ICI/PRO member Shayne Farquhar sent me this update about the music licensing situation in Australia. If you haven't been following this:
The Phonographic Performance Company of Australia (PPCA), a leading recording industry group, won its bid to replace the previous copyright fee of 94.6 cents per fitness class, after the Copyright Tribunal ruled gyms should pay $15 per class to pay for the use of original music.
The ruling effectively meant that Instructors would be only able to use "approved" or "pre-cleared" music in their classes. This works great for Les Mills RPM programs because they are already using only this type of music.
Thankfully it appears that common sense prevailed and the ruling was overturned... at least for now.
Fitness Australia welcomed the decision and said the previous ruling would have had a detrimental effect on group exercise in the industry.
"If it had been upheld, the claim made by PPCA would have resulted in a typical fitness centre with 1500 members being forced to pay over $80,000 in fees per annum, a massive increase on the $2,000 they currently pay," Fitness Australia chief executive Lauretta Stace said today.
"This decision will ensure that gyms, fitness and recreation centres remain viable and affordable for all Australians, helping them to maintain a healthy lifestyle."
Help me understand this: The PPCA had an existing "use tax" and wanted to raise that tax 15oo%. Did they really believe every club would roll over and say "OK, we will pay the additional $78,000" and that the PPCA would take in additional revenue? I think the PPCA thought that Clubs didn't have a choice but pay the 1500% increase. But Clubs do have a choice and you can see it in action here in the USA with LA Fitness restricting Instructors to only use approved music. The result was clubs refusing to pay anything. So the effect was the PPCA gets less $$$ than their original deal.
The Internet (and iTunes) has changed everything and there's no turning back. Let me know your thoughts.
John is a member on the AFS (Association of Fitness Studios) Advisory Council.
Holding certifications from; Schwinn, Heart Zones, Team ICG and Life Time Fitness, John's held regularly scheduled cycling classes between 1998 and 2015 when he moved to Florida.
When the weather permits, you'll find him riding and leading outdoor groups by himself or with his Tandem partner (wife) Amy.
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It is just a question or probleme for some that make money with it. All those taxes are not going to the authors anyway or the music industry.
I would like to know what are the connection between Les Mills and PPCA.
All my other thoughts are for me …
PPCA and les mills are not related.
Les mills supply music to instructors.
PPCA collect public performance royalties for sound recordings on behalf of their clients.
Hère on Canada i had a issue with an organisation called Socan Who says we have to pay them for the use of any music After one year They ask for renew and I ask were the money goes they said to their members and who are they? Those members supposed to be the artist but I told them how you know which song I played this sound a real fraud
This type of organization should prooved you that the money
Is going to the creator. But this is not true this doesn’t make sence so I decide to stop paying them and I ‘ll go in court if necesary I hope you guys downunder will get rid off this kind of people .
Hère in Canada i had a issue with an organisation called Socan Who says we have to pay them for the use of any music After one year They ask for renew and I ask were the money goes they said to their members and who are they? Those members supposed to be the artist but I told them how you know which song I played this sound a real fraud
This type of organization should prooved you that the money
Is going to the creator. But this is not true this doesn’t make sence so I decide to stop paying them and I ‘ll go in court if necesary I hope you guys downunder will get rid off this kind of people .
My club was all set to switch to non PPCA music as of the first of Jan, now i’m looking forward to putting a good use to the 161 best indoor cycling songs. No doubt we could still make a class with non PPCA music, but who wants to.
Sure makes you appreciate your favourite songs.
Keep up the good work on the website guys.
This is a really complex issue. For any centers (of which there is a lot) who haven’t renewed their license with ppca you cannot play licensed music. As Tim has written in the related post, the federal court ruling is nothing about the fairness of the claim by ppca to the copyright tribunal, only that the way the tribunal came to the decision was not achieved through”natural justice”.. Basically the basis of the tribunal decision drew on a study presented by ppca as low quality and poorly created. This study found that music was significant in member satisfaction when working out etc etc. So fitness australia went the fed court and said ” hey, they can’t give the green light to a fee increase based on a study that the claimants, ppca, said in their claim was a dud study…it isnt fair!” the federal court agreed. So ppca now can go back to the copyright tribunal and do it all again…using the correct studies….and they probably will because they would be pretty pissed by this outcome and looking for blood. For teachers like me, unless my large fitness chain decides to pay the license fee again and get assurances from ppca that there will be no or little fee increase we will be sticking to license free music.
For gyms who are still paying a license they are ok for the moment. Fingers crossed though that ppca will decide not to run this claim in the short term. The cost would be horrendous so I remain optimistic!
Imogen, what has been the reaction of your members after months of ppca-free music?
We are still ppca free and they are coping ok really once we got thru the first round of LM release between may & august. My music has improved actually as it has expanded my repertoire from mainstream to alternative. A lot of jen ‘s playlists are not under ppca which has been good.
There is no announcement from head office yet. Not surprised as they did not renew their license after it expired mid may. I am surprised my members haven’t asked me yet though. I think my large chain will wait to see what ppca do next and I would be confident they will resign a license otherwise they will definitely lose instructors. Why would you want to stay when you can teach next door where they have a license.
How about you? Any feedback yet?
No, we kept our license and were due to drop it in January when the new fees came into effect. I assume we will keep paying the original fees like we always have until the tribunal rematch.
Andy, Imogen, Tim,
this is so interesting to follow. Thanks for the updates. I’m following closely everything you guys say so I can keep abreast of it, although I admit I still don’t understand a lot of it.
Imogen, I’m glad to hear a lot of my music that I post is license fee, but how do you guys know when a song is or isn’t? Is there a web site you run it through?
Andy I hope you can use those 161 songs plus the 210 new ones coming soon in all your classes!
Cheers,
Jennifer
Jen, when I find a song I like, I look it up thru iTunes or wherever I can find who the song is owned by, the label. Then I go to a website “disc hogs” and it isa database that tells me the background to the label and who the parent company is as the big labels own heaps of smaller labels. Once I am confident who the parent company is I check it against a PDF file posted by ppca on their website and search for the label. If it isn’t on the list I use it. It is quite time consuming but as I said a lot of your tracks are ppca free and I’m getting a pretty good collection that I cycle thru over a few weeks. My members are loving it as most other instructors are usin crappy covers, lts of power music stuff. It is ok for one song but a whole cd is a bit too much. Anyway I will keep you posted.
On a different note I bought a sufferfest DVD and put a cool soundtrack to it and did two ” sufferfest rides with my main classes, big screen and great footage. it was so great and a terrific learning curve for my class to see pro riders and i could talk technique while we watched. definitely going to do it again when the tour starts in 2011!
Merry christmas everyone!
hey Imogen,
the process you describe proves that the owner of the sound recording copyright is not represented by the PPCA, and therefore you CAN’t use the track in class (even if you have a PPCA license) because you are not paying public performance royalties to the owner of the sound recording rights when you do so.
Power music, yes fitness, trax and other vendors of PPCA free music actually bundle the public performance rights as part of the sale of the music.
To put it simply, you can only use a song from iTunes if it *IS* covered by PPCA *and* you have a PPCA license.
bad luck mate, same as everyone else for you!
feel free to contact me if you have questions, mail@timgraham.net
Cheers,
Tim
if it any consolation, i originally thought asame as you and i dropped 300 bucks on “non-ppca” music before i realised the horrible truth that i can’t use it in class.
But Tim, who is policing it? I mean, how can they possibly control it? I think of me in my little community club playing my fun music and who would ever know? A big large chain gym, much more likely to be policed, right? Or do they have PPCA vigilantes out running around everywhere reporting on instructors and clubs? In other words, was Imogene at risk of being turned in by a whistle blower?
And what is the penalty? If you’re “caught” once are you given a warning? Hand slap? Fine? Jail? This sounds so horribly Big Brotherish…
It’s copyright law Jen – because it is not policed doesn’t mean it can’t be. When you play a song in class it is a public performance, and royalties are due to copyright owners (even if it’s a cover version).
Example: The Recording Industry Association of America decided to make an example of a few illegal music downloaders to scare the millions of others who thought they wouldn’t get caught “because everyone does it”. They thinking was that if they scared them enough they would stop.
Google “Jammie Thomas-Rasset” for details. She got fined 1.9 million dollars for downloading 24 songs.
It would be so easy to catch a few clubs and make examples of them that I am surprised the PPCA hasn’t taken that idea from the RIAA and run with it.
A big large chain gym is less likely to be policed, because they are more likely to dedicate the time and resources to ensuring that they don’t infringe in the first place.
In that context, you can see why LA Fitness might want control of what gets played in their clubs, and why they will supply music that their legal people have given the green light.
Tim, you’re hurting me…but I know you are right. I know about the itunes bit…isnt’ that case for all people who download from itunes and play them in class like lots of people are saying they do here? I assume it is.
At this stage I am avoiding ppca and the risk of a fine and getting sacked from my centre as we had to resign contracts to say we will not play PPCA licenced music. I am confident my music is not covered by PPCA. That is my main concern. I am not worrying about the itunes part at this stage, but now I probably will now though…
What about music from that website that jen talks about, rcdlbl.com (I think). that is a lot of independent music that doesn’t have labels. could i use that?
Jen, We were notified through our clubs that PPCA would be sending people out to clubs to check playlists. how they verify your music I have no idea. I don’t know how accurate this is personally although I have been told of a couple of instructors who have had random people come up and ask where they get their music from and this has led to the assumption that they were a PPCA “mole”.
I have to say that I have been trying to be pretty positive about the whole music thing and like Tim have dropped a lot of cash on new music but I am beginning to lose my mojo with it. The thing about this issue is that the major impact is not to members or the clubs, clearly members come whether the music is crap or not, but us as instructors. I just feel down that noone has suffered financially (the key point) and professionally more than instructors and so little has been done by clubs to assist us. They win either way because if they don’t pay the licence to PPCA it wasn’t like they dropped membership fees or gave me a payrise to cover my new costs or the drop in costs associated with the centre. They just told us we couldn’t play ppca licenced music and get new stuff and get it now.(and let me say that all instructors would have had to pay some money to buy new cds, all the Les Mills stuff is not able to be used…so 15 years worth of music gone). The music companies are running rife. The power music you buy on itunes is repackaged and doubled in price to us instructors here, it is so crap…grrr ..
I think I need a break. bring on Christmas day!
Tim, With the rcdlbl, I meant can I play it as it isn’t through itunes or PPCa so it would only be an issue for the band who may not have any licences around public use. they are trying to get air play after all.
Also do think there may be a way to get a personal PPCA licence to cover what you play? have you heard of that?
finally – the other music I use a lot of is zumba music because that is ok to be used in any class format and it is ppca free. sigh.
hi Imogen
The thing is, if you play *any* sound recording in class it’s a public performance and royalties are due if it is a copyrighted work (and most are). A sound recording could be a CD, iTunes track on your iPod… whatever.
If the copyright in that recording is owned by a label that is covered by PPCA then a buying a PPCA “blanket” license covers you. Most people assume it is all music, but it’s not. It’s only labels covered by PPCA (in the PDF you mentioned).
Any other music, you need permission and that means $$$ usually. When you buy from a site like TRAX etc. the permission is part of the deal so you are good to go. That’s why they have “PPCA FREE” plastered on their website.
I haven’t looked at rcdlbl website, but if they specifically grant royalty free public performance then you are ok. but seriously, can you build a class from that?
The only real options right now are PPCA FREE websites like TRAX, or teach Les Mills programs.
I have not found anything about a personal PPCA license. From what I have read they only offer the license to businesses (clubs).
Just checked rcdlbl.com and it is only for personal use. There really is nothing I can play other than rubbish to be legal.
I think I may buy the new indoor cycle instructor cd from Marty Clarke. The first one is ok so maybe the next two will suffice.
Thanks Tim for your advice. I have been purposely ignorant to the finer detail because it suits me but probably time to lift my head out of the sand.
I am thinking of doing my rpm training in 2011 so if the music thing doesn’t go away I may go down that path.
hey imogen
I teach RPM, and I think it is a good group fitness program.
That said the back-catalog for RPM is history too as it is not PPCA free.
So even in RPM your choice is limited. At least the quality of the covers is pretty good. The mountain tracks in the last two releases for example are awesome. Give it a year or two and the variety will be back.
I assume that Les Mills will keep producing ppca-free releases.
I checked with ppca on an instructor license but they don’t offer one. Apparently they have “thought about it” though.
Another option is to pay the class fee yoruself? I have one freestyle class each week. I offered to pay the $15 out of my fee, just cos I love doing it. My GFM said no, too hard to administer, but maybe yours would go it. (but if you are FF or Fernwood then I doubt it)
I thought that http://www.yesfitnessmusic.com.au had some reasonable ppca-free stuff for freestyle.
that is good to hear about RPM. I only know 1 instructor who teaches both RPM and freestyle and I have been put off as I teach 3 other LM programs and don’t want the hassle of learning a 4th one but I think the time has come.
I realise the back catalogue is no good but if ppca decide not pursue this case (which they may not given the costs already associated with the first one)
I work for FF so I doubt they will let me pay my own fee (nor do I want to, yet another cost) but I also have thought about it.
I have several YES music cds but it is the cheese factor that is rubbish for my cycle..fine for aqua, abs and freestyle step – in fact it rocks in freestyle step because I like the cheese factor in my classes.
I just ordered the new RIDE cd which is pretty good covers. The first one was really good, 8 out 9 songs great – 1 really average INXS cover.
what are you using in your freestyle? have you had to use much ppca free?
so far very little ppca free. was gearing up for january but not the pressure is off and business as usual for a little longer.