At the same time, deliberately playing music while conducting an activity that entails conversational interchange is clearly a ploy to prevent that which I understand to be (perhaps incorrectly) a lawful activity in the US.
https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/recording-police-officers-a...
> A public performance is one that occurs either in a public place or any place where people gather (other than a small circle of a family or its social acquaintances).
https://www.ascap.com/help/ascap-licensing
> Generally speaking, public performances are very broadly interpreted under the law and are defined as performing “at a place open to the public or at any place where a substantial number of persons outside of a normal circle of a family and its social acquaintances is gathered.” This has been interpreted to mean that most performances at so-called private clubs and fraternal organizations are “public” under the copyright law.
https://www.bbb.org/council/for-businesses/toolkits/bbb-broc...
It's a place open to the public, so it is a public performance.
No, that's not a rational inference.
Care to take a moment and search the case law for this?
Given that millions of people play music in public every day, can you find even a single instance of case law that supports the absurd claims in this thread?
No?
Nobody ever charged for listening to music themselves?
This comment really helps to highlight how badly HN melts down in the face of facts they don't like.
By your argument, playing music at the beach or at the office, even to yourself is a against the law.
It's a false argument based on a magical reading of the code.
It is 100% legal for someone to play music for themselves, full stop.
This is not one of those issues that IP lawyers just don't pursue because it's not worth it, rather, they don't pursue it because they cannot.
Just because you are 'in public' does not mean you are giving a public performance. Otherwise every radio everywhere would be banned, or come with a warning label.
If you are playing music in your store, for customers, you may be breaking IP law.
If you play it for a large number of employees, maybe.
If you play it as part of a performance intended for the public and have a public audience, then probably.
And of course, if you film someone listening to music - real or rehearsed (like a cop) - and put it up on YouTube you're probably breaking copyright. Maybe.
Yes, playing music at the office is against the law.[0] It's just difficult and extremely impractical to enforce. UK law is similar, and as others have attested on this post, rightsholders are much more aggressive in enforcing them there - if it's not absurd that that would constitute a public performance in the UK, why is it absurd that it wouldn't constitute a public performance in the US, when the law is written the same way?
> It is 100% legal for someone to play music for themselves, full stop.
If you're playing music on a speaker in a public place (and the law defines what a public place is), then you're not playing music for yourself, it's a public performance.
> Otherwise every radio everywhere would be banned, or come with a warning label.
There are specific exceptions in the law that cover playing the radio in an establishment (17 U.S. Code § 110(5)(B)). Yes, the limitations on public performance would apply that broadly if there were not a specific provision in the law carving out an exception for these, and even then they're required to follow certain provisions.
> And of course, if you film someone listening to music - real or rehearsed (like a cop) - and put it up on YouTube you're probably breaking copyright. Maybe.
There is no copyright infringement here, this is covered by fair use. If this went to court, a judge would determine the video was published for the purposes of commentary/criticism of government officials, among other fair use factors. Otherwise government officials could come to an arrangement with rightsholders and always play licensed music at all times and deny these licenses to critics in order to prevent any critical videos from ever being published, which is obviously just circumventing the First Amendment.
Even if Instagram had taken it down, it wouldn't mean it wouldn't be fair use as platforms are notoriously conservative with respect to these matters, but the fact is that Instagram hasn't even taken this video down for copyright infringement. So your theory about this being copyright infringement is moot.
[0]: https://www.bmi.com/news/entry/20030509_Playing_Music_in_Wor...
Otherwise, every employee in bars and restaurants could "play music to themselves", without paying anything and without infringing copyrights ?
The arguments being made here are infantile, and embarrassing.
Because people 'hate cops' (shameful), they use magical thinking to twist even common sense upside down.
The person making a video public is the person making something public, not the cop.
Playing music to yourself is 100% legal.
Making videos of content of said music, and posting to YouTube, is not.
"I'll hold my breath while the individual police officers are pursued for these egregious copyright violations"
So given that it's the person filming that is breaking the law, and not the cop, I'll assume you'd point the same disdain for those individuals egregious breaking the law?