No sacrifice of income in return for exposure, poll results

For the first few weeks of January this blog ran a poll asking for opinions on whether sacrificing income in return for a high-profile advertising placement is a price worth paying. Of the 489 votes cast, 81.2% said they would not give up all royalties to a track in return for its use in a major advertising campaign, with 18.8% saying they would. The question was prompted by a competition launched at the beginning of this month by the brand promoter and advertiser Ogilvy, which is holding a “music pitch session” later this month at the music conference MIDEM. Continue reading →

When royalty collection costs outweigh the benefits, is it smaller artists that miss out?

Blog picThe accuracy of data regarding the reported use of music is key in determining the level of royalties paid to authors, publishers, performers and producers. Improvements in technology to identify what music has been played and performed at all manner of venues and establishments has resulted in higher collections and greater confidence that royalties are reaching the correct recipients. But is there a point where collection costs outweigh the benefits? And if so, are the smaller, less commercial artists the ones in danger of missing out? Continue reading →

Japanese consumers turning away from mobile music formats in ever greater numbers

Music buyers in Japan are continuing to confound the rest of world, with digital sales falling and physical-format sales rising. Recent figures published by Japanese music trade association the RIAJ show that the once loved mobile music formats are continuing to suffer big drops in sales. Internet sales are growing but nowhere near fast enough to stem Japan’s digital-music collapse. Continue reading →

Absence of recognized licensing structures in the Gulf States opens the door to international collection-societies

Few regions in the world have escaped the spread of digital-music services. Even in the least developed territories, basic digital services, such as ring tones and ring-back tones, have been rolled out in an effort to tempt customers to go digital. But even though many of the Gulf States have highly developed technology infrastructures, digital-music services have been slow to take hold. Moreover, the lack of collection societies to administer rights collections has left the region as something of a rights wasteland. Could overseas involvement kick-start the rights-administration process? Continue reading →

Performance-rights distributions continue to defy global economic uncertainty

Performance-rights collections paid to record companies (producers) and performers are often seen as the poor relation to authors’ rights, with global receipts from performance rights traditionally much lower than the equivalent authors’-rights total. Yet for the past couple of years the growth in performance-rights collections has outshone authors’-rights collections. Moreover, the revenue stream is growing in importance as the recorded-music industry continues to battle falling sales. Continue reading →

European Commission gives the nod to the UMG/EMI deal

Earlier today the European Commission said yes to Vivendi/UMG’s bid to buy EMI Recorded Music. The full Commission press statement is here . Is anyone surprised at the outcome? Our guess is no. If the Commission didn’t want the deal to go through it would have said so months ago.

In the release there are some big name artists that are part of the Parlaphone sell-off (Coldplay, David Guetta, Tinie Tempah). The statement issued earlier today by the Association of Independent Music’s Chairman and Chief Executive Alison Wenham described these divestments as “the crown jewels of EMI.” But there are also quite a lot of artists and bands being divested whose best days are behind them (Tina Turner, Duran Duran, Jethro Tull, Depeche Mode, Moby) and whose value is going to lessen over time. But, UMG has The Beatles and so the company now has the two biggest UK bands ever (inc. The Rolling Stones) in its stable. Other icons moving under UMG’s control include the Beach Boys, Genesis and Bob Seger. Contemporary big names that pass to UMG include Katy Perry, Emeli Sandé, Robbie Williams, Herbert Grönemeyer, Lady Antebellum and Norah Jones. Continue reading →

The recorded-music industry is still a US$40 billion business

Over the past decade or so, the assessment of the recorded-music industry has shifted from retail sales to trade value. The complexities and the growing number of business models involved in the delivery of digital music, coupled with unknown retail markups, make quantifying the retail value of recorded-music sales speculative at best. But the enduring appeal of ring tones and ring-back tones in some less-developed countries suggests that the size of the global retail pie has not changed; there are just more players taking a slice. Continue reading →