New York Consolidated Laws, Penal Law - PEN § 275.00 Definitions

1. “Person” means any individual, firm, partnership, corporation or association.

2. “Owner” means (a) the person who owns, or has the exclusive license in the United States to reproduce or the exclusive license in the United States to distribute to the public copies of the sounds fixed in a master phonograph record, master disc, master tape, master film or any other device used for reproducing sounds on phonograph records, discs, tapes, films, videocassettes, or any other articles upon which sound is recorded, and from which the transferred recorded sounds are directly derived;  or (b) the person who owns the rights to record or authorize the recording of a live performance.

3. “Fixed” means embodied in a recording by or under the authority of the author, so that the matter embodied is sufficiently permanent or stable to permit it to be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated for a period of more than transitory duration.

4. “Performer” means the person or persons appearing in a performance.

5. “Performance” means, whether live before an audience or transmitted by wire or through the air by radio or television, a recitation, rendering, or playing of a series of images, musical, spoken, or other sounds, or a combination of images and sounds, in an audible sequence.

6. “Recording” means an original phonograph record, disc, tape, audio or video cassette, wire, film, hard drive, flash drive, memory card or other data storage device or any other medium on which such sounds, images, or both sounds and images are or can be recorded or otherwise stored, or a copy or reproduction that duplicates in whole or in part the original.