online airchecks

[markwa1ion@aol.com]

I have a question about airchecks since I'm sitting on 7 CD's of 
aircheck MP3's of many different shows of the last 50 years - largely 
Top 40 DJ, but some talk too.  Playing time total is in the vicinity of 
70 hours.

About half were recorded originally by me and the rest acquired via 
swaps with other collectors (and, in a few cases, downloaded from the 
web).

What are the legalities involved in posting this stuff online ?  I have 
friends with substantial online hosting capacities in addition to the 
not-insignificant amount of available space I have on Comcast and AOL.

Do songs have to be scoped to avoid any grief from RIAA/ASCAP/BMI etc. 
?  Or do even short snippets of songs being present still pose a 
problem ?

What about the station's own claims to copyright and intellectual 
property of content it originally aired, be it talk programs, DJ's, 
news, sports, jingles, advertising, etc.?

I have a 1966 Boston Celtics championship game - complete - called by 
Johnny Most.  Would the Celtics have some sort of claim to that 42 
years later ?

Is there a difference if a station ceases to exist - like '60s era WMEX 
and WCOP - or can the modern operator of those facilities still get 
involved (even if using entirely different calls, format, and - in the 
case of 1510 - broadcast facilities) ?

Beyond normal airchecks, DX enthusiasts post short audio clips online 
demonstrating how they heard a distant difficult station.  These are 
typically far from studio quality.  But let's say UK on 1215 was 
recorded in Massachusetts - maybe with a little splash but with an 
overall good signal - and a whole song, or most of one, is in the clip. 
  I wouldn't think there would be a problem with that.  But I'm no 
expert.  Maybe someone reading this is.

Posting regular high-quality unscoped airchecks, I'm not sure.  
Podcasts, Internet radio stations, etc. could be a similar case.  Are 
these relatively unrestricted ?  I suppose country-of-origin comes into 
play.  A Chinese or Russian webcaster could likely play entire albums 
(or, for that matter, host full-length bootleg US movies) with little 
problem.

I'd love to share the gaggle of airchecks I have with the online world, 
but I really wonder how that would all work out.

Mark Connelly, WA1ION - Billerica, MA