this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2024
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Europe

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[โ€“] [email protected] 27 points 9 months ago (3 children)

It works the same way in Germany. If you're playing music in essentially any venue, even just on the radio, you pay a royalties fee. For places that do it everyday there is usually a flat yearly fee. At least here, a good chunk of that money does indeed fund other cultural endeavors.

[โ€“] [email protected] 18 points 9 months ago (3 children)

You also pay fees to GEMA if you buy a writable CD or USB or other forms of data storage, because you could potentially use it to store music on it. It's included in the price. This also affects devices with which you could transfer the data on the storage medium.

Don't believe me?

https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauschalabgabe

[โ€“] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago

You even pay if you buy a printer. Because you could print sheet music I guess.

I am not even kidding.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

And that's why I pirate.

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

Didn't know that, wild!

[โ€“] [email protected] 18 points 9 months ago (1 children)

At least here, a good chunk of that money does indeed fund other cultural endeavors.

Cultural endeavors is a very polite way to put it. A large chunk of it goes to only a handful of big performers in the music industry, the small ones who would actually need money get very little.

[โ€“] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Actually GEMA takes a percentage from the big pop musicians to help fund the contemporary/avantgarde composers who would otherwise earn a lot less. There are plenty of things to complain about with GEMA but I think for the most part they do a lot to support smaller, more obscure genres. (I ran a publishing company for contemporary music in Germany for ten years, so I had a lot to do with GEMA)

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Good for you. Doesn't hold true for the others. Besides the problem that it's too less what they pay out.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

How much money did you get from GEMA?

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It depended on many factors like the size of the venue, length and instrumentation of the piece, also the genre. I can't give you an amount in โ‚ฌ off the top of my head how much I earned lol.

[โ€“] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

If you don't know how much GEMA gave you, it can't be noteworthy.

Better scrape it. But wait, you can't leave. Any resemblance to mafia?

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Why would I memorize financial information from a company I left years ago just to share it with random strangers on the internet?

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Not if it's a closed party for invited guests only such as a wedding.

[โ€“] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Yes I've heard that argument too. A bit annoying