Is now the right time to tinker with HADOPI Mr Hollande?

Political change has come to France and the impact of the switch to a socialist president, following the election of François Hollande earlier this month, could be felt by the music industry. Hollande has begun looking at reforming tough anti-piracy measures despite claims from the music industry that targeting file sharers is beginning to generate increased interest in the legal digital sector.

Filed under: Uncategorized, Music industry, download, Legal, full track, Music industry, Music subscriptions, Internet, France, HADOPI

The Adele effect hits major-record-company market shares in 2011

Music & Copyright’s annual survey of the recorded-music and music-publishing industries has revealed that Universal Music Group (UMG) remained the world’s biggest record company and Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG) the largest music-publishing company in 2011. The positioning of each of the four major record-label and music-publishing companies was unchanged last year. Although this lack of change could suggest that 2011 offered up “more of the same” in the recorded-music and music-publishing sectors, such an assumption would be wide of the mark.

Filed under: download, Intellectual property, Music industry, Uncategorized, download, emi, market share, Music industry, sony music, universal music, warner music

Demystifying Pan-European digital music rights – new report

The number of digital-music services in Europe is growing every year and consumers across the continent are being presented with an array of different ways to listen to music. Digital-music delivery and consumption has undergone a rapid transition. However, such has been the speed of the sector’s evolution, new business models specializing in digital-music delivery across Europe have forced those organizations charged with issuing licenses to rethink the way they operate.

Music publishers and collection-societies in Europe have taken to the task in different ways (see below table for major music publisher initiative details). But, in contrast to a few years ago, when digital-music services were required to negotiate countless licensing deals, agreements between music publishers and collection-societies have reduced the necessity for endless rounds of licensing negotiations.

Filed under: Collection societies, Intellectual property, Music industry, Uncategorized, CELAS, collection society, gema, Music industry, Pan European, performance rights, publishing

Artists and composers swim against the tide in the battle of rights

Last month the European Composer & Songwriter Alliance (ECSA) held a press conference at the Silken Berlaymont Hotel in Brussels to brief news reporters about a stance it was taking against European broadcasters on behalf of music composers. ECSA accused Europe’s leading broadcasters of forcing composers to give up their rights in return for TV commissions. Big names in broadcasting, such as RTL, ITV, BskyB, TF1, ZDF and Rai, were all accused of operating a system called coercive commissioning – in return for awarding a composer with a commission, the composer must assign all rights in the music to the broadcaster or TV production company. Put simply, no rights, no commission.

Filed under: Intellectual property, Legal, Music industry, Uncategorized, ECSA, Music industry, performance, performance rights

Does Adele’s success dispel the myth that the majors’ dominance hampers market access for indies?

In the two weeks before the publication of the current issue of Music & Copyright, we conducted a poll of visitors to this blog asking whether Adele’s success disproved the argument that major-record-company dominance hampered market access for independent artists. Unsurprisingly, the majority of voters said no (see chart below). Despite the phenomenal success of Adele, one artist, no matter how big they have become, would certainly not be enough to invalidate the argument. But there have been a number of other indie-label successes that could form part of a case against the arguments concerning market-access restrictions.

Filed under: Music industry, emi, market share, Music industry, universal music

Why the case against ReDigi should go to a full trial for the good of the music industry

Earlier this month, US District Judge Richard Sullivan ruled against EMI’s Capitol Records’ request for a preliminary injunction against the digital-music reseller ReDigi. Capitol had wanted the service closed down but Judge Sullivan denied the record company’s demand and insisted that the service should stay online and the case go to trial. The judge’s action has been widely reported as a victory for ReDigi and to some extent it is. Not every day can a start-up company say it has fended off one of the world’s biggest record companies. But in the longer term, having the case go to a full trial can only be a good thing for the music industry. Should Judge Sullivan have ruled without a trial that ReDigi was infringing copyright then the issue of legality would rumble on and proponents of digital resale would simply claim they have been trodden on by a big corporation wanting to protect its business.

Filed under: download, Intellectual property, Legal, Music industry, capitol records, Music industry, redigi

Streaming and subscriptions have really begun to make their mark

At the end of last month the music industry once again descended on Cannes for the annual institution that is MIDEM. Opinions from the trade floor and the many conferences and panel sessions left visitors in no doubt that there has been a major shift in opinion from across the music industry that streaming and subscription services have really started to take off.

Filed under: Music industry, Music subscriptions, Music industry, Music subscriptions, Spotify, STREAMING, universal music

Tax havens still attract big-name artists, but how do the big five music markets compare for tax rates?

For many years, the biggest-earning artists have benefited from moving their residence to countries with more-favorable tax rates. The Rolling Stones famously became tax exiles in France in the early 1970s and subsequently released the album “Exile on Main Street” soon after. Are tax rates in the big five music markets still driving the highest-earning artists into exile?

Filed under: Music industry, Music industry, tax

Live music faces up to a challenging 2012

With the organization and promotion of live events differing from country to country, comparisons of how one country’s live music sector is performing against another are not always easy to make. However, the live industry has, in recent years, seen the emergence of a small number of global players, such as Live Nation and CTS Eventim, and their financial details have provided an insight into current and possible future trends.

Filed under: Music industry, Uncategorized, concert, festival, live music, live nation, Music industry

Is the X Factor simply a great entertainment program or is it TV nepotism at its absolute worst?

A simple answer to these questions is yes, on both counts. Large numbers of viewers across the UK tuned in to watch some great TV moments over the course of the last few months culminating in Little Mix being crowned the X Factor winners in front of 10,000 adoring X Factor fans at Wembley. The girl band will no doubt go on to achieve great things, as will runner-up Marcus Collins and probably a few of the other contestants.

But in comparison with previous years, which offered a degree of subtlety in the way viewers were duped into thinking they were just being entertained, this year’s show was explicit in its very blatant advertising of all things X Factor-related. As has been widely reported, the UK broadcasting regulator OFCOM has received complaints that the “established artists” that performed alongside the contestants were signed to Simon Cowell’s record company Syco, which is part of Syco Entertainment, a global joint venture between Cowell and Sony Music Entertainment. Syco TV co-produced the X Factor show.

Filed under: Music industry, Uncategorized, Little Mix, music tv, Simon Cowell, tv, x factor