For the last few weeks, I’ve received several questions about the legalities of burning entire albums from a friend’s CD collection and creating and giving mixed CDs to loved ones or as part of a corporate gift. These questions make me cringe.
The U.S. Copyright Act allows you to make an archival copy of media you’ve legally obtained, in case something happens to the original. This is for personal use, not to be shared with others. It is perfectly legal to create a playlist or mix CD from your music collection for your personal use. If you allow friends to copy your CDs, that is likely an illegal copy (unless the music is so old that it’s in the public domain). By burning a copy of your CD, you are depriving the artist and their record label of the royalties they would have earned had your friend bought their own copy.
To the person who asked me if they could make a mix CD of holiday music to send to clients and contacts, that really made me cringe. Not only would you likely be illegally copying and distributing music without a license, but you would also be informing your contacts through your actions that you either lack knowledge of copyright law, or you don’t respect it. Neither of those are a sentiment you want to have as part of your reputation.
The exception to this situation is to get permission to make these CDs by obtaining licenses for each song. I work with an organization called Ignite Phoenix that puts on awesome shows that showcase speakers’ passions. At several events, we wanted to highlight the musical talent in the Phoenix area, so one of our organizers contacted local bands who agreed to have one of their songs featured on an Ignite Phoenix compilation CD that was handed out to every attendee.
Remember, what you can legally do and what you may get away with are often different things. The only person who can come after you for infringement is the copyright holder. If they don’t know what you did or they don’t care, you won’t be sued for infringement. Although it is rare to hear about copyright infringement cases like this, they do happen. A woman in Minnesota was ordered to pay $1.9 million for illegally downloading 24 songs. The amount was later reduced to $220,000.
The interaction between the Copyright Act and technology is often confusing, with many gray areas instead of black-and-white answers. If you have any questions about copyright and avoiding the risk of infringement, you can contact me directly or connect with me on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or LinkedIn.