[Coco] Republishing Magazines

[Dennis Bathory-Kitsz]

At 10:10 AM 12/28/03 -0800, Neil Morrison wrote:
>> ..."Work for hire", which is done for the person paying, and owned
>by them
>> when the work is submitted; all rights are transferred to the
>paying
>> customer, and the original creator relinquishes everything,
>including a
>> future stake and all credit. Until the strikes of the early 1970s,
>much
>> movie music was done under these terms.
>
>IIRC, this has caused a problem with the re-broadcasts of "WKRP" and
>as a result they've had to change all the music played on the show,
>and many of the related jokes are now rendered pointless. Seems dumb
>to me.

That's yet a different issue. :)

I believe the problem is not the re-broadcast but rather the re-release of
WKRP (and many other shows) on DVD.

The background music was contracted for broadcast, not for commercial
release. Those contracts must be renegotiated, and because it is a public
release, royalties are paid per copy. That adds up and, unfortunately, the
on-the-cheap producers of the original shows did not incorporate the idea
of future release into their  contracts, nor are they willing to pony up
the cash to pay those royalties now.

The dumb part is the cheapskate producers who want to get huge profits from
re-release on DVD (notice it's been held for DVD and not VHS, which was
more expensive and harder to market). But they want to get rich on the
backs of the creative contributors. I'm not sure what the residual
situation is for the actors, but musicians and composers have had a very
long and bad experience with the movie and television cutthroats, and have
developed -- as you see here -- a very effective coping mechanism.

Dennis