Who Owns The Star Spangled Banner?

Leave it to the scumbag corporate gangsters to steal the Star Spangled Banner and profit from it. Call me a crazy liberal but I for one hold our the national anthem sacred and believe it belongs to the people of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.... NO EXCEPTIONS!! 



NO ONE SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO PROFIT IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM FROM THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER... PERIOD! ANYONE WHO DOES IS A FUCKING TRAITOR!

My shock is not that great because the corporations and the criminal elite also have made the Constitution and its Bill of Rights mostly null and void. Will the next step be them owning design patents on Old Glory?

IMO any proceeds from the Star Spangled Banner should go to the American people or the descendants of Francis Scott Key and the people of England because the tune was originally an English drinking song. 
Censoring the National Anthem for Copyright Violation


Performing rights: These are held by (ASCAP, BMI, SESAC etc.) as registered by the publisher. These organizations reserve the right to act on behalf of the publisher to obtain monies from the performance or broadcast of a sound recording. 

Mechanical rights: These are held by the person or persons who's performance was recorded (i.e. vocalist, intrumentalist, comedian etc.) 

Copyright: These are held by anyone that had anything to do with the creative work that was recorded. (i. e. composer, lyricist, arranger etc.) 

Publishing rights: These are the intellectual property rights to the sound recording that can be bought or sold to parties that may or may not have anything to do with the recording. The owner of these rights have control of where and how the recording is obtained or broadcast. 


Television and radio stations stopped using the Star Spangled Banner when they signed off the air because if they used it they would have to pay royalties so they stopped using it.

Any time the anthem is sung at an NFL game, recorded by NFL engineers and broadcast during NFL TV time, the mechanicals, publishing, and performance rights belong to the NFL for that specific performance even if the song was originally written and recorded by U2 or Green Day. If it is sung at an NBA or MLB game, those respective organizations control the same rights. 

Imagine: The NFL owns the rights to Whitney Houston's version of the Star-Spangled Banner while MLB owns the rights to Rosanne Barr's version!