Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
This is also the situation in the UK, as I gave a reference to in post #247 on the previous page.
Let me give you a real-world example of such a situation. A few years a local school was prosecuted for staging a performance of "Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" without the permission of the rights holder. No fee was being charged, but still the school was found guilty of copyright infringement. I see no fundamental difference between that and a public reading of a book in a library.
There is very little question that "rights apply"; the law makes it clear that public performance is an activity which is the exclusive right of the copyright holder. The question (as you rightly point out) is what constitutes a public performance, and a court will make a decision on this based on the specific circumstances of the case in question. In the case of the school I mentioned above, the court decided that even though this was a school play to which no admission was charged and only pupils, teachers and parents were in attendance, it was nonetheless a public performance. Can you honestly say that it's "dreaming" to say that a public reading in a library might well be viewed in the same way?
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Sadly, you are correct. At least in the UK, you are not dreaming. Nevertheless, the result both of your example and your hypothetical IMHO would be morally unjust, and I think most people would regard it as such. Further, such results tend to bring into contempt not only the particular law but the law in general. The balance between Public Interest and the interests of "rights holders" is, once again IMHO, currently far too much in favour of the latter.