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| posted by Andy Martin on Monday October 29 2007 @ 06:12AM PDT |
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Dear colleagues, its been a while since I wrote anything in the
forum but I thought the subject matter might be a welcome
"heads up" for us with respect to the serious issue of getting
paid!
My stance regarding life of copyright (or the apt pseudonym
LOC) is well known to those that care to read our forum, ergo
the following subjects are subjective cousins. So if I may
address you regarding:
A contentious issue: Music For Free
This is indeed very worrisome & not just to those of us in the
new music business. The old music business was founded on
"music for free" however because the premise was to rob
songwriters of ownership of their own work & to transfer that
ownership for free to the publisher, who then proceeded with
alacrity to license the copyright everywhere else - & here´s the
bummer, eventually to sell it to the highest bidder. Ask Paul
McCartney who owns "Yesterday" for example. Hence, "music
for free" is endemic in the old music business - it was always
there. It is the root & hub of the whole music industry no less.
How do we combat this? First rule, never, I say never (Foghorn
Leghorn style delivery!) sign away your copyright. The word to
remember is "License". Secondly, do not make your music
available for free on the internet. There are many ways you can
earn money from it. For example, Radio 365 is royalty
compliant! If you want to release your music, there are many
ways & many platforms that are mushrooming all over the
internet as (sigh of relief) the new music business grows.
Copyright law, in my opinion, needs to be streamlined &
brought into the year 2007 with an eye to the future. Copying
of music is here to stay, we must accept that as a "given". So, if
we want to maximize our income from our copyrights, we need
to own them! Here is the maxim: "The music business is a
rights business."
From that point onward, we need to actively search for portals
where we can sell it to the public. Like Cdbaby of course & like
Amazon, EBay & other platforms. Believe me when I say the
world is our oyster. The new music business is everything the
old music business should have been, but wasn´t. We should
be on our guard & strive to ensure that old habits don´t
permeate into it. A little mould goes a long way - just see what
happens if a microbe or two attacks the tomatoes in your
refrigerator!
But how do we maximize our earning potential when we must
accept that copying is a fact of life? Well, the answer could be
to levy a "tax" or "surcharge" on the internet providers
themselves & that this source of income could be pooled &
then shared equitably. Of course, we need to also ensure that
the PRO societies themselves are up to the task - (more about
those later.)
Additionally or in tandem, companies such as Bell, British
Telecom & the like who provide carrier technology & administer
it could be taxed. The word tax is itself not popular with
anyone, so let us use the magic word, which is of course,
"License." It is the musician´s only friend. PRO´s like the
PRS/MCPS, PPL, GEMA, SENA, BMI, ASCAP etc are all in the
business of imposing such licenses & collecting revenue from
them. Which brings me to a rather sore point:
Getting Paid!
Oh dear. This is not so easy friends. We have done our
homework, we have joined the required societies. The money
(in theory) is collected. It should then be shared out after our
respective PRO society has banked it & earned some interest on
it but in practice, we are not getting paid anywhere as often or
as much as we have a right to expect.
I give you a current example: Myself & Jean-Michel Danton
have collaborated on a new recording of an iconic song from
the 70´s called "Music", written by John Miles. The original
recording had a duration of 5 minutes. Our cover version has a
duration of 7 minutes. The original publisher was Decca UK. As
I pointed out in earlier letters in this very forum, the publishers
routinely seek to "acquire" & build copyright mountains, to
license that catalog & at some future time, sell it to the highest
bidder. This is unquestionable and is akin to asking: "Is the
Pope a Catholic..?" & "Are there bears in the woods..?" etc.
Currently, Universal are the biggest copyright-mountain
owners. All this shifting around/buying & selling is a nightmare
in the world of copyright administration. Each time a song
changes hands, the new details must be duly advised to & then
logged by the appropriate PRO societies. If this doesn´t happen
then of course, plays cannot be accurately logged or accounted
for. Result = Loss of income! Serious loss of income. It might
be a shock then to the reader when I tell you that SENA in the
Netherlands did not have accurate details on file for who owns
the copyright to "Music". It is in constant play in that territory!
The next question is: "Just how far does this breakdown in the
system permeate?" Who really owns this song?
Of course, it isn´t the writer John Miles. He had the rights
wrestled off him back in the mid 70´s. Decca sold out to
Reprise & then Reprise sold to RAK who then sold part of the
sub-publishing to Universal. Whatever. A can of worms!
As I must notify the PRO´s of our intention to release, as well
as the actual copyright owner - the very person who stands to
lose the most from this potential income is of course the
songwriter himself. Down the line, myself & my colleague also
hope to earn something from our re-recording but it is a
shocking revelation to discover that the very people we put our
trust into to administer our copyrights, are actually not doing
it! Songs are lost in the ether, in some sort of musical limbo.
Music for free again. The writer loses, the artist loses, everyone
loses! No-one passes GO, no-one gets a cigar. Even worse, if
we don´t accurately notify the copyright owners (Mako Shark
Publishing of The Big Swim) we stand the real chance of being
sued for non-notification & non-compliance. But here is the
conundrum: How do we know who the real copyright owners
are & how do we comply in good faith if the labels themselves
aren´t keeping their books in order!? What a way to run a
ballroom!
So my cautionary advice here is that we join as many PRO
societies territory by territory as we possibly can, rather than
appoint just one to represent & collect for us on "our" behalf.
Yes, it does mean a lot of paperwork. Yes, it means a lot of
administration but the bottom line is that if we don´t do this,
we stand very little chance of being accurately accounted to. Its
a can of worms again. So this brings me back to the only
sensible solution, which is a "one time" tax at source, imposed
by law by the Governments of participating copyright treaty
territories. Any other income streams that find their ways to our
depleted coffers is of course icing on the cake.
If we can address the issues of copyright ownership, licensing &
the fair price tagging of music at source, we will largely have
solved some of the biggest issues at the heart of our own
industry. It is very much in our vested interests to do so. To not
do so will result in the cutting of our own throats. We did that
when we signed life of copyright assignments - remember?
As an experiment, I ask you to close your eyes momentarily &
then to tell me what you see. If the answer is nothing - then
we can agree that nothing is indeed for free. Access is not
king, if it were simply a matter of accessibility, then gas
stations would be springing up all over town advertising petrol
for free & we would all be helping ourselves. Or, why not nip
down to our local supermarkets, load our trolleys full of
groceries & then whistle a happy tune as we walk out into the
sunshine with a backward glance & a "thanks very much" to the
bankrupt storeowner?
In this scenario ladies & gentleman, I give you the current state
of the music business, both old & new. So some clever
attorneys need to get on with drafting new license fee
agreements & have those ratified at Gov´t level & then put into
immediate effect.
Then, we might actually get paid. Or, will nothing ever change?
Mozart, lest we forget, was buried in a paupers grave. My guess
is that there´s plenty of room for more. Coffin anyone?
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Via la Francs!
they've got such a law on the table! yeaH!
go see the movie Fred Claus for a realllly good understanging of what is going on .. IMHO
Happy T-Day!
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er.. um.. that should be viva la france!.. typos...
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sorry for typos. am in a rush...
I like this article. thanks for posting it.
would love to know more about what licensing is and how to go about it..
anyone?
LIcesning to me can mean it's playhign ont eh radio adn tv etc.and getting the standard bottom penny rate . which is supoed to bne a starting poinnt but we al know it's been abused to be the high point..so we woul al need to realyl stick to charging for licensing to keep the value of our music up... liek teh abover articles. says.. we have to vcalue our music and our selves as high as we can to retain our rights and NOT to do free.. fre jsut doesn't work.
LIcensing also to me means negotiating for higher fees for use in films and commercials etc....
but how many of us havae ever rally had teh chance to negotiate under such pressure of our dreams comign true. the emiotions and then weatching our own backs as we try and figure out an approepiate fee and stick to our guns. woudl be good to have some stories nadi nsights and how it goes..
also. in regards to France's passing a law to make it ilegal to download for free...adn how accessiblity does not guarantee succes... liek the articles says it's not about accessiilty for me so much as it is distribution ability. if the distribution is taxed to me or a fee charged to me then it feels like that would interefere again.. so would this interfere with our distribution? I cant' seee that it woul unless company was put in between teh isps and the user.. liek AT&T daying they own the lines..
ok too many issues at once I know .. perhaps jsut getting abiut excited here :)
woudl one company own the channels and then raise teh prices .. sort of like a digital jeff mclusky/radio stations?
also here is a list of PROs territory by territory if anyone is interested..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_copyright_collection_societies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_rights_organisation
if I missed any please add them to this forum so we can al benefit..
and finally
You mentioned the music industry is a business of rights...
all the rights there are in the music industry I would love to see a list of ones that exist. Like can the majors help us piece together and get al ist of all the rights htey know about and have perfected collecting on and fighting on over the years? They obviously know how to do it really well, and I feel it could benefit us all to share the wisdom,,,
Here are ones I've heard about .. not sure exactly how to colect for each of them. .. anyone have more info we can add to this list for everyone to be able to benefit from? also how to get in wtihte Harry Fox stuf which is exclusively not indie... currently we have to cut an album out of the country to get theat country to collect for us. or have to have dual citizenship.. most folks don't have either luxury adn so can't collect synch rights and cd rights etc..
copyright onwers - ASCAP, BMI, etc..
performance right
performers right
online authoer annd performer - sound exchange
film
tv
radio
CD/dvd/
post mortem publicity rights
celebrity rigihts
Rights of publicity
rights of distribution
rights to merchandise
name
image
likeness
sound
style
blank medium recoding rights - AARC/ the DART tax
re-distribution rights?
would love to see more listed here as well as how to collect on it.. anyone?
this could be awesome. and right before Christmas! yeah!!!
regards
BArb
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The key to understanding what I said about the music business being a rights business is to extend the quote thus:
"The music business is a rights business - and it is the ownership of those rights that is the fundamental generator of licensed royalty income." - Andy Martin
If you sign/assign life of copyright (LOC) for your work to anyone - that fundamental right is withered away, beginning with the cold fact that you, the writer, have transferred ownership of the song/s to someone else, for free. It is the sole intention of the new owner to license that work from that point onward - and, to eventually sell it (the song) to the highest bidder. The writer does not own the work any longer, but will continue to receive 50% of royalty income ad infinitum but vitally:has lost ownership/(thus control) of the work. Transference of copyright ownership means transference of ownership of the whole song, for your life and 75 years after your death, depending on the copyright laws of the territory you signed the contract in +/- 5 years. Whatever, those that have signed away their own material (their property) will not be around to argue the point. Here is a test question for you to ask your publisher/s:"Please tell me why you must own my copyright, and why I cannot license it to you, because I presume you intend to license it yourself to everyone else as soon as you own it and I cease to!" If you can get a straight answer to that question, instead of a blank snake-like stare, or being shown the door... - however, Quasimodo has more chance of a date with Esmeralda. - Andy
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Go see Fred Claus!!!!!
awesome movie! Thanks VInce, Jessie Nelson and Dan Fogelman and WB for putting it out..Still don' understand the english link but that' ok .. will recognize it in time :)
regards
Barb
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oh one more thing
I think if we all signed teh save teh net neutrality petition here
http://action.freepress.net/campaign/comcastviolates
that we coud protect teh distribution I was so worreid about inmy above post.. and still be able to enjoy licensing and charging for our music.. geting a "royalty" for it.AND charging to buy it.
and just in time for Christmas :) thansk santa :)
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THe bEe movies is great! I loves the part abotu teh smoker used on the bees in teh courtroom . as they pointed it at teh bees annd smoked them out so they woul stumbled around and fall and not be aware as their copyrights are beign stoklen. er I mean their honey..... the smoke screen we alwasy get? LOL!
: you're music isn't good enough or needs some work", "music should be free", "licensing means you get .085 per song and dont' deserve more", " distribution onlien means you have to give up rights to your song", "artists are stupid", or the opposite ego booster of" wow! YOu're an artist! how do you do that!?!? as they steal the copyright from behind your back", "I love you rmusic lets share it aorund teh world for free let me h elp you!" ( as you're starving to death fro food cause you arn't able to sell any music", " sign up njow to distribute your music worldwide with our free service" ( as you sign away all your rights to some other thieving tech startup etc...".
woudl love to get a list going of all the places online where they call artists to, to work wtih artists or charge artists to get their services int eh name of "helpoing the arttist" and the only one making ANY money and the only ones ownign al the content. well are . the .. website owners. as the artists lose thier content righst theminute they distribute the stuff woith these sites.. mysepcae got taken to court by Bill bragg, as did bebo.. and they changed their terms but be wary.. they can alwasy change thhem back eh> t
The golden eggs in this age are content ownership and distribution... be VERY CAREFUL! and if we all stop going along with the "latest crazey new way to dsitrubute" and focus innstead on licvening our music to legitimate compnaies for use in their commercials annd ads or such .. then we stand a better chance. READ THE FINE PRINT TO THE LAST LETTER!
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Andy Martin.. I like you article! :)
Nicely said. would love to hear some of your music. got a link?
thanks
BArb
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Hello Barb,
Please visit www.myspace.com/andymartinsongs to hear our release. Thank you for the comment.
Happy Xmas.
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THough I am confused as to why you don'ty liek the idea of lifelong copyright for the artist? Because it is true that , the deal between the artist and the label is their issue and should not affect whether or not artist i.e actual creators of the song.. have to abide by those rules.
I feel that artists/creators should have life +100 years and then first right of renewal.. I wlud like to pass my copyright certificates on to my heirs and teach them this bueinss of rights and lincensing and making the most of ones gifts and talents on this planet.. and dreviing a luzurious income from it..
the deal between signed artsits adn theri labels is somethign they have to wokr out for themselves... they got into it that way and while I agree that no man is an island and we all need to work with others at somme point to get what we need done. we ought never sign away our rtights on anything! just to be able to get services provided by others.. such as marketing or distribution or graphic design etc..
holdon for dear life as you ( as I"m experincing) wil be tempeted and tested and pushed and forced out of busines ot near bankruptcy if someone wants some thign you have and wants to weaken you system tili you cry uncle annd h and it ove.r that is claerly bully b ehavior and I dont' play. walk away. You can et that kin dof business on any street corner..
walk away.. there is MUCH better out there. have a littl efaiht let go fo that desire for what sommeone promises if it means you lose your ights in any way.. including freedom of expression and movement and friends and money etc.. and income oand ownership and creative say and publishing etc.. learn abou all the rights out there.. there are a lot, and be sooo careful who you hire.. and what you tell them as you worok wtih them. IO have had more than one of my life stories stoilenin workgin with a comnpany,making friends with the co-director and talkign abou my journey a littl ebit adn then seeing it appear in an affiliate compnay of his out of state in a moivie script with some famous named actress getting paid millions.
treasure your journey and write it out and make money from it
it's a gift fromm above use it! and dont' give it awy fro anything! I leanred the hard way..
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It´s simply not in any songwriter´s interest to sign life of copyright. Licensing allows repeat business - life of copyright is only in the vested interest of "publishers". I have written at length about this in the CDBaby forum. Artists must strive to own their own work. Ownership=control:of everything. Licensing is the key - the only one. Good luck and happy Xmas.
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I have decided to stop writing music.
What's the point!
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Don´t deprive the world of your music or talent:Instead, stop signing life of copyright "deals" and insist on owning your own work and then licensing its use! There is no reason on this earth or any other, that says you cannot own your own work. Everyone else in the business licenses useage - and makes a very healthy living, so why shouldn´t you, or any other writer? By guile, the publishers and sleight of hand lawyers have heisted ownership of material from writers since the days of music hall - that is how they became wealthy and why the writers often died in abject poverty.
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Hi Andy, your right about licensing one's music, very true. I guess I am sad about how the internet lets people get free music all the time, which is not right at all, it makes music worthless and cheap. People pay to have there car fixed but then they expect to have free tunes, ya. I just think of all the time and money I spent making music and the emotional crap of trying to write lyrics.
Then I look at all the 65 companies selling my first cd on CD Baby and only 1% are reporting sales of anything, I don't know, I give up.
Thats really my own feelings about everything.
I am not trying to discourage any young musician out there, all the power to ya, CD Baby is a great company, don't get me wrong, I am just jaded, I guess, over the hill.
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The wheels in the music business turn very slowly in most cases. A domino effect of this is the time it takes for royalties to accumulate & be paid over to the writers & performers. The new music business is to some degree about the *decentralization/demonopolisation* of the former frameworks. See in the first part of those words the unintentional but clear formation of the words *decent & demon*.
Vitally, the creation of the music business has always rested with the host songwriters & performers - the rest are by nature parasites. Ideally this would be a beneficial relationship but this falls apart when the parasites kill the hosts by sucking on them & bleeding them to death.
The songwriters made the basic mistake of transferring ownership (for free) of their work to publishers & record labels for life & this disenfranchisement allowed for huge gains out of all proportion to the amount of work done on behalf of the creator/s. Those should have been the first to benefit the most of course & the fact that they were not, is the crime. Copyright transference (ownership)was demanded as part of the "deal" - which is tantamount to blackmail or an imposed condition. Is that fair business practice? I say it is not, I say it is monopolistic, restrictive & injurious to the songwriter. And absolutely so.
This has created over time an inverse pyramid of wealth in which the songwriters & performers for the most part are at ground zero of the pyramid - & will remain there. The old music business is able to carry on because it owns vast pyramids of song copyrights which it controls, re-sells & re-releases on new formats, generating successive renewed income. It is important to realize that any dividends are not shared with the writers - only the copyright owners can benefit from them. Of course, 50% of publishing royalties is available but that is not what is at issue here. The core issue is who owns the rights - & in the vast majority of cases, it is not the songwriter. Therefore he cannot market it, re-sell it or license its use. He does not own it anymore - someone else does. And that "someone else" is busy licensing & re-selling in the hope of making that copyright valuable & desirable, so that it can then have a re-sale value to the highest bidder at some future time. For this value to build, it can take years - hence, the vital importance of time - & why labels require life of copyright plus another virtual lifetime after the death of the songwriter.
The key to this is of course licensing. A copyright is a patent of sorts, & repeat use means repeat income, although patents are often copied, as everyone knows. The law is very comprehensive & punitive in such cases - obviously, those who own copyrights/patents don´t want their income to be eroded by theft or copying.
The same applies in the new music business/internet in which, sadly, there is a serious lack of control & in which "music for free" seems to have run amok. It is of no benefit to anyone except the freeloaders, who are another variation of parasite upon us. I do believe over time that new legislation in the form of adaptive licensing will be put into effect but this is still some way off & in the hands of those who stand to benefit most, the RIAA etc & the other collective industry bodies who have representation at Governmental level.
The new music business runs at base level on a very different premise: that songwriters retain ownership of their work, thus control over the rights & any income. It is protective of the songwriter, not injurious as is the former. If songwriters keep that fundamental objective in sight at all times & hold it to be sacrosanct, then the former music business will not be able to get a foothold by stealth in the new & there will always be two music businesses - & they will be absolutely opposed to each other. The former antagonistically against the new.
The former is all about market share & monopolistic practices. The new music business is a huge growth area & is eyed by the former music business as an asset it "must have". Market-share has shifted in very real terms away from the powerbase of the former music business & has resulted in a sharp decline in the monopoly held by the former. Why? Because people are going elsewhere - because they can. I often pondered the question: "Why do children run everywhere?" - the simple answer came to me: Because they can.
There is much grinding of teeth in the former music industry as it eyes & lusts after the new music business in which it has no control. It cannot control what it does not own.
The only way in for the former music business is to swindle/gatecrash its way in & its credo is this: The music business is a rights business & it is the first ownership of those rights (the copyright) that are the key to controlling it. It should also be the credo of the new music business as RULE NUMBER ONE, carved into its own keystone. And it is for this self same reason, that they will remain fundamentally opposed because the very basis of them are not compatible. One is selfishly self serving, the other not. One believes in outright ownership, the other in shared wealth. One is a sucking parasite, the other sucked upon.
It is absolutely vital that songwriters retain ownership of their material. Everyone makes money out of licensing & franchising - the music business is no exception. The songwriter is at the top of the pyramid, or should be - never the other way around. When it is not, it is the result of a massive swindle somewhere along the line. Rule one: never sign or "assign" copyright, always license it.
No-one in their right mind wants to see the former music business encroaching or warping into the new one by some sort of copyright osmosis. The best way to keep it out & at arms length is to retain ownership of it ourselves. There is only one way. That means, copyright is shut into a room under lock & key, like a Fort Knox or "Fortress New Music Business".
This will be an ongoing fight & now is the time to realize it! It will be too late after the fact, when the swindlers move in & rob us all again, for life, & 75 years after our deaths.
That is our only fate if we should weaken on the point of copyright ownership - be it on our own heads. Let it be known that the former music business is seeking to extend the lifetime of copyright ownership well beyond former limits! You have been warned. It knows it cannot survive once copyright falls into public domain & out of its hands. Lack of copyright ownership is the death knell to certain individuals in the former music business with highly vested self-interests. Perversely, the first of those is the songwriter.
And yet, agonisingly, the former music business can still survive & prosper by fair licensing. The only reason it hates that idea & requires 100% of ownership of copyright is so that it can be bought, sold, bought & re-sold again at a premium! That´s a nice little circle to be in. The swindle occurred when songwriters allowed themselves to be cut out of it & historically, that is the concept of the former music business.
If that is in any doubt, please look at any publishing or recording agreement & take note of the many sentences that require assignment of copyright to the label! That is sleight of hand & no doubt could be construed as being illegal.
A good lawyer could argue that the imposition of life of copyright is tantamount to unfair, monopolistic & restrictive trading, likely to cause hardship & further, highly restricts the income of the creator & heirs. In this case, if such precedent is ever brought to court & successfully overturned, all publishers & record labels will be liable to be sued & ordered to pay punitive amounts of compensation to songwriters who have been swindled out of owning their own work.
I think such a case is long, long overdue. If that is in any doubt, it would be interesting to have the opinion of the writers who wrote "Rock Around The Clock", the copyright of which was sold & then bought for $250 US Dollars. Had the writers licensed it, they would have been rich beyond their wildest dreams & their heirs would now be controlling it. As it happens, they are not.
With regard to licensing, the record labels & publishers would all still make money, & lots of it. As they always have. But, more wants more, & the Holy Grail of the former music labels, publishers & so forth, is the ultimate ownership of copyright, for free if & whenever possible, or by outright purchase when not.
When these fundamentals become understood - the veils surrounding the former music business fall away. Once lifted, the naked truth is revealed in all its stark, red-faced & open mouthed embarrassment. It is revealed for what it is: a shameful, guilty & monstrous lie. - Andy Martin.
See:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recording_Industry_Association_of_America
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Downloads? Call me old fashioned - llng live the CD! - here´s why:
The music business was never an easy pitch, least of all for the songwriters or the artistes themselves. Looking back on the former record industry & having made records myself, in a manner of speaking I have one foot in the old business & another in the new. From these different viewpoints, spanning both, I've given some thought to the "end product". I have to because at day's end, I have a vested interest - music is my profession & my way of life.
In the former music business, the end product was a tangible item of merchandise, the most common forms being a cassette tape, a 45 single or LP, & thanks to Dolby, we could really enjoy the depth of those warm sounding analogue recordings - even hissy old tape became bearable. Later on, a far superior item called a CD came along & presented music at its best audio fidelity ever! But with all its faults, the real love for many loyal music buyers was a 45 single & its larger brother, the 12" vinyl album. It might be important to ask ourselves why this was so.
I recall that buying a 45 single was always a pleasureable moment. Yes, it was really something to have a new single! There was an adrenalin, an aura of excitement about it, in the fact that you might even be helping your favorite artiste to get into the charts. (Even if that was a naeive illusion!) Be that as it may, buying an album was a bigger commitment because of the cost, & you could never be certain that all the songs on an album would be worth having. Often, there were filler tracks that failed to live up to expectation - on the other hand a 45 single had to be good, or there was no point in releasing it. But in either case, holding that physical product in your hand felt like you owned part of the band or artiste. It was a personal artifact, something tangible & in a way, a token of thanks for the loyalty shown. After all, a music consumer wants his/her favourite artiste to carry on making music & releasing product. Without product - what is there to support?
Its also important to mention a very special place, the musical shrine in everyone's home where in some cherished corner stood our stereo system - & that meant the best amplifier & speakers possible - & naturally, the best record deck money could buy. How can we forget famous names like Garrard, Philips, Decca, Pioneer or Grundig etc? Another vital piece of equipment was a good set of stereo headphones.
Some even aspired to the Holy Grail of stereo & fixed their sights on a reel to reel tape deck, the most fortunate of those owning a Revox B77! For some reason, a rubber plant was de-rigueur! I've often wondered if Revox or Akai gave them away as an accessory!
Getting home as fast as we could with our new 45 single or album, we would carefully place the single or album on the turntable, wipe it with an anti-static cloth, settle into our favourite chair with headphones on or not, & concentrate on enjoying every nuance of the recording. In the case of an album, our pleasure was doubled by the fact that the record company might have been generous enough to include the lyrics on the sleeve or as a booklet. As we listened to the disc, our eyes would rove over the sleeve, scrutinising & reading everything, even down to the fine print. These were the rituals & they didn't change much when the format moved to CD.
Gone were the turntables, but the stereo system was far from redundant, & hi-fi speakers just got better & better. We didn't have to worry about scratchy records anymore or the problem of very fragile vinyl that warped, cracked, attracted static or of course, those pesky ubiquitous scratches!
Yes indeed, owning a recording, be it on tape, vinyl or CD was a very ritualistic pastime, & we developed an undeniable emotional attachment to our record & CD collections. Therein lies a very subtle but vital moot point.
GHOSTS IN THE MACHINE:
In the new music business, we now have a faceless, impersonal, invisible thing called a download. Gone are the rituals. Is it any wonder music is shared for free on the internet? No-one cares or feels emotional about a thing you can't see, touch or hold in your own hands. A download is perceived - & its easy to understand why - as something that has no intrinsic value. And you can't get attached to something you can't even see or hold, or that you came to own by virtue of a mouse click.
While I would be the first to applaud the ease with which songwriters & artistes can now bring their product to the whole world, without all the middle-men, record company or rights stealing publishers - something vital has been lost. Its called the end product.
We all know times move on & change must happen. But, in our race to be up to date & at the leading edge of technology, we have made something cold & clinical. Instead of clothing music in a robe, presenting it on a pedestal & treating it with the respect it deserves, we have made it naked, put it in a fridge & dished it up blindfolded as some sort of will o' the wisp - a cold & faceless digital product that has no apparant value, no personality or charm - just an empty shell. A ghost.
It seems to me that this is the biggest problem the new music business faces - & both music businesses have this duality. Thinking about it - its probably the only thing they do have in common. There is no manufacturing base any more & this is bound to hurt the High Street record shop or CD retailer. In fact, its not good for anyone in the music business.
I don't like downloads - called me old fashioned, but I like to hold a CD in my hands. At gigs, its great to be able to have some actual merchandise to sell to the people that enjoy my art, & to sign it for them - its a very personal thing. That is I guess the essence of it - that music is very much a personal experience & when you digitise it, it loses all its soul & personality.
Perhaps if the former music business could take some lessons from the new, & that means acknowledging that songwriters & artistes have rights - & a claim, dare it be said, to earn a decent living.
Then idealistically, perhaps there could be a resurgence of the ailing industry into something that it never was before, in a word, fair. To its credit, the new music business addresses that aspect very well & very honestly, which is something to celebrate on a daily basis. But no-one can stay in a party mood forever. Reality comes knocking sooner or later.
In the end, both businesses, at core business level, need to come to terms with a hard fact: customers of any business want to own something tangible.
When that isssue is re-addressed & resolved, the music industry will re-invent itself & rise again from its vinyl ashes, like the proverbial pheonix.
Its worth noting that CDbaby takes its name from an actual product. It is not called DownloadBaby & although a market for that might well exist, it can only be as an adjunct to real product.
The music industry as a whole cannot survive on ghosts, & that includes CDBaby - take away the CD´s, & all that´s left is an empty warehouse.
Long live the CD.
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Wow..great article. Keep that and publish that in a magazine. I
agree that I prefer the music in hand ie cd; however, I don't
know how long that'll last. It may last a while, it may not.
As far as licensing, that's a HUGE monster. MY publishing is
handling my music (which I own) and I totally understand. I'm
wondering about the laws in other countries, I talked to Ms.
Toscannini (yes she's related to the Master) and she told me
ASCAP is in partnership with several countries.
Let's see what happens!
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Thank you, I agree that no-one can predict what will happen, with one possible exception perhaps. Which is that the corporate music industry will no doubt close ranks and lobby for another new format - which would empower it to return to the practise of the re-issuance of more back catalog, with the dual objectives of renewed income as in former times and, a market stimulus. (This is where the outright ownership of life of copyright shows its true worth!)
It would make sense, but its hard to imagine what new technology could possibly challenge the ubiquitous digital download. Perhaps the answer is somehow going to be tied to an audio-visual format, such as holographic technology. That would certainly be innovative, and would usher in a whole new plethora of platforms, professional and domestic. It may sound far-fetched now, but at the rate of ongoing technological advancement, the seemingly implausible becomes truly possible.
http://holotainment.com/
http://storage.itworld.com/4795/051118holo1/
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Compact Disk Market Shrinks As Listeners Want The Soulful Sound Of Vinyl Recordings
Vinyl records and turntables, once relegated to garage storage boxes are enjoying a strong resurgence according to online yinyl record seller, GEMM. "Sales of vinyl records have increased 20% since 2005," said Roger Raffee, co-founder and company CEO. GEMM (Global E-commerce Mega Marketplace) began selling vinyl records online in 1994.
Some suggest renewed interest in album sales is driven by the dance club DJ craze. Audiophiles claim that vinyl records produce a warmer, richer sound.
Whatever the case, CD sales dropped 10% in 2006 and 20% in 2007 while sales of vinyl records have increased nearly 10% a year since the late nineties. Not just classic recordings, either.
Elvis Costello recently announced that his new recording, Mokofuku set for release on April 22nd will only be available on vinyl and through digital download.
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Digital Sales Will Account For 40% Of Music Purchases By 2012
Digital sales of music represented 10% of the total worldwide music market in 2007, up from 6% in 2006, reports In-Stat. By 2012, digital music sales will represent an impressive 40% of all music purchased worldwide, the high-tech market research firm says.
Factors contributing to this growth include the global expansion of broadband, continued demand for single-track downloads, and expanding music catalogues. Another key driver is the potential for market growth in full-track downloads to mobile handsets in markets other than Japan, which currently is the primary market for this type of digital music format.
"Digital piracy continues to represent the primary challenge to online music service providers," says Stephanie Ethier, In-Stat analyst. "Other obstacles still include the lack of interoperability between services and devices due to differing digital rights management (DRM) technologies, and weak consumer demand for subscription-based services. Another potential market inhibitor is the fact that content owners, cellular service providers and handset manufacturers are increasing the amount of marketing and promotion for mobile music."
Recent research by In-Stat found the following:
* Sales for online digital music reached $3.05 billion in 2007, up 48% from 2006.
* Revenue for worldwide full track mobile downloads will reach approximately $4.2 billion by 2012.
* The majority of respondents who accessed online video (72.3%) in 2007 did not pay for the video they saw from the Internet.
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One of the first artists to sign up to LicenseQuote music licensing solutions, is producer-songwriter Andy Martin, who is supporting & fully endorsing the very newest platform in the independent music publishing sector of the web.
"This bright star on the event horizon of the new music business is quite possibly the single most important evolutionary development since the new music business took flight", says Andy Martin.
"It has long been a played-down fact that life of copyright & 100% ownership of songs by old style `music hall´ publishers has created a monopolistic & inverted pyramid in the former music business". ("Behind every great fortune, there is a crime". - Balzac)
"The very backbone of the opposing music industries is copyright & licensing, with the connecting discs being the copyrights themselves. Whoever controls the copyright, that is to say, whoever owns it, is always able to license its use".
"The songwriter & creator of the work has traditionally been denied this advantageous right. All artists should endeavour to retain first ownership of their own material & to license its use thereafter. The only necessary follow on from this recent & welcome development is that the end users of hitherto LOC´d (life of copyright) material, learn about it & take the fullest advantage of it.
Since the advent of the new music business, the monopolistic cartel on music sales has been broken, with the independent music business accounting for 60% of all sales. Other than market share, the other prize that will soon be wrested away from the maws of the former collapsing music business is music licensing, which in itself is a byproduct of life of copyright".
"The vital & only difference is that songwriters are now able to do this for themselves without being forced or co-erced into signing away ownership of their material, (for no equity) which was then promptly licensed by the new owner, the publisher/label. The fate of any copyright (song) is that it will be:
a) "assigned" (given for free, whenever contractual duplicity allows) to a publisher
b): licensed out by that publisher to end users
c): when sufficient credits have built up on that same copyright, it will be sold in its entirety by the publisher, to the highest bidder. The songwriter sees no dividend whatsoever from the sale & is cut out of the equity chain from the outset (notwithstanding the degrading 50/50 royalty split).
Publisher: "Thanks for giving me your song for free, I will now license it because you´ve just signed over ownership of the copyright & it now belongs to me: Its my song, not yours anymore. I agree to give you 50% of any royalties. But I own it now, 100% - you don´t - & buddy, I will sell it to the highest bidder at some future time & any profit from that is none of your business - OK?".
"Life of licensing is the only viable alternative to life of copyright. I predict that LicenseQuote, set up by Michael Borges (CEO) will be a huge catalyst in the new music business, which is fundamentally `artist & rights friendly´ by default & by demand. The new music business exists because it was created out of demand, by the artists & the general public themselves, who were tired of being led by the nose by the former cartels".
LicenseQuote - Music Licensing Solutions:
LicenseQuote.com provides an easy to manage online solution that helps independent artists, labels, producers & music publishers license their own songs, recordings & related assets directly from their own websites.
The basic LicenseQuote music licensing service (widget) is free to all music artists, labels & publishers who have authority to license their various copyrighted music materials. LicenseQuote does not charge any sales commission percentage fee to the sellers & is also completely free to all music licensing buyers.
The Free LicenseQuote widget features include: 17 standard licensing types, standard (published) pricing profile, description & usage details shown for each selected license type, instant price calculations, "captcha" protected email sending, print out feature & option for custom bid price negotiation inquiry.
LicenseQuote gives independent artists & music publishers unlimited opportunities to license their copyrighted materials to the music, advertising & broadcast media industries for commercial usage including: TV, cable, radio, advertising, film, video, theater, corporate, websites, music on hold, plus many more innovative & custom-requested applications.
The LicenseQuote service gives media industry buyers direct access to artists, labels & publishers who are offering LQ enabled music licensing sales via the internet directly from their own websites, blogs, emails or other pages.
The mission of LicenseQuote is to pioneer the world’s most powerful & cost effective self-managed music licensing solution for professional publishers (licensors) to enhance their opportunities for doing business directly with their existing or new customers including various media industry buyers.
The LQ business philosophy is focused on creating unlimited direct licensing access points where publishers, artists, labels & buyers can do business as never before. A variety of LQ music licensing service plans (upgrades) will provide a powerful array of self-managed sales & licensing tools to sellers along with free & advanced self-service tools for buyers enabling both to trade efficiently & profitably over the internet on a truly "direct access" global market scale.
http://www.musiclicensequote.com
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This article is of vital & vested interest to all songwriters & underlines the subject I have been writing about for so long in the CDbaby & other forums. The new music industry is the leader in coypright reform & must continue to emphasise the importance of non-transference of copyright & the term of copyright away from the music creator etc. My thanks to Eric de Fontenay. - Andy Martin
ASCAP Launches Bill Of Rights For Songwriters / Composers
To remind the public, members of the music industry and U.S. legislators of the central role and rights of those who conceive and create music, ASCAP (the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) today officially launched a 'Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers.'
This awareness-building initiative centers around 10 core principles, including "We have the right to be compensated for the use of our creative works, and share in the revenues that they generate" and "We have the right to license our works and control the ways in which they are used." (See full text of the Bill below and at www.ascap.com/rights/billText.aspx)
These rights, all of which are already inherent in the act of music creation and protected by U.S. copyright law, are increasingly under threat as competing interests argue over the future of the business of music - and as growing numbers of individuals bypass payment altogether to illegally share music online.
"Given the many issues surrounding the music industry today, it can be all too easy to overlook the source of it all - individual songwriters, lyricists and composers," said ASCAP President and Chairman and Academy Award-winning lyricist, Marilyn Bergman. "That is why ASCAP has launched this Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers. Our goal is to remind lawmakers, the general public and music creators themselves of the rights that are inherent in their art. We simply cannot allow the original source of all music to be lost in the shuffle."
Developed by ASCAP to support and empower all those who create music, the 'Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers' debuted during ASCAP "I Create Music" Week at the 25th Annual Pop Music Awards held on April 9 and was also introduced to attendees of the third annual ASCAP "I Create Music" EXPO (April 10-12). In just a few days, more than 500 signatures were collected including: Lionel Richie, Stacy "Fergie" Ferguson, Justin Timberlake, Desmond Child, Jackson Browne, Steve Miller, Marilyn Bergman, Alan Bergman, Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller, Chamillionaire, Keri Hilson, Johnta Austin and John Rzeznik.
These 500-plus signatures served as the kick-off to a grassroots campaign that, over the next few months, will collect signatures and support from both established and aspiring songwriters, lyricists and composers from all genres of musical compositions. Those who wish to add their support to the Bill can sign it electronically at:
www.ascap.com/rights
As part of this initiative, ASCAP also wrote a perspective piece on the relevance and importance of music copyright protection, titled "Music Copyright in the Digital Age: A Position Paper" which may be viewed and downloaded from www.ascap.com/rights/billText.aspx
"The signatures that we collect on this Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers will be shared with key legislators in Washington, as well as numerous other leaders both inside and outside the music industry," said ASCAP CEO John A. LoFrumento. "Now is the time to ensure that everyone who has a stake in determining the future of music, both as an art and as an industry, recognizes the importance of protecting creators' rights."
Please read the full articles here at:
http://www.mi2n.com/press.php3?press_nb=109009
http://www.mi2n.com/press.php3?press_nb=109044
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A Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers - Thank you for participating.þ
From: rights@ascap.com
Sent: Tuesday, April 22, 2008 9:44:38 AM
To: andymartinvm@hotmail.com
Thank you for participating in the Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers.
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I would like to have comment from my fellow writers & artists concerning this issue, which is of fundamental importance to us all. Thank you.
ANDY MARTIN OPPOSES MUSIC PUBLISHERS;Andy Martin Exposes The Injustice Of StandardSongwriting Contracts & Requests That The MusicIndustry Responds Equitably
http://www.mi2n.com/press.php3?press_nb=109187
Andy Martin has long been an advocate of music licensing & a firm & resolute opponent to the long standing former music industry practise of assignment of song copyright to publishers for life of copyright (LOC).
In Andy´s experience, the double-edged sword of life of copyright & assignment of copyright for free (gifting ownership of the song) to publishers is the worst case scenario. Publishers would of course disagree & for obvious reasons that are steeped in vested interest & nothing more.
Songwriters, says Andy, have been disenfranchised over a barrel historically speaking, since the days of Music Hall & Tin Pan Alley, when old style music publishers instructed music lawyers to construct contracts that from the outset, disenfranchised the songwriter, leaving the publisher with: full controlling rights, 100% ownership of the song & the right to sell or assign the copyright to the highest bidder, with no dividend payable to the songwriter whatsoever.
To add insult to injury, as soon as the publisher had “acquired” the copyright (song) he then proceeded to license its use wherever & whenever possible. This ruinous practise (for the songwriter) has remained endemic in the former music business & has enabled publishers to build massive song copyright mountains, which are bought & sold over & over again to the highest bidders.
However, the new music business is fundamentally different in that it recognises that songwriters also have the right to own their own work & vitally, that they too can have the freedom to license its use. The most recent positive change in attitudes has been signalled by ASCAP who only last week went public with its proposed Bill Of Rights for Songwriters.
See: http://www.ascap.com/rights/
So far, this bill of rights has not encompassed or addressed the all important issue of removing from publishing contracts the basic mandatory “requirement” that songwriters must transfer ownership of copyright.
Andy asserts that there is absolutely no legal grounds for any songwriter to transfer ownership of the song whatsoever & that songwriters could just as easily license their songs to publishers, who could still work from a baseline of 50/50 of the profits.
In other words, nothing would change except that songwriters would retain first ownership of their songs (copyrights) in perpetuity for life of copyright. And, that the songwriter could decide when & if to sell their material at some future time to the highest bidder, or not.
Andy says: “Surely this is not the sole prerogative of the publisher & why should the songwriter be cut out of the loop? Especially when songs & the associated rights are the basic currency of the whole industry, bar none. If it were not for songwriters, there would be nothing to record & hence, no music industry whatsoever. Surely its time that songwriters were given their due, as without them, nothing else would exist, no-one would pass go & there would be no cigar. Standard song publishing contracts are onerous & injurous to the songwriter in total & whole & in fact, were designed to be so by dint of legal sleight of hand.”
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Here is the basic fundamental wrong:
AGREEMENT made this day of 20 , between (hereinafter called "Publisher"), and
jointly and/or severally, hereinafter called "Writer(s)");
WITNESSETH:
1. The Writer(s) hereby sells, assigns, transfers and delivers to the Publisher, its successors and assigns, a certain heretofore unpublished original musical composition, written and/or composed by the above named Writer(s) now entitled: "MY SONG IS NOW YOURS TO SELL TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER" including the title, words and music thereof, and the right to secure copyright therein throughout the entire world, and to have and to hold the said copyright and all rights of whatsoever nature thereunder existing, subject to the terms of this agreement.
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This article about the father of all modern day songwriters, Stephen Foster, is compulsory reading - he died (January 13th 1864) in poverty with 38 cents in his pocket, having written some of the classic songs of his time. He was 37 when he died, and had a cent in his pocket for each year of his life, plus a cent commission.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Foster
Stephen Foster wrote classics such as "Beautiful Dreamer", "Oh Susanna", "My Old Kentucky Home", "Swanee River", "Camptown Races" & "Jeannie With The Light Brown Hair"
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| NOTE: If you need a reply you should email CD Baby directly instead of posting here. We don't often read old message board postings, and have no way of replying to them!
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