All posts by: Adam Garson

In our July newsletter, we posed the question of whether the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) was crazy (tongue in cheek, or course).  You may recall that ASCAP was seeking public performance licensing fees for ringtones.  ASCAP demanded royalties for every transmission and sounding of a ringtone because each was a public […]

Our office frequently receives calls from young entrepreneurs asking us to copyright their latest fashion design.  Sadly, we tell them that copyright does not offer the protection they seek and, in fact, they will have to enter the market place with the expectation that their designs, if good enough, will inspire “knock off” copies. This […]

The Copyright Act is continually subject to pressures created by technological and economic forces.  Here’s yet another example. Composers and producers are urging Congress to change copyright law so that music airing in a audio-visual downloads are considered public performances and, therefore, deserving of royalty compensation.  Federal law, of course, grants owners of copyrights the […]

If the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) has its way, each time your ringtone sounds in a public place, it is a public performance and, assuming you didn’t pay a royalty (a good assumption), you have violated copyright law.  That’s the claim made by ASCAP in responding to AT&T’s Motion for Summary […]