Fair Use: TV Infomercial Audio

[zeroweb]

Fair Use: TV Audio Clips

What is the name of your state? NM

Bottom Line: I am giving a performance of music and audio material and will be using several clips from TV Infomercials.

The Clips are short (<10sec), the performance can be considered a paradoy on all infomericals, and clips from over 20 programs will be used.

Is this infringement in any sense? If the Infomercials are publically broadcast, does that give me the right to quote from them? Can a performance be considered a paradoy? What kinds of cases have dealt with this?

-mark

 

[zeroweb]

Clarification

I guess I am interested in two things:

1) Is the content coming over TV airwaves copyrighted and NOT public domain?

2) If I am using the content in a paradoy/educational purpose, is teh use of the material legal?

-mark

 

[divgradcurl]

1) Yes, it is copyrighted.
2) Maybe. Both education and parody typically fall under fair use. However, niether are dispositive -- that is, educational use is not ALWAYS a fair use -- but it is more likely to be a fair use than, say, a commercial use. Parody also is more likely to be a fair use than would be a non-parody use. The answers to these types of questions are very fact-specific.

 

[zeroweb]

divgradcurl

Thanks for the help!

By fact specific, do you mean the details of the performance and the content used?

I will be using clicps from over 20 shows, each <10 seconds in length, which will be processed and altered to some degree.

However, I will be charging money for the public performance.

It will be a paradoy, as I am "building" a paradoy infomercial from the building blocks of real infomercials.

Is this what you mean?

Thanks for the help,

-mark