TWENTIETH CENTURY MUSIC CORP. Et Al. v. AIKEN

Background

A small fast-service restaurant owner in Pittsburgh played a licensed radio station over four ceiling speakers while customers ate. Two copyrighted songs were broadcast by a station that held performance licenses from ASCAP, but the restaurant owner did not hold a separate license. The song owners sued for unpaid performing rights; a trial judge awarded damages, but a federal appeals court reversed.

Reasoning

The Court asked whether merely receiving a licensed radio broadcast in a public, for-profit place is itself a "performance." Relying on earlier decisions treating broadcasters as the performers and listeners as passive recipients, the Court held that the restaurant’s radio reception was not a separate performance by the owner. The Court stressed practical problems and unfairness that would follow if every listener in businesses were treated as performers, and said such a rule would conflict with the Copyright Act’s balanced purpose.

Real world impact

The ruling protects ordinary businesses that play broadcasts from being treated as separate performers when the broadcaster holds the appropriate license. It makes it harder for copyright owners to demand many separate in-store licenses for the same broadcast. The opinion also leaves open different outcomes where facts differ (for example, an unlicensed broadcaster or fundamentally different uses) and signals that Congress could change the rule if it chooses.

Dissents or concurrances

Justice Blackmun joined the outcome but worried the owner was more than a passive listener and criticized narrowing older precedent. Chief Justice Burger (dissenting) argued the owner used the transmission commercially and urged Congress to address the issue.