Editing 1581: Birthday
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{{w|Chuck E. Cheese's}} is an entertainment restaurant, geared toward young children, which routinely hosts birthday parties as part of its business model. Parties held in commercial venues tend to be a gray area for this kind of issue. Singing copyrighted songs at a private function is allowed, but the staff of a restaurant singing them to patrons could be considered a commercial performance, and potentially expose the restaurant to claims from the copyright holder. The title text suggests that [[Randall]] was at a family birthday party, witnessed someone (possibly the staff) singing "Happy Birthday", and called the police. This would be an extreme overreaction in any case (even if it were a violation, copyright infringement is a civil liability, not a criminal offense), but the decision that the copyright wasn't valid in the first place makes such an action even more indefensible. | {{w|Chuck E. Cheese's}} is an entertainment restaurant, geared toward young children, which routinely hosts birthday parties as part of its business model. Parties held in commercial venues tend to be a gray area for this kind of issue. Singing copyrighted songs at a private function is allowed, but the staff of a restaurant singing them to patrons could be considered a commercial performance, and potentially expose the restaurant to claims from the copyright holder. The title text suggests that [[Randall]] was at a family birthday party, witnessed someone (possibly the staff) singing "Happy Birthday", and called the police. This would be an extreme overreaction in any case (even if it were a violation, copyright infringement is a civil liability, not a criminal offense), but the decision that the copyright wasn't valid in the first place makes such an action even more indefensible. | ||
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| + | However, many restaurants (for example, [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OG9yZigKk0I Olive Garden]) actually have staff sing a special birthday song (not ''Happy Birthday To You'') to avoid having to pay royalties. | ||
==Transcript== | ==Transcript== | ||
