In this issue…

1. TONS OF GREAT RESPONSES ABOUT USING PHOTOCOPIES IN WORSHIP
2. GREAT INTERNATIONAL AND DOMESTIC CALLING RATES FROM USA
3. SLIDE SHOW ON CONFLICT IN ISLAM
4. LOOKING FOR ALL THOSE EVANGELISTIC FILMS ONLINE?
5. MISSIONARIES: NEED HELP SEARCHING THE INTERNET?
6. USE MEDIA FOR GOOD!
7. USE THE INTERNET FOR GOOD!
8. ON THE LOOKOUT FOR CONSULTATIONS ON SUDAN
9. VOIP FROM ANY COUNTRY
10. THANK GOD FOR SPONSORS
11. LAST DAY TO HELP BRIGADA IN 2005
12. CLOSING STUFF

1. TONS OF GREAT RESPONSES ABOUT USING PHOTOCOPIES IN WORSHIP — Whoa.. had no idea I’d be so flooded with responses regarding the ethics of using photocopying in worship. (Maybe somebody out there is reading Brigada Today after all! :-) ) Thanks to all who responded. By far, most informants told me about “Christian Copyright Licensing International” http://www.ccli.com Ross, an attorney in Arcadia, California, drew my attention to: http://www.ccli.com/Visitors/CopyrightLaws.cfm (Thanks Ross) Basically, as Eddie summarized, a church can simply pay an annual fee depending upon its attendance figures, then have license to copy as described in the respective request (per CCLI’s agreement).

Others referred me to Susan Fontaine Godwin at Church Copyright Administration, which specializes in church copyright compliance: http://www.churchca.com/ Basically, she and her team will administrate these kinds of issues for your church and make it easy for you. I spoke with Susan for some time on the phone. (Thanks Susan.) Here’s what I’m learning: This issue of photocopying music for the worship team is kind of gray. The actual regulation says that the music can be printed for use in singing… so if the music is mostly *words*, I guess it’s okay. However, if the music became actual *scores* (ie., if it were to be broken down as the “sax part”, “bass part”, etc.), it might not be legal to copy it. Lester drew my attention to this quote from the CCLI agreement: “What the License does not cover: Photocopy or duplicate octavos, cantatas, musicals, handbell music, keyboard arrangements, vocal scores, orchestrations or other instrumental works.” Oops.

Anyway, the church I attend — and where I play keyboard quite often — has a CCLI license and the music is mostly for singing, in that it isn’t broken down by part. So — bottom line — CCLI seems to be the way to go. If you copy music (words or otherwise) without a CCLI license, your church is probably, at times, cheating the original creative genius that came up with the lyrics and music. That’s sad.:-(

Do mission organizations need CCLI licenses? Probably. If they do worship sometimes, like ours does. I checked and, sure enough, our guy in charge of promotions and printed stuff was way ahead of me. Come to find out, Team Expansion already has *two* different CCLI licenses, one for music and one for film. (At a boy, Nick.) Again, thanks to all who pitched in so we could figure this out.
2. GREAT INTERNATIONAL AND DOMESTIC CALLING RATES FROM USA — Thanks to Judy for sending $15 recently from her TEL3Advantage long distance service account. She wanted Brigada Today readers to know that they can get great calling rates while helping Brigada — for domestic (starting at 1.9 cents/min to continental US and Canada) and international calls (200 countries for less than 10 cents/min …UK 3 cents, France 3 cents, Russia/Moscow 2.5 cents, Israel 3.2 cents, Colombia/SA 4.2 cents, South Africa 9 cents). Call from any touchtone phone including cell. Prepaid service. No contracts. No monthly, activation, or connection fees. No need to switch carriers. Up to 470 FREE minutes on signup. Lots of convenience features. For more info go to: http://www.tel3advantage.com/?agentnumber=837371 An agent affiliate program with good income potential is also available at no cost to sign up. Based on sign-ups, she says she’ll send additional sponsorships to Brigada Today. So — please, everybody, call someone! :-)
3. SLIDE SHOW ON CONFLICT IN ISLAM — Operation Reveille has produced a 12 minute slide show detailing the nature and implications of conflict between modernist and fundamentalist Muslims by comparing and contrasting the conflict with differences between liberal and evangelical Christians. You may view a low quality QuickTime version of the show at http://www.oprev.org/3rdQtr05/ConflictInIslamWeb.mov Higher quality versions in PowerPoint, AVI, ShockWave, Keynote, MPeg, or QuickTime format may be requested on CD-rom or as e-mail attachments from bside(at)oprev(dot)org [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]
4. LOOKING FOR ALL THOSE EVANGELISTIC FILMS ONLINE? — Grab them at: http://www.createinternational.com/films/ (Thanks Cal!)
5. MISSIONARIES: NEED HELP SEARCHING THE INTERNET? — Do you live in a sensitive- or creative-access country? Can’t search for what you’d like, because someone might monitor it? A site launched in September of this year searches the internet for requests submitted by missionaries, church planters, evangelists and those in related occupations, especially those from developing countries. Requests are currently limited so please request a search only if you fall into the above category. Not all information is available on all topics. However, many good resources exist and it is the aim of this site to match these resources up with those who need them most. See http://www.internetmissionsresearch.com or email a request directly to request(at)internetmissionsresearch(dot)com [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]
6. USE MEDIA FOR GOOD! — Here’s a site: http://www.mediastrategy.org that has general mediastrategy resources on a variety of media types (Thanks to the tip from an anonymous tipster who preferred his name not be mentioned.)
7. USE THE INTERNET FOR GOOD! — And another… http://www.ie-21stcentury.com has materials in internet evangelism, including links to free IE workshops presented at a recent IE conference.
8. ON THE LOOKOUT FOR CONSULTATIONS ON SUDAN — Are there any consultations focused on Sudan? If so, please email Brian with the JESUS Film Project brian(dot)burchell(at)ccci(dot)org if you know of any consultations, or if you’d like to network around a Sudan focus.
9. VOIP FROM ANY COUNTRY — Interested in calling the US, Canada, the UK or Germany from any country around the world for only $0.029 per minute? With the VoIP solutions offered by United World Telecom (UWT) through our Brigada friend, Phone-access.com, you can make calls over the internet to these countries, and any other countries at very discounted rates. After you have signed up and downloaded the small Softphone you can call from your PC to any landline and mobile line in the world. The Softphone works even with dial up connections – and the rates beat even Skype for many countries. If you prefer using a VoIP handset, UWT can set you up if you already have one – or you can purchase one through them. No monthly fees, no sign up fees, no minimum fees. You only pay for the calls you make. From early 2006 you can even call for free to any other UWT customer within their network. For more info and to sign up please go to http://www.phone-access.com/voip/. Any questions please write to johnfryd(at)phone-access(dot)com [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]
10. THANK GOD FOR SPONSORS — Thanks to Good Neighbor Insurance ($100), Dial-Abroad ($91.20 for Oct. and $70.81 for Nov.; love it!), Center for Intercultural Training ($50), Blessed Hope Communications ($13.99), the Interserve and the Rethinking Forum ($25), and an anonymous giver who pitched in $25 with a note of encouragement. As always, we encourage you to make good use of these sponsors and their services. Find them at: Good Neighbor: http://www.gninsurance.com/ Dial-Abroad: http://www.dial-abroad.org/brigada.htm CIT: http://www.cit-online.org/ Blessed Hope: http://www.lowermyphonebill.com/brigada/ Thank you, thank you, thank you!
11. LAST DAY TO HELP BRIGADA IN 2005 — Want to join together to help Brigada cover the cost of a part-time secretary… or just do a good turn to help them with some basic advertising costs? Well if you’d like your gift to count toward their drive in 2005, better hurry. This is the last day. It’s easy. Just pull together your $25 or $250 or $2500 and click on “sponsor” in the top menu (to use PayPal or a credit card), or just send a check payable to Team Expansion to: Team Expansion (Brigada secretary), 13711 Willow Reed Dr., Louisville, KY 40299. As always, be sure to let us know if you’d like us to promote any particular service or ministry, or if you’d prefer your gift be anonymous. If you send a check, you’ll automatically receive a tax-deductible receipt. If you send your gift via PayPal, please specify in the comment blank on the donor form that you’d like a PDF receipt that you can print on your own printer at home. Will we make our goal for 2005? The next 12 hours will tell! :-)