Funday Pawpet Show meets CARP
We knew it was coming, but it's still a shock when it actually happens.
The CARP legislation hits the Funday Pawpet Show, extort... erm... requiring payment retroactively from their first broadcast -- 29 January 2001 through 31 August 2002.
In my opinion, CARP stinks to high heaven.
The following announcement from Randy Fox was posted on the FPS Mailing List:
Well, we knew the time was coming, and it has.
CARP, and Soundscape, the evil spawning of the RIAA has sent FPS it's
letter of collection. FPS was filed with the US copyright office for
Jan 29, 2001I Still have to do the total calculations, (Will be making a phone call
to them to find exact calculation formulas).Under their rate fees, using their brodcast hour calculations, we fall
short of fees, so we are required to pay their minimum annual fee, of
$500.They are requiring Historic back payments from Oct 28, 1998 thru Aug 31,
2002.Effectively, with when we are on record for, I need to pay them by Oct
20, 2002 for periods between 1/29/01 and Aug 31, 2002. This total, if
carried on to Jan 2003, will be the amount of $1000.If calculating is correct, I assume they are going to want roughly $42 a
month, and so I need to pay up.My Plea: I can't afford this. If this hits my pocket, I will need to
pull the plug on FPS, as I can no longer financially take the
burden. With this recent hit, we are now liable for $1250 a year in
music licensing alone, then on top, the phone lines, electric, repairs,
etc..If any of you can possibly help support these expenses, please help and
make a donation. I don't have this cash to pay up, and if I can't pay
it, I may have to pull the plug and sell assets to pay what I owe them.I have never made a post to the list like this begging for financial
assistance, but I have stuck desperate times. I greatly appreciate
those of you that have been making financial contributions, as your
efforts have kept us going this long, and without you all, we would have
never gone this far. I hope we can continue to bring you a show every
week, and are looking to start season 4, as long as we can get by these
road bumps.My rant: These licensing agencies, BMI, ASCAP, SESAC and now
CARP.. Simply don't realise that non-profit, non-commercial entities
can't just pick $$ off the money tree, and it is agencies like this that
will milk the lil guy, just having some fun, making no financial gains
off the music use, right out into the silence.. Tis a shame, but it is
the Law, and I trying to be a law abiding citizen, must comply.- --
____ |\/|
\ /\ / ..__. The Yappy Sly Fox ^..^ (vulpes yappaloticus)
\/ \__\ _/ http://www.thefoxden.com/
\__ __ \_ http://thefoxden.com/pubkey for PGP Public Key
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Comments
This is just sad....C'mon, everyfur pony up a buck!
Well, since I submitted this on Saturday, here is an update.
Over the course of the weekend and during the Sunday night show, people had been sending donations to the FPS to help ease this sudden burden. Thanks to the generous donations received (and especially those from one anonymous donor), the FPS crew has made the $1000+ they needed immediately for the retroactive CARP payment.
The Funday Pawpet Show is just a group of guys that get together on a Sunday night and make a 4-hour internet puppet show to keep a bunch of nutty furs entertained. They've been doing it every Sunday night for over two years. That's a very long time for a webcast show. There's always a lot of out-of-pocket expenses for making and producing a show like this, so donations are always accepted. For now, the CARP crisis has passed.
This tiger sends his heartfelt thanks to everyone at the FPS for putting on a great show. :)
Peace;
- PunkTiger!
(...whose computer doesn't seem to like Flayrah's name cookie as it keeps posting me as Anonymous.)
I'm sorry to hear about the music industry muscling itself like it has been on the internet, and glad that furries came out in support for the show.
Still, when I first saw Steve Plunkett show up on the con scene doing his puppet acts, I thought, "Wow, hey, this is a whole new interesting direction for furry fandom to get into." And ever since then it's been stuck in a rut: synching to music, and not much else.
Is there any incentive for furry puppeteers to move into more non-musical, narrative or comedic show formats? There's already a lot of creative ad-libbing, interviews, and the people under the puppets have certainly demonstrated wit and creativity. I realize non-musical stuff is a lot more difficult to create and prepare, but still I think there's a lot of untapped potential there. And no royalties!
I mean, the Muppet Show wasn't just about the music...
Well, it's not like their entire show is lip-synching to one song after another. They may play 4 or 5 lip-synching videos during the course of the show, and a few songs they'll do in-house, but the majority of it is general goofing about (pretty much a non-stop comedy routine between songs).
There have been some people who have sent in videos done to comedy routines... even writing original skits. So, it seems a little unfair to give the impression that all they do is lip-synch to music.
There's also the occasional background music they'll play as they do a DVD review or mini-shows like "Win Nothing And Like it" or "Spits Or Swallows" (where they get odd soft drinks from around the country and taste test them to see if they're good or not... get your mind out of the gutter ;-) ). That also falls under what they have to pay for licensing fees and CARP.
There aren't many shows, comedy or otherwise, without some sort of music in them.
Peace;
- PunkTiger!
(Avid FPS fan since show #81.)
Peace;
- PunkTiger!
Well get yourself a puppet, film it in and send it in to the show! ;)
well i didn't know any of this - and not sure i entirely understand it. i know ABOUT fps or thought i did. i've been to the website and so on though i've never seen a broadcast as such. i've only got a 33.6 and no sound card. i don't know what's to be done about the past other then hopefully enough furs will help the guy out - but for the future, arn't there furry musicians who can/will donate background scores and incidentals?
i had no idea about existing music being used and am a bit baffled by this - but what i'm really baffled by is this business of being able to collect under the law retroactively. that certainly sounds like one more bit of evidence that we're living under some kind of tyranny that we've all been brainwashed into blinding ourselves to. but i don't think scapegoating any political party or phylosophy is going to solve that so i hope no one thinks i'm suggesting anything of the sort.
i just think there's a lot going on that hardly anyone has been paying enough rational and objective attention to - but then i've been thinking that ever since the fall of the u.s. embassy in tehran sometime back in 77 or 78 whenever it was - and what came to power here in the 80s as a resault ...
wait a minuet - does this mean you have to pay a fee to do a product review? is it just me or is there a great big fat problem genericly moraly wrong with the concept of anyone having to???
The "Spits or Swallows" segment wasn't just soft drinks. Last week it was Soju (Korean moonshine). You could tell it was having an effect on some of the bits later in the show. Also last week they filled in with MIDIs instead of the usual recordings. You should have seen Poing when they put on The Muppet Show Theme -- never seen such a disgusted dooker....
Not quite. I was referring to any background music they may play during that, or any other non-musical segment of the show. Product reviews are fine. :-)
Peace;
- PunkTiger!
Peace;
- PunkTiger!
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/headline/tech/1607639
Apparently, webcasters now have to pay a percentage of revenue. What's X percent of... nothing?
Reality is not only stranger than we think, it's stranger than we CAN think!
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