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The guys end the week by discussing a recent lawsuit in New York involving restaurants being sued by the music industry for playing music. They answer the question, "One of our former employees filed a frivulous lawsuit against us. Our attorney is reluctant tocountersue for malicious prosecution soshould I just forget about it?" Full Podcast Transcript NASIR: Welcome to our podcast where we cover business in the news and answer some of your business legal questions that you, the listener, can send in to ask@legallysoundsmartbusiness.com. My name is Nasir Pasha. MATT: And I’m Matt Staub. NASIR: And that’s it. Thank you for joining us, everyone. Don’t forget to leave some positive reviews on our iTunes and thank you. That’s all I have. MATT: That’s all you have for today? NASIR: Yeah, we’ll give everyone a break today; a lot of legal issues this week that they’ve had to deal with. MATT: That’s good because you sprung this story on me the last minute so I don’t have the background information that you do. NASIR: Oh, like I do? MATT: Well, you knew about the story, but I’m glad we’re talking about this because it’s something I have never thought about before. Now that I’ve seen the idea, I’m pretty intrigued. So, this is in New York – at least, this specific lawsuit – but I’m sure it applies to a bunch of places. So, restaurants in New York are being sued by the music industry for playing music in their restaurants which, you know, I guess that, when you think about it, is there a valid license to the music that’s being played? How exactly is it set up? Or maybe some restaurants are just having their owners records their own music and that’s what’s being played over the speakers? But it’s a really, really interesting idea that, like I said, I’ve never really thought about it. NASIR: Yeah. MATT: Lucky for me, you’ve looked into music licensing for restaurants. NASIR: I’ve dealt with this before. It’s actually, you know, we’ll pull out a story that we’ll link to of a restaurant – where were they? I want to say New Jersey but it’s probably off. MATT: I thought it was in New York. NASIR: New York? Anyway, so restaurants are being sued by music industry for up to $150,000 for playing music, and this is a big headline as if it’s a big deal, but the reality is this happens all the time, and the reason is because, just like Matt’s saying, it’s not a common issue that you would come across, but those in the music industry know it very well. There are these what are called “performing rights organizations” and there’s a few of them. There’s BMI, there’s ASCAP, there’s SESAC, and each one of them have a different focus and so forth. They’re not really important to all this but the point is that they govern not only stuff that’s playing on TV but also radio. By the way, there’s also – related to this – sports events too and I’ve dealt with that as well. When you’re watching the NFL, right? There’s always that warning that this is not supposed to be rebroadcasted, et cetera, and then you’re sitting in your living room thinking, “Wait a minute, am I breaking the law right now by watching this?” But the reality is that, when you have a restaurant, for example, depending upon whether or not the general public can listen to the music or whether or not how the size of your TV and all these very specific specifications will depend upon whether or not you have to pay a licensing fee to the appropriate organization for use of that. And so, oftentimes, like, for radio, if you have more than, like, six loud speakers, or more than four loud speakers in any one room, or joining outdoor space, there’s always those technical details, but the point is that, if you want to play the radio or even, like, people say Pandora or Spotify, you can’t just play that and say, “Okay. Now, this is my media entertainment for my restaurant.” You actually have to get that license to actually play that. And so, oftentimes,