The Squeezer
We are now close to finish the first part of our wedding preparations. That is, to hire all the providers.
Wedding is a rather big project in Israel. I wander what is the cultural background for this. I know that in many places in the western world it is not that big an issue; however it is a big party in many societies - in many Arab villages, for example, it usually involves recruitement of the entire village for a week or so; in the jewish sectors it usually involves months of preparations; and one of the strongest memories I have from my journeys involves an engangement party I attanded in Vanuatu over two years ago.
Part of the thing in Israel, of course, is that it had become an industry: many people make a lot of money from this, and the mantra “you marry only once” is used repeatedly to try and take a lot of money from you. The oldest trick in the book, on this context, is to separate things. A friend of mine had to hire separately the bar-tender and the wine glasses; in almost every place you need to hire separately the place itself and the music system infrastructure, in most you’ll pay an additional price for the lights. There are many tricks in this business, all aimed at one goal: take as much money as possible from the young couple. There is not much you can do about it, besides trying to think of as many details as you can in advance and close them in the initial contract - because any detail you forget now will cost you a lot of money in more advanced stages. That’s how it works, and once you decided to do a “conventional” wedding - you’re in.
Yesterday we discovered another, particularly frustrating, manifestation of this principle. We signed with a d.j. for the event, and the issue of music rights came up. There is a legal address for this - ACUM, which is in charge of keeping the rights of its members. Its members, meaning mostly the secretary, the beaurocrats, and the big music companies; much less the real artists.
Anyhow, several years ago these guys decided to join the party. They now directly charge every couple a bit over 200NIS for the right to play music in their event. It could seem reasonable, if they were not charging in parallel the DJ for the right to use the discs, and the place for their ability to charge places. So actually they have triple charges - which eventually all fall on you, the happy couple. You wed only once, as they say; so - leave the moral issues aside - would you risk someone shutting your music in the middle of the event?
One thing that I would like to know, is where this money goes. What part of it goes to the real artists? What part goes to artists that I don’t like, don’t want to support, and there is not a chance to hear in my wedding? Why do they triple-charge you instead of being open and honest (well, I think I know the answer for that question)? and so forth.
One thing is known: if I do pay these fees, I will have no moral problems burning myself cds for my personal use. Sorry for the poor artists - but they should find someone more reasonable to claim their business.
November 20th, 2007 at 22:39
I failed to convince Osnat to marry in the Rabanot.
my personal feeling to minimize the cost of wedding as much as you can>
i am personally not hungry at 10pm. since it happens only once in your life, you do not remember much of the event anyway.
The most important thing about marriage is that the couple will enjoy the love and happiness in years to come. The single night means nothing to this issue.
November 21st, 2007 at 13:23
I know there are some artists that will be willing to give (or sell) you personally permission to play their works in an event or something, and if you are willing to do the leg work and only play fringe artists at your wedding, then that might work.
Also - I don’t believe that AKUM just goes around and shuts down wedding that didn’t pay the tax - they don’t do that to businesses that play music without licensing, and I do know they monitor businesses. While not being a lawyer, one thing you can probably do is just forgo the licensing at all, and in the improbable event that you actually get sued, settle for the your part of the fee alone (200NIS).
November 21st, 2007 at 17:38
No music!
In a case like this I would either claim the wedding as a private event, hold it privately and say that playing music there is just as “evil” as playing my own store-bought collection to my friends in my apartment (Although I’m sure ACUM probably has numbers and figures to determine what is a private event and what is not) or forgo the music altogether. It’s a wedding not a dance party, I think.
In any case, when I get there, I want to do it in the kibbutz. That’s about a square kilometer of private property, no one’s gonna bother you there.
November 26th, 2007 at 19:04
[While not being a lawyer, one thing you can probably do is just forgo the licensing at all, and in the improbable event that you actually get sued, settle for the your part of the fee alone (200NIS).]
Hmmm… IIRC There is the issue of the damage per infringement without having to prove any damage being limited to 100000 NIS… (http://www.knesset.gov.il/privatelaw/data/17/3/196_3_1.rtf - see section 56), the old version (only changed this year) had a minimum of 10000 NIS in place and it is still likely to be taken as a guideline.