quote:

Originally posted by Kuffdam I personally have been visited by PRS at a venue but the difference was they just wanted to know what tracks I was playing. They didn't actually ask to see if they were paid for etc.

There are two types of visits from the PRS/MCPS/trading standards.... you had the royalty type...where someone (usually very bored who hates the music) has to write everything down you play so the artists get royalties. No problem with these guys at all.

The other type is where they tear your record box/cd wallets apart looking for copies or CDRs.
These tend to be the evil b*stards, who will try and remove anything they see fit and give you 7 days to produce the originals.
Think of them like those flesh eating mutants from the film '28 days later' and you are somewhere near.

On certain nights i do i have had no choice but to transfer a lot of stuff from old vinyl onto cd, and have also condensed a lot of cds onto less for practical reasons.
I also have a letter in my cd wallets from my solicitor stating i have X amount of records which "for practical and damage prevention/insurance reasons have been condensed and/or backed up onto other media" and they are "not authorised under any circumstances to remove any material- however, originals can be provided within a reasonable time upon request, at my clients convienience and your expense".

The law is very ambiguous and unclear in the majority of respects, especially with digital (legal) downloading being available now.