Copyrights & Legal

All about copyright, understanding music licensing, and government regulations.

Samsung in trouble for making Milk Music a free service

Posted on by Anna Washenko

Samsung has drawn the ire of the Korea Music Copyright Association with its Milk Music. The group of record labels signed a contract with Samsung stating that the tech major would begin charging for the streaming service starting Oct. 10. Samsung is still offering Milk for free to the owners of certain smartphones, but it is paying the streaming charges to Soribada, a subcontractor and local music distributor. The association ended its contract with Soribada today as a result, claiming that continuing to operate Milk Music without its approval would be a copyright infringement. Continue Reading →

Rumor Fact(ory): Sony split from ASCAP/BMI could come by year’s end

Posted on by Anna Washenko

As the Department of Justice weighs what to do about digital performance rights, Sony/ATV/EMI has been making bold claims that it would consider leaving the collective licensing system in order to negotiate its own rates. According to The New York Post, that could be happening soon. The paper reported that Sony could split from ASCAP and BMI by the end of the year. Continue Reading →

College radio webcasting gets quick settlement for 2016-2020 royalty period

Posted on by Brad Hill

College radio stations, represented by College Broadcasters, Inc. (CBI), will see their webcast royalty rates for the use of music recordings unchanged in the looming 2016-2020 royalty period. Most stations will use a simplified “proxy” reporting method to SoundExchange, an easier administrative process than the fastidious reporting that commercial stations must supply. Continue Reading →

Webcast parties file arguments with Copyright Royalty Board; we look at NAB and SoundExchange

Posted on by Brad Hill

Webcast companies have filed written arguments with the Copyright Royalty Board, as the streaming industry moves inexorably toward a new licensing period for the use of music recordings starting in 2016. The filing deadline was last night at midnight.

The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and SoundExchange have both filed their documents. The two petitions use some of the same language, but to opposite purposes. We examine both arguments. Continue Reading →

The Turtles now targeting Pandora with class-action copyright infringement suit

Posted on by Anna Washenko

The Turtles have filed a class-action suit against Pandora, claiming $25 million in damages for copyright infringement. The New York Times reported that pre-1972 songs only account for about 5% of the music played on Pandora. A representative from the online radio company said that the platform was confident in its actions, noting that Pandora pays separate songwriting royalties on all its music, including those tunes from before the pivotal dates. Continue Reading →

Sirius XM plans appeal of pre-1972 copyright case ruling

Posted on by Anna Washenko

Following the recent copyright ruling in favor of The Turtles, Sirius XM said it will appeal the decision. “We think Judge Gutierrez is wrong,” Sirius CFO David Frear said at a conference this week. “We’ve been observing the law since we started service.” Frear said that the pre-1972 ruling has much broader implications than for just the satellite radio company. Continue Reading →

Verstandig Broadcasting perseveres in royalty-exemption case

Posted on by Brad Hill

Inside Radio tells us that Verstandig Broadcasting is pushing back against the recent magistrate recommendation that the case be thrown out. Verstandig is suing SoundExchange, seeking an exemption from paying royalties for recordings used in the online streams of Verstandig stations. the case hinges on an argued loophole in the Copyright Act, which potentially allows a royalty exemption for retransmitted music in a 150-mile radius, representing a typical terrestrial signal reach. It’s all a bit obscure, but significant. Continue Reading →

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Rosanne Cash: Streaming is “dressed-up piracy”

Posted on by Brad Hill

The latest outburst in the high-profile Spotify debate does more than just criticize streaming, it condemns it. Rosanne Cash, who testified in a congressional music-licensing hearing this summer, stirred up mixed reactions with two recent Facebook posts in which she equated streaming with music piracy, and also continued her impassioned campaign to alter U.S. copyright regulations. Continue Reading →

Grooveshark shares upbeat, defiant response to copyright ruling

Posted on by Anna Washenko

Grooveshark received some damning news from a New York district court judge yesterday, but it is still trying to swim on. Today the streaming and uploading service shared a blog post with a response to the ruling. “This latest news dealt specifically with an early version of Grooveshark which we dispensed of in 2008 in favor of our current music streaming service,” the company said. Continue Reading →

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The SoundCloud Conundrum: The intersection of copyright holders and revenue sharing on user-generated content platforms.

Posted on by Michael Spinelli

by Mike Spinelli

SoundCloud’s kettle boiled over this summer when major labels (“the majors”) started to enforce their intellectual property rights upsetting the service’s large community of Producers and DJs. After seven years of maintaining the same service, SoundCloud took drastic steps to change its design, and more importantly, its functionality. Many of the functionality changes likely occurred from the growing concern over potentially copyright-infringing works that inhabit the platform. Although SoundCloud has remedied the situation temporarily to satisfy the smaller artists, it could run into further problems down the road. Continue Reading →

Judge finds Grooveshark liable for copyright infringements

Posted on by Anna Washenko

It seems yesterday’s news was just the tip of the iceberg in Grooveshark’s copyright woes. Today, a district court judge ruled that Grooveshark is liable for copyright infringement because its employees uploaded tracks without the labels’ permission. The judge determined that these uploads were not protected by the DCMA safe harbor provisions. Continue Reading →