My take is they are going after legal download purchases, such as from ITUNES. The impression I have always gotten is that ASCAP's position was that a DPD (buying a CD by downloading it rather than buying it physically) is a public performance. Wrong. It is not. It's not performed as it is downloaded. The stream is closed. Congress envisioned a DPD as being the same as a physical CD. There is no public performance in the purchase of a physical CD, and there is no public performance of a DPD download. My opinion of course.

Now, streaming/tethering (not internet radio) or on-demand listening to a CD/Song...there may be more argument there, but let's decide what it's gonna be. Is streaming and on-demand going to be a different type configuration of a DPD? As is envisioned by attempting to change compulsory mechanical law? If so, it should not be a public performance. It should be considered a purchase. If I stream something to your computer first, and then you listen to it, why is that a public performance?

They are just trying to get a court to take their side of it, and honestly, I don't know if that is a good thing or a bad thing. My opinion in the case of a true DPD, it's the wrong thing. A songwriter is already getting paid for a DPD, or streaming/tethered/on-demand configuration of such (or they are supposed to be anyway), so adding a public performance fee to me will simply be passed on to the consumer (perhaps resulting in lower sales), or it will be taken out of the cut the label gets for the DPD sale. To me, it's double-dipping...the songwriter gets paid twice. Whether that's good or bad, I dunno...

Last edited by Liszt Laughing; 03/26/07 01:47 AM.
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