On Sun, 19 Jan 2003 03:44:04 -0500, John VanSickle wrote:

> Exactly what part of "You may not violate copyrights of any sort" do you
> not understand?

	I think he is making many valid points. Try it this way. They sell a CD.
Whoever they are they are the responsible party is the one who collect the
earnings. The CD may be non-violative of the copyright laws of their 
country as interpreted in court decisions but may violate the statuatory
and law in other countries. 

	Is the standard copyright statement in the entry binding in all 
countries? Make the statement then sue under some arcane court decision
in one's home country of Lower Silesia. Although winning does not have 
a tangible reward intangibles are held to be of value which can be 
considered an inducement. As an inducement requiring the statement can be
viewed as coersion. An argument can be made that giving up something of
value for a chance at winning something of value is gambling -- consult
your local gaming laws. 

	That is far fetched but have you read the RIAA statements lately?
And they are suing with very novel arguements. Novel in anything courts
have not previously decided in hopes of winning at least one case. The
RIAA is in America. What are equivalent organizations doing in your
country? 

	Now lets say there is unauthorized reproduction of the CDs. The owners
of the works on the CD have reasonable grounds to sue the IRTC if the
IRTC does not vigorous pursue the offending pirates. 

	Again far fetched but no one knows what any law really means until there
is "much" case law as precedent.

	Speaking of case law first we assume there is a violation which puts the
IRTC at risk. If it is regarding the website, they have only to remove
the offending material and there is no further legal recourse. If such
material should be included on the CD, if the IRTC agrees to pay standard
royalties on each sale that is the end of it. Ordinarily royalties are
based upon their fractional contribution to the entire item. That
fraction would be the ratio of the music bytes to the total bytes on the
CD. The courts do not put up with vindictive lawsuits. 

	And then there is fair use. I recall a stills image with a movie poster
as an image map. Movie posters are copyrighted. One of the challenges in
modeling is looking like something famous like the Enterprise or a Tie
Fighter. The better the model the closer it is to violating copyright.
But in the first case it was a small component of scenery to make the
image appear realistic. In the second neither copyright holder has complained and
therefore it is not only fair use but likely in the public domain because
of the lack of complaints. Out-takes from the copyrighted works remain
copyrighted. 

	And a final point. Unless those CDs are selling like hotcakes all over
the world the IRTC is judgment proof. I would be surprised if there were
any profit at all after recovering the cost of conducting the contest
which is the cost of this website. There is no malice. It is intended as
a recreation not a source of income. The material was open for public
inspection for a year or more before the CD is released and there were no
complaints. This is not an obscure website as the monthly bandwidth must
certainly indicate.

	More simply, the whole discussion of risk is like a corporate attorney
trying to earn his keep and cover his ass giving advice based upon worst
case possibilities. 

	The solution? Amend the rules to prohibit anything soundtrack unless
wholely created by the person submitting it. 

	A final comment. The movie Heavy Metal took so long to go from the
theater to TV because the people who made it did not get permission to
use the music. Even Hollywood doesn't pay attention to the rules.

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