Copyright Infringement on Ridley Scott's "Raised By Wolves" TV Programme

[BankFodder]

I'm sure we would all like to listen to the track on the YouTube video in question. Maybe you could post it up here.

This is a very interesting story and you will have two problems. First of all establishing that the copyright work is yours, and then deciding what the value of the work is. I think there would be no question of preventing its use at this stage and if it went to court I can imagine that a court would eventually decide that a certain figure of award would adequately compensate you for the use of your copyright work.

I had initially thought that the company which owned the rights to the film was a US company – but in fact I think they are London based and it is Ridley Scott's production company in partnership with an American company based in Los Angeles. I suppose that another problem will be to discover who is actually the copyright owner in the film.

Whoever it is, the film company has a problem because they have created the film and presumably they are licensing out to TV companies all over the world and also eventually to Netflix or Amazon prime. When these companies buy the rights to screen a particular production, they expect that it comes as a package with no loose ends and no disputes over the ownership of the rights in the work.
It looks as if you are going to upset the apple cart – although don't expect it to be easy.

As it happens, many years ago I was doing some high altitude gliding in Scotland – almost 26,000' - I had a video camera with me and I videoed quite a lot of the flight. I remember it was quite a big camera in those days and trying to jostle it as well as control the glider, I put my thumbprint on the lens which you can see in the video going back and forth as the lens hunted for focus. I was very annoyed about that.

 

A few months later somebody contacted me and told me that a TV company had produced an edition of "how do they do that" on high altitude gliding and they were going to use some of my footage.
They had turned up at the airfield in Scotland but the weather had gone to worms and they were unable to do any high level flying and simply took film of takeoffs and landings. Somebody told them that they had a copy of my video and the film team took it away.
It turned out that they used 29 seconds of my video in the final production, that was the only high level flying that they screened during the entire half hour.

Anyway, with two days to go, I phoned up the production company and told them I was the copyright owner and that we had something to discuss. My calls were never returned and on the morning of the transmission, I contacted the BBC and sent them a fax putting them on notice that they were about to commit a copyright breach.

The effect was transformative. Within an hour I received a telephone call from a producer of the TV company complaining that it hadn't been necessary for me to phone the BBC and that they were in the middle of sorting it out. I told her I didn't believe it. Anyway we finally settled on £800. I can tell you that she was outraged – but  I was faxed a contract within half an hour and the money was in my bank within a week.

I phoned my mum – she was very proud. All over the country people watched my thumbprint going back and forth on the lens – I was so chuffed.

Anyway, the story is only vaguely relevant to you. The series has been completed so it's a done deal. However, they will still be wanting to license it out and that would allow you to put pressure on people like Netflix et cetera and other TV companies. Which in turn would put pressure on the production company.

Of course all this sounds very simple and straightforward – but it's not. I'm just generally speaking sketching out the position.  It certainly is the case that every time an episode with your music in it is screened, there is a new copyright breach.

 

How has this music been produced? Is it electronic music produced with FL studio or something? Do you have full evidence of your work – preparatory work et cetera so that you can refute  any challenge to you as the copyright owner?

I think you are going to have to do some very solid research as to who is going to be using this TV series after the screening that is happening at the moment. In fact where has it been screened so far?

Is there a soundtrack for sale? Do you know if your piece of music is going to be repeated in any of the other episodes?

I think we really need to find out who is the owner of the TV series for starters.

Also when you eventually make an approach to them, I would suggest a very nonconfrontational approach to begin with in order to see what their attitude is. They may well be used to this kind of thing – even though they won't be happy with it.
Eventually you would aim to grant them full rights to your work including the rights to sublicense it to other companies – in return for a consideration.
We will have to try and work out how much it's worth – but it might well be a nice little earner for you.

I'm wondering if it's too late to negotiate a credit in the closing titles

[BankFodder]

That is something which concerns me – but on the other hand I know that music is generally speaking added right at the end of the production – and very often quite at the last moment.

However, this is broadly why I've said that very solid proof of copyright ownership needs to be established

[BankFodder]

Please can you avoid posting in a long block of text. It makes it very difficult to read. Proper spacing and punctuation would be very helpful

[BankFodder]

I think it's a shame that you have notified them already. You came here for help and I think you should have waited for advice.

Nothing beats excellent preparation – especially when dealing with a big company.

I think you should set about preparing your position which means gathering all the evidence of your copyright ownership. Then finding out as much as you can about the TV series and where it is being screened, who owns the copyright, who actually arrange the music for the episode – and maybe the entire series. Also, to what extent are they using your music? Are they proposing to use it for future episodes?
If they are intending to use it for future episodes, then there is a risk that your notification may prompt them to revisit that part of the music and to redo it to reduce their exposure. This would have been a bad move by you because you would then lose value.

I think you should stop rushing in

[BankFodder]

Please will you post up the email that you sent

[BankFodder]

Incidentally, I see that you say that you "cheekily" asked for credit as a composer.

First of all, once again you are rushing in – but anyway to express your request as a cheeky request suggest that you consider that you are subordinate in this. Although they are more powerful than you, on the basis of what you say you have the Right on your side and in fact in terms of rights they are subordinate to you.

I don't see that you should position yourself so that it is as if you are approaching them hoping they will do you a favour.

[BankFodder]

I just read the email that you sent. Did you send this before or after I had posted my initial advice?

[BankFodder]

Please address my question as to when you sent this email

[BankFodder]

Thank you.

You say that you didn't want to express yourself with any anger yet am afraid that your email is exactly that. It is confrontational. It suggests that the Work has been stolen and it has started off by making threats.

I'm sorry that this is an absurd way to go about dealing with this kind of thing in the world of adults. You risk damaging your own position – partly because when they see this kind of rant they are less likely to take you seriously – but also because they will go on the defensive and they will batten down.

I suggest that you cool your heels and start doing some research.

First. Putting together all the evidence of your ownership of this Work. That means not only make sure you got evidence as to the publication date of your Work – – but presumably it took you some time before the publication of it to complete it. Have you got evidence of that? I'm talking about files with dates et cetera. Gather them all together in one folder and also make sure that you have a backup

If you emailed versions of this to your friends or relatives – then make sure that you got all of those emails safely stored away and backed up.

Then start finding out more about the production – when is the final episode aired? I suggest that you do nothing until you have listened to all the episodes and you can be certain that no more of your music has been used.
I'm sorry to say but it was really quite foolhardy to jump in when you don't really know the extent of the copyright breach or the strength of your position.



 

[BankFodder]

Well it's rather too late for them to edit it out now in respect of episodes which are already screened – although if they want to license it out of course they could then alter the soundtrack.

As far as bundling you into their royalties goes, the problem is that you don't know the extent to which they are using your music. You don't know whether they are continuing to use it in other episodes. You have no idea what plans they have to license the episodes out to other platforms. In other words you have no idea of the value of the copyright breach. Although it will be difficult for you or us to estimate the value because we don't understand how this world of film production works, at least we can get an idea of the extent to which they are proposing to use it.

I think you have to understand that you're not going to be able to force them to do anything – unless you eventually take court action. These people are massive with huge resources and of course if they're really silly they could decide to spend a lot more on crushing you then it would cost them simply to pay you a decent royalty in return for you going away.

This is why your confrontational approach is so potentially damaging – because whereas this is something that could be negotiated and settled to everybody's satisfaction, by challenging them, you risk getting somebody's back up which would prompt them to dig their heels in even if it becomes more costly to them.

I understand your outrage at having your copyright work used, but am afraid that this is probably something which comes with the territory and the answer is to resolve it by negotiation to mutual satisfaction. You don't do that by starting fighting without trying some dialogue.

Also, as you've already suggested, the production company is probably completely unaware. I'm quite sure that they would be very fastidious about respecting rights in copyright works. Clearly they have delegated the task of producing the music track to somebody who is may be inexperienced or maybe less scrupulous. I can imagine that that person will probably get their arse kicked at some point.

 

I suggest that you get printouts of everything that is printable – emails – notes et cetera. At some point you will need hardcopy

[BankFodder]

Well spend the next few days preparing and also researching the series and trying to find out where it's going to go. Find out how long the series is going to go on for – how many more weeks is going to be broadcast and then we can decide what to do.

I think your propaganda start off by sending a conciliatory letter to the production company – and I'm wondering whether it's possible to get a direct contact email for Ridley Scott.

[BankFodder]

Don't send off any more messages without posting them here first.

Here's a link to where you could end up – although you really don't want to  https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/copyright-tribunal

[BankFodder]

1 minute ago, unclebulgaria67 said:

 

 

The argument will be that you gave it away for free, as you set no terms to whoever you passed it onto.

 

 

I'm afraid that this would not be a valid argument.

Even if you give a piece of music away, it doesn't mean that you have also transferred copyright. Copyright can only be transferred by an assignment in writing. Anybody – but especially in a professional production company would be required to assume that there is a copyright issue with any piece of music that they come across

[BankFodder]

I'm afraid I don't think that your proposed email is at all appropriate. In your second sentence you immediately start challenging the character of one of the composers – and this is confrontational and is calculated to put them on the defence.

Much of the email is spent outlining your requirements – but you are not at that position yet in the dialogue.

Also – the minuscule fly on the wall bit is just completely servile and I think you should start elevating yourself a bit. I agree with my colleague above that you should also put in paragraph spacing – and I've already pointed this out to you that we don't appreciate solid blocks of text here and nobody else will in the messages that you send either. Spacing and punctuation is a very basic presentational technique.

 

I propose the draft which I have set out below because all it is doing is alerting them to the issue and trying to open a door to deal with the proper person and to have a dialogue. This is what should have been sent originally instead of your rather abrasive and confrontational email - which I hope doesn't damage things too much.

 

Quote

I'm writing to you to bring to your notice a potential copyright breach.

I should say now that I wrote to you in the early hours of X X X when I first discovered the issue and I was rather angry and I believe that I wrote to you in rather confrontational terms.

I am the composer and the owner of the music contained in this YouTube video which I uploaded on the X X X date – YouTube link.

I've been watching Your "Raising with Wolves" series over the recent weeks – I've enjoyed it very much, but when I watched episode five, I was struck by a piece of music at about X X X minutes/seconds into the episode which resembled my own piece of music.

I carried out a comparison of the two pieces and there is no doubt that they are to all intents and purposes, identical and that clearly one piece of music has sourced the other for its ideas and its form.

As my own work is an original work which I made at home on my own computer, and also because it appears to predate yours by over three months, I'm afraid that unbeknown to you, that part of your soundtrack has been developed by reference to my own.

I have previously been a film student and I am aware of how accidental copyright breaches can creep into a finished work – especially in a large and busy production company.

Clearly there are some issues to discuss – and I'd be grateful if you would put me in contact with the person who is responsible for your music production element or for copyright matters within your organisation so that we can begin some kind of dialogue.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely

 

Just now, erikborgo said:

Oh no, I've done it again and too much time has passed for me to edit it.  Just tried.

 

It shouldn't have been in a solid block of text in the first place.

[BankFodder]

Wait a few days. In the meantime have a hunt around and you may find other contact details for them.

You may even find they have got a copyright department – have you looked?

[BankFodder]

And you think that was a good idea?

[BankFodder]

The extent to which their treatment of the notes which they copied my have added value is irrelevant to the question of whether the copyright was breached. That would only be relevant to the question of damages.

I agree that there is little chance of disruption. I certainly didn't indicate there would be disruption. I simply suggested that it might help to put pressure on the production company

[BankFodder]

Certainly the ranting threats that he has made so far Will not have put pressure on anybody.

The way to deal with this is to treat them as if they are reasonable people and that they've made a mistake and that they will realise they made a mistake and they will want to sort it out for a reasonable settlement

[BankFodder]

But I understand that only the source material has been taken from YouTube. The infringing copy has not been placed on YouTube. If that's right then there is no point in talking to YouTube