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I know there are stringent copyright laws in the USA BUT , I believe, Germany and EU countries are not too tough. So, if a copy of a record can be made there, can it be sent elsewhere?
I know that whenever the Happy Birthday song is performed, a royalty is supposed to be paid if the last line is sung.

Happy Birthday was recently put into public domain.

Hullo!
Thanks! Good to know.

I know that whenever the Happy Birthday song is performed, a royalty is supposed to be paid if the last line is sung.

Who goes around checking on people singing "Happy Birthday"? Does that mean the next time I'm at the Old Spaghetti Factory and a family sings Happy Birthday, I have to go over and say "I hate to be a killjoy here, but I'm one of the Happy Birthday nazis. You're going to have to send $5 to the Happy Birthday people." I think they'd have the waiters throw me out! And also, who goes around checking on people making a copy or two of the Charleston? The big music execs are too wrapped up checking on who's copying their Rap records to worry about the Roaring Twenties. By the way, I own an 1861 edition of Dickens' Great Expectations published by T. B. Peterson of Philadelphia. It's the first American edition of Great Expectations. In the preface, the publisher announces that he has paid Mr. Dickens $2000 for the right to publish his book. It was kind of a new and voluntary thing back then, as I have many copies of earlier American editions of Dickens that are pirated!

billybob62 wrote:I know there are stringent copyright laws in the USA BUT , I believe, Germany an EU countries are not too tough. So, if a copy of a record can be made there, can it be sent elsewhere?
I know that whenever the Happy Birthday song is performed, a royalty is supposed to be paid if the last line is sung.

It's mostly true. The biggest problem of US copyright is that it is non-systematic and a nothing but a complete chaos, making it extremely hard to even find a licencor, not to mention negotiating. Copyright in the EU has been widely harmonized. It allows me to legally produce my records by paying approx. 13% of the final retail price for each record to a central royalty agency. And that's something that I even did not include in my open calculation back then.

But this does only work for recordings that are at least 71 years. After 70 years, the associated copyright for the recording (often called 'label rights') expires, but it remains protected for the rest of the year it expires in. Thus, I go for at least 71 years. Anything earlier get's quite complicated too and gives another good reason not to think about later recordings that I haven't done myself.

If you want to see what I mean with chaos of US copyright law, there's a good and frequently updated chart available. Sound recordings start on the bottom of page 5. But don't expect to be more confident afterwards:

http://copyright.cornell.edu/resources/ ... htterm.pdf

marcapra wrote:

I know that whenever the Happy Birthday song is performed, a royalty is supposed to be paid if the last line is sung.

Who goes around checking on people singing "Happy Birthday"? Does that mean the next time I'm at the Old Spaghetti Factory and a family sings Happy Birthday, I have to go over and say "I hate to be a killjoy here, but I'm one of the Happy Birthday nazis. You're going to have to send $5 to the Happy Birthday people." I think they'd have the waiters throw me out! And also, who goes around checking on people making a copy or two of the Charleston? The big music execs are too wrapped up checking on who's copying their Rap records to worry about the Roaring Twenties. By the way, I own an 1861 edition of Dickens' Great Expectations published by T. B. Peterson of Philadelphia. It's the first American edition of Great Expectations. In the preface, the publisher announces that he has paid Mr. Dickens $2000 for the right to publish his book. It was kind of a new and voluntary thing back then, as I have many copies of earlier American editions of Dickens that are pirated!

Now that you mention it, I've noticed these days that the franchised chain restaurants don't seem to be using the "Happy Birthday" song. They all seem to use their own in-house silly clapping song. I've wondered if it's to avoid the copyright issue altogether.
The song's copyright issues have come up over many years. In the 1943 movie musical "Girl Crazy" they prelude the song with clever lyrics: "and now with special permission from the copyright holders we're delighted to say..."
More history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You
Bob

does the tune of the Happy Birthday song come from the old fashioned way elementary students used to greet their teacher in the morning? It uses the same tune: "Good morning to you! Good morning to you! Good morning dear teacher. Good morning to you!"

This birthday song is not copyrighted!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=V62sNmicpH4

Hey, whassup?
Anything new?