Re: No Singing at Camp
(no name) ((no email))
Sun, 25 Aug 1996 13:11:02 +0200
Came across the following article off the internet. This is a reprint
from the Washington Post (Internet):
ASCAP Nixes Bizarre Fee Demand
By Anthony Jewell
Associated Press Writer
Saturday, August 24, 1996; 5:17 a.m. EDT
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- The American Camping
Association
says a music industry group may be backing off
its demand that
camps across the country pay royalty fees on
songs sung around
the campfire.
The American Society of Composers, Authors and
Publishers had
notified several thousand camps that royalty
fees must be paid on
4 million copyright tunes -- everything from
"Happy Birthday" to
"God Bless America."
The fees would range from $77 to $257 a year
per campground,
according to the American Camping Association,
based in
Martinsville, Ind.
But Bob Schultz, a spokesman for the camping
association, said
Friday that ASCAP's public relations arm --
Sunshine
Communications in California -- told the group
the whole issue
was a big misunderstanding.
"They said they never intended to go after
non-profit camps, nor
did they intend to go after camps that are
singing songs around
campfires," said Schultz, who spoke with the
public relations
company by telephone Friday.
"Their main interest was to go after
for-profit camps that do large
musical productions."
A spokesman for ASCAP in New York could not be
reached
Friday night for comment. ASCAP is the
organization responsible
for tracking and collecting royalties for the
music industry.
ASCAP sent notices about the royalty fees to
as many as 7,000
camps across the country -- about two-thirds
of which are
non-profit camps, including Boy and Girl Scout
and YMCA
camps, Schultz said.
Schultz said his group had not received
anything from ASCAP to
indicate a change in policy since the notices
were sent.
"At this point, their actions apparently are
different from their
desires," he said. "We'd like to hear about it
from their lawyers."
The issue has quickly turned into a
public-relations problem for
ASCAP, drawing media attention and protests
from scouting
troops and camp groups.
Even Los Angeles Lakers center Shaquille
O'Neal got drawn into
the dispute.
The Lakers' $120 million man was watching a
television news
report Thursday when he heard that Girl Scouts
at a summer
camp might have to stop singing songs unless
they pay a fee to
ASCAP.
At a news conference in Los Angeles Friday,
O'Neal offered to
pay a $250 annual fee for 10 years so the Girl
Scouts could
continue singing.
"I'm a big Girl Scout cookie eater," O'Neal
said. "The Girl Scouts
... keep singing, and keep making those
cookies."
But there's a price to O'Neal's offer: "I want
free cookies then," he
quipped.
) Copyright 1996 The Associated Press
Yours in Scouting & WWW,
Mike Lardie
Barbarossa District Committee Member
Transatlantic Council
WB (WAKO) Owl, NE-VI-19
O/A Vigil 1994 - Black Eagle Lodge
email: logplanner@fwd.areur.army.mil / 100104.241@compuserve.com
Terry Howerton Sakima Group, Inc. SCOUTER Magazine Kansas City | 
