Categories: Legal Disputes, Legal Issues, Music Industry, Record Labels, Royalties, Tags: class action, digital royalties, license, royalties, Warner Music
“The Warner Music Group has submitted a settlement to the class action lawsuit filed by artists who claimed they were entitled to be paid on a licensing bases instead of a royalty bases for download and mastertones.” Read the full article at Billboard.
Categories: Digital Distribution, Music Industry, Music Publishing, Record Labels, Royalties
International music artists are fed up with low streaming royalty payments, and fed up with the labels getting a bigger cut of those royalties than the artists receive. Warner and Universal Music are now facing possible lawsuits from artists unless they agree to increase the artists’ share of those royalties. While The Guardian cites example figures in British pounds, today’s currency conversion rates show that while the artist could make roughly $800 on 1 million Spotify streams, the label would make over $7,000 for those same streams. To further complicate things, some artists’ contracts pre-date the online wave and those artists’ royalty shares fall under the old model when online streams were not contemplated. In addition, music publishers are joining the fight to complain they are not paid as much as labels from the digital streaming services. (Source: The Guardian — “Spotify row: artists threaten to sue labels over music streaming)
Due to the speed of technology, many of the artists’ contracts are outdated in their terms even though the contracts themselves are still governing the relationships between artists and labels. In this digital age, it is important for artist lawyers to attempt renegotiation of these older agreements to ensure artists are sharing fairly in the income from these new technologies and services. The problem is that many labels may not be willing to renegotiate royalty terms. In addition, major label contract terms often lag behind the times even for newly-signed deals, so it is important for the artist representative to stay current on industry trends and know which terms to update in deal negotiations. Major labels have notoriously been somewhat behind the times in relation to many online and technological developments, and my prediction is that they will not be so willing to renegotiate a large number of contracts. Sure, they might change terms for some of their most important (i.e. financially successful) artists, but I doubt they would do a long list of renegotiations without an influx of lawsuits — or at least the threat of them.
Technology definitely has a way of keeping the litigators busy…
© 2013 Erin M. Jacobson, Esq. All Rights Reserved. If you like this article and want to share it, please provide a link to www.themusicindustrylawyer.com or a direct link to the post for others to read it.
Categories: Business, Copyright, Infringement, Law, Legal Issues, Music Industry, Music Publishing, Record Labels, Royalties, Trademark, Tags: advice, band entity, copyright, music business, music licensing, music placement, music publishing, record contracts, record deals, royalties, sync, sync license, synch, synch license, synchronization, synchronization license, trademark
I recently had the privilege of being interviewed for My Music Masterclass about how musicians can protect their music, avoid some common legal pitfalls, and more. The video is available for a temporary stream or permanent download HERE.
My Music Masterclass is a fantastic website where users can view exclusive masterclass sessions with the top touring musicians and industry professionals. (Registration required and there is a small fee for the streams and downloads.)
You can view a preview of the full video below. This video is packed with a lot of information and I hope it helps artists to further understand and take control of their careers.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me so I can help you to protect your music and grow your career.
Stream or download the full video here!
This preview video is also available on YouTube – please like, comment, and share it! (Subscribe to my YouTube channel here.)
The information contained in this video and any linked resource is intended to provide general information and does not constitute legal advice by Erin M. Jacobson, Esq. or My Music Masterclass. The content is not guaranteed to be correct, complete, or up-to-date. This video is not intended to create an attorney-client relationship between you and Erin M. Jacobson, Esq. and you should not act or rely on any information in this video without seeking the advice of an attorney. YOUR USE OF THIS INFORMATION IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. YOU ASSUME FULL RESPONSIBILITY AND RISK OF LOSS RESULTING FROM THE USE OF THIS INFORMATION. ERIN M. JACOBSON, ESQ. AND/OR MY MUSIC MASTERCLASS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RELATING TO THE USE OF THIS INFORMATION.
Categories: Legal Disputes, Music Industry, Record Labels, Royalties, Tags: audit, Gershwin, music lawyer, music publishing, record royalties, royalties, Warner, Warner Music
In breaking news today, George Gershwin’s heirs are suing Warner Music for $15 million. According to the article, the Gershwin estate conducted an audit of Warner in 2007 and found fault with Warner’s licensing and registration practices in regards to the Gershwin catalog. The full article gives an example from the suit complaint as to how various commissions were taken off the top by foreign agents.
These types of issues come up often. A good attorney will know to build certain precautions into the contract language to limit many of these commissions and make sure you have adequate audit rights. Audits are expensive, but they can often be worth it by revealing accounting discrepancies and getting artists the money they are due.
If you are considering signing a contract involving payments and royalties, make sure you have a music or entertainment attorney review it carefully and keep tabs on the companies! Contact me if you need assistance with a matter like this.
Categories: Copyright, Royalties, Tags: copyright, copyright royalty board, copyright royalty board rates, CRB
Categories: Business, Music, Music Industry, Music Publishing, Record Labels, Royalties
The Copyright Royalty Board has chosen to keep the statutory mechanical royalty rate at 9.1 cents.
The mechanical royalty rate is the royalty paid for reproduction/manufacture/distribution of a composition on records and sometimes other media. The origin of the “mechanical” is that it is a royalty paid to mechanically reproduce the composition on a record. It’s not done mechanically anymore, but the principle is the same.
The record labels always want the mechanical royalty rate to be lower, so they can pay less to the publishers. On the other hand, the publishers understandably want the rate to be higher so that they can make more money. Thus, this new decision by the CRB is a victory for publishers.
In addition to keeping the statutory mechanical rate at 9.1 cents, ringtones will remain at 24 cents. The CRB also came out with new revenue sharing rates for publishers regarding some newly-created royalty categories, mostly having to do with the cloud, lockers, and interactive services.
You can read more detail in Billboard.
© 2012 Erin M. Jacobson, Esq. All Rights Reserved. If you like this article and want to share it, please provide a link to www.erinmjacobsonesq.com or a direct link to the post for others to read it.