers, wrote in the letter that these groups "simply do not want to
pay for the use of our music. Their mission is to spread the word that our
music should be free."
Wired.com notes that none of the named groups have
advocated that music "should be free," although they have lobbied for
more liberal copyright laws.
ASCAP writes that the groups are "influencing
Congress against the interests of music creators."
"It’s very sad
that ASCAP is falsely claiming that Creative Commons works to undermine
copyright," spokesperson Eric Steuer told Zeropaid.
"Creative Commons
licenses are copyright licenses — plain and simple, without copyright, these
tools don’t even work. CC licenses are legal tools that creators can use to
offer certain usage rights to the public, while reserving other rights."
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/y8ojo
(Wired.com)
http://snipurl.com/y8p35
(Zeropaid)
ASCAP is certainly living up to how their organization name sounds (ass-cap). They need to get their head out of their ass, and realize that these groups serve to improve the situation for artists.
They will certainly not do that !
Have you never seen the phrase ” Home, sweet home” ?
They want to keep their heads “home” !
ASCAP is supposed to be protecting the rights of those who create content; regardless of what copyleft licenses do to copyright, ASCAP is undermining the meaning of themselves! This is absolutely ludicrous of them.