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Streaming Services Must Hike Songwriter Payments Nearly 50%, Court Rules (bloomberg.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the music-rules dept.

An anonymous reader quotes Bloomberg: Songwriters will get a larger cut of revenue from streaming services after a court handed technology companies a big defeat. The Copyright Royalty Board ruled that songwriters will get at least a 15.1 percent share of streaming revenues over the next five years, from a previous 10.5 percent. That's the largest rate increase in CRB history, according to a statement from the National Music Publishers' Association. The decision is a major victory for songwriters, who have long complained they are insufficiently uncompensated by on-demand music services like Spotify and YouTube.
"The ratio of what labels are paid by the services versus what publishers are paid has significantly improved," argues the NMPA, "resulting in the most favorable balance in the history of the industry.

"While an effective ratio of 3.82 to 1 is still not a fair split that we might achieve in a free market, it is the best songwriters have ever had under the compulsory license... The decision represents two years of advocacy regarding how unfairly songwriters are treated under current law and how crucial their contributions are to streaming services."

Meanwhile, the U.S. Congress has introduced a bipartisan "Music Modernization Act" to overhaul the rate court, and to create a new governing agency to issue blanket licenses to streaming services and then collect and distribute the resulting roylaties.

88 comments

  1. Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How about my rights, as a web coder, to get paid a percentage every time someone loads a web page I have coded?

    1. Re:Great! by arth1 · · Score: 1

      How about my rights, as a web coder, to get paid a percentage every time someone loads a web page I have coded?

      Nothing prevents you from paywalling your page.

    2. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is nothing original or creative in your use of code. Any AI will be able to do your job inside 5 years.

    3. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Youâ(TM)d have that right if you negotiated it with whoever you created the website for.

    4. Re:Great! by mspohr · · Score: 2

      I dug a drainage ditch along the road. Water from all of my neighbors runs down this ditch every single day and they pay me nothing!
      Where do I apply to force them to pay me?

      --
      I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
    5. Re:Great! by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 1

      Apparently the Copyright Royalty Board, and say your work was an 'artistic interpretation performance'.

      --
      If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
    6. Re: Great! by Calydor · · Score: 1

      Have you heard music from the past ten years?

      --
      -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
    7. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Oh boy, if I shit on today's music people will think I'm smart!"

    8. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Only when it's unavoidable. Sure as hell haven't paid for anything written after 2000.

      Make push-button Hip-hop dubstep trash using "Babby's First Music Maker" -- then get ripped off and learn you can't earn a living as a "professional musician". Seems like a fair trade.

    9. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Making fun, the best way to avoid presenting an actual counterargument. For a 8 year old child.

    10. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More like "don't forget to bribe the lawmakers".

    11. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We are still listening to music which was written hundreds of years ago, there's plenty of music which was written in the 50's and 60's which still gets played daily.

      How much from the last 25 years do you think will be played daily in 50-100 years? I can't think of anything worth it.

    12. Re:Great! by Altrag · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Nothing except the hundred thousand competitors who don't charge a percentage and would happily take his business.

      Music artists get a bum deal because any fool with an instrument can make music, and even if we want to ignore the complete crap, there's still plenty of people who make reasonably good music in their garage or local pubs yet never make it beyond that. On the other hand there are (relatively) very few publishers which is why they basically hold all of the power. If you want to get your band signed you don't get to go shop around to the publishers and demand a reasonable percentage. You have to beg them and hope they'll give you _any_ percentage.

      The internet was supposed to change all of that, and to some degree it helped. But at the end of the day the publishers just have too much control. Consumers want to to go a website that has the music they want to hear right now. Its great if that website also has new music for them to explore but its not the biggest deal. So you can set up a Indiefy (or whatever name:P) site and cater specifically to unsigned bands and do your own curation to ensure the music quality is high and pay the artists a good percentage.. and you will die out fast because you don't have Lady Gaga or Ed Sheeran or whoever the latest fad of the week is. And even if you don't die out and end up becoming a big name yourself.. well, you've essentially become another publisher. And sooner or later you'll come under the same pressures to eternally increase profits that every other publisher deals with. Its an ugly cycle.

    13. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nothing to stop you making a deal with the clients for who you write pages!

    14. Re: Great! by nospam007 · · Score: 1

      "There is nothing original or creative in your use of code. Any AI will be able to do your job inside 5 years."

      The same goes for music. After all, it's just the same 7 notes that are rearranged over and over again.

      Any AI should be able to do that very soon.

    15. Re:Great! by arth1 · · Score: 2

      I think another part of the problem is that there's at least fifty minstrels for each bard. But who the public sees and want to reward are the minstrels. Not the guy who wrote the song, but the charismatic people on stage.
      There's not a lot of incentive to compose great music, and especially so if you're not also a performer.

    16. Re:Great! by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 1

      If you sold SaaS, then you would get paid at least monthly, per user...

      --
      Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
    17. Re: Great! by David_Hart · · Score: 1

      We are still listening to music which was written hundreds of years ago, there's plenty of music which was written in the 50's and 60's which still gets played daily.

      How much from the last 25 years do you think will be played daily in 50-100 years? I can't think of anything worth it.

      According to the movie "Demolition Man" people will be listening to commercial jingles.... and every restaurant will be Taco Bell.... (grin)

    18. Re:Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And if you were a prostitute you would get paid every time a huge black cock penetrated you ass.
      Did you have a point?

    19. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Songs that win or are nominated for each year's Grammys tend to be well written, and of course they're professionally performed. So many of those will survive.

    20. Re:Great! by rickb928 · · Score: 1

      " a web page I have coded"

      Oh, is this *your* page? Or your clients'?

      --
      deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
    21. Re: Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So I hear this all the time and all I can say is if you haven't found good music produced in the last ten years its because you are not looking very hard. Yes, what you hear on the radio is mostly mass produced cheap music, designed to be an ear bug for a few months and sell a bunch of records fast and give way to the next sound.

      However, if you go looking there are some fantastic artists creating some really good music. Now I tend to lean more metal in my tastes so feel free to disagree with the following examples, after all music choice is subjective, but from a music technique approach, here are some solid examples:

      Avantasia (10 year anniversary actually) released a series of three albums staring in 2008 thru 2014ish... (The Scare Crow, Wicket Symphony, Angel of Babylon) . As a complete work it is fantastic, and the individual songs are great on their own (still releasing music, not sure when the next one will be out).

      Epica is another example, they are symphonic metal band, released a album in 2008-9 (Design Your Universe) excellent work, they also released an album in 2010 Classical Conspiracy where they covered some classical music as well as modern sound tracks. Did a rendition of the Imperial March that was amazing. (still releasing more music).

      Dragon Force is still making music

      Alestorm has just been coming into their own over the last ten year... and they are just fun to listen to, I won't call them high art, but really, who can argue with Pirate themed metal band???

      These are just the four bands off the top of my head which, in my opinion, are putting out good music, in their genre. I have to imagine there are similar musicians creating great music in other genres that just don't see radio time.

    22. Re:Great! by ausekilis · · Score: 1

      People forget a big part of what those publishers do is front money to the band then turn around and advertise for them. Sure, you'll see that they signed "Band X" for 5 albums over N years, but what you don't see is that it is basically all a loan. The publisher will give them some money, but also spend money promoting the band and expect to get a cut of all proceeds.

      They get a cut of merchandise, album sales, likely more as the band tours and becomes known. I read somewhere that most artists don't actually become profitable until their third or fourth CD is released. Considering how many one-hit wonders there are out there, you can see how all the power goes to a few rich companies. Not to mention one time people had to buy a whole CD even though they wanted 1 or 2 songs. Today we have that choice thanks to Amazon and iTunes. Here's a couple articles:

      Record sales: Where does the money go?

      In Shift to Streaming, Music Industry has Lost Billions

    23. Re:Great! by Quirkz · · Score: 1

      Slashdot, once obsessed with the car analogy, is now fixated on hourly work as the one and only true business model. But there are many of them, all valid for different purposes. Consider:
      - hourly wage
      - per-contract bid (pretty close to hourly wage, but not the same)
      - annual salary
      - subscription model
      - rental
      - investment
      - transactional (buy low and sell high, irrespective of time put in)
      - patronage (mostly out of fashion)
      - group patronage (probably not the right term; think Kickstarter)

      And then there's the thing that most copyrighted works do, where there's a whole bunch of up-front costs, and the idea is, if there's enough mass appeal, one entity can cover those costs in advance, and as long as a large number of people are willing to pay a fairly small amount for the ability to enjoy a work, it's successful enough for the process to be repeated with another work. It's not illogical. It's worked for centuries. It is a valid and consistent business model, in that if enough people play along, it works out okay.

      Now, sure, it's easy to argue it's not perfect, on a lot of levels. But to argue it's a nonsensical business model, or fails simply because it's not an exact duplicate of some other business model, is just silly. You could just as easily ask, why don't I own an apartment after paying a month's rent? Why do I have to pay more than once? Or scold investors for putting in money but not time, because if you don't have hours worked, calculating their hourly rate produces a divide-by-zero error. When one thing is not another, sometimes an analogy between them just doesn't apply.

      --
      The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
  2. If the money really goes to songwriters... by QuietLagoon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ... I'm OK with it. My concern is that the publishers and "music catalog owners" will get an overwhelmingly large share of the money, leaving only cookie crumbs to the songwriters and artists.

    1. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by geekmux · · Score: 1

      ... I'm OK with it. My concern is that the publishers and "music catalog owners" will get an overwhelmingly large share of the money, leaving only cookie crumbs to the songwriters and artists.

      One could be fairly ambiguous with the title "artist", but songwriter I would hope would be pretty damn specific from a legal perspective, and focus the rewards on those who actually deserve it.

    2. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh yes, songwirters are special snowflakes who deserve to get paid forever for a few hours/days/months of work, unlike the rest of us who get paid by the hour.

    3. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If the artist can cede his rights over to the publisher, why wouldn't the writer be able to do the same? Or put another way: if the publisher forces the artist to hand over the rights, he can do the same with the writer.
      IIRC Michael Jacksons rights to many of his songs, which he also wrote afaik, were transferred when he was bankrupt.

    4. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by QuietLagoon · · Score: 1

      ... songwriter I would hope would be pretty damn specific from a legal perspective ...

      Since it was a publishers' association that brought the case to court, I'm not optimistic. I'd really like to be wrong, though. It wouldn't not be the first time I've heard about publishers diverting a lot of the money to themselves while saying it is going to artists.

    5. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by QuietLagoon · · Score: 1

      ...IIRC Michael Jacksons rights to many of his songs, which he also wrote afaik...

      Michael Jackson also owned the rights to Beatles songs at one point.

    6. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by QuietLagoon · · Score: 1

      ... songwirters are special snowflakes who deserve to get paid forever for a few hours/days/months of work..

      Unlike publishers who sit back and make money off the work of others.

    7. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh yes, songwirters are special snowflakes who deserve to get paid forever for a few hours/days/months of work, unlike the rest of us who get paid by the hour.

      If you don't like what you do, there's always songwriting.

      Oh, it's a lot harder than you thought? Gee, go fucking figure...

    8. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Being paid by the hour is not the natural order. It's a social construct, and it's for your comfort. You trade your labor for less than it's worth for the guarantee of some stability. You could choose to freelance (and still be paid by the hour) or even go create your own product and company (and then possibly you won't be paid by the hour any more). The natural order is if you can sell/trade it at a profit, you make money/surplus goods. If you have to design something once (like a TI-86 calculator or Dale Carnegie seminars) or repeatedly perform some work (like farming or performing financial audits) is irrelevant to how you should be paid. You should be paid when you sell something (or why sell it). Because allowing songwriters to individually choose when and to whom they sell something is onerous, we have created a complex scheme which most everyone has agreed to (at least in rough form; there will always be disputes and revisions and negotiations) where rights to distribute and sell can be assigned en masse and royalties granted in exchange.

    9. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 2

      The natural order is the hunter-gatherer, who only works a few hours a day. However that can only support a few tens of millions of people on the Earth.

      You need farming, which requires security from non-producers or the effort doesn't get made.

      Forget all other definitions of civilization you've read, by hacks all. Civilization is the thwarting of the hunter-gatherer impulse so humanity can be secure in longer-term efforts.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    10. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Altrag · · Score: 1

      Publishers do an important job in the process.

      The problem is that they essentially get to choose their own percentage when signing an artist, and unsurprisingly choose to benefit themselves greatly at the cost of everyone else involved. Basically anyone who gets to decide on their own wages (these guys, corporate board members, etc) is going to end up with a significantly larger fraction of the pie than they deserve. But that doesn't mean they do nothing or deserve none of the pie.

    11. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by UnderCoverPenguin · · Score: 2

      My concern is that the publishers and "music catalog owners" will get an overwhelmingly large share of the money

      Speaking as an artist, I can tell you that the publishers do get a huge share of at least the compulsory license royalties, This is because, by law, compulsory royalties are collected by organizations operated by the publisher associations. Besides the publishers' "cuts", these organizations also take a percentage as a processing fee and require artists to pay "annual membership dues". Any royalties intended for artists who don't pay said dues are kept by the organizations.

      --
      Don't try to out wierd me, three-eyes. I get stranger things than you, free with my breakfast cereal. --Zaphod Beeblebr
    12. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The money could go 100% to the songwriter/artist, and the publisher/rightsholder still gets their cut. They have predatory agreements with artists, offering needed exposure and infrastructure, while claiming huge portions of any future revenue.

    13. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Civilization is the act of living in cities. Anything else is just a bonus.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    14. Re: If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      One can only be jealous of the amount of skill and genius required to write anything even remotely as insightful and profound as https://genius.com/Daft-punk-around-the-world-lyrics

    15. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by _Sharp'r_ · · Score: 2

      Yeah, most of the articles on this emphasize "songwriters", but when you look into the details, it's actually the labels and publishers who get an increased percentage and if someone who actually wrote or performed the song gets any more money it'll mostly be because of the details of their contract after the labels and publishers get their cut. So to call this an increase for "songwriters" is fairly misleading. At best, an increase for rights-holders and music distribution/promotion managers.

      --
      The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
    16. Re: If the money really goes to songwriters... by Reverend+Green · · Score: 1

      Afaik sedentary agriculture is a universal requirement for having cities.

      Happy to be corrected with an historical counterexample, if you know of one.

    17. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by rtb61 · · Score: 1

      Upon that basis copyright is entirely artificial, a fraud, the artificial ability to sell an item more than once beyond it's initial creation, a lie based upon greed. You get paid for the perfomance, that is all beyond that is entirely unnatural. So you allow limited restrictive selling, to promote development of worth while content, for only that reason, promote development of socially worth while content. Otherwise you are using artificial means for no other reason than sheer unadulterated greed, putting content of no social worth upon the same basis as food, water, clothing and housing. Content as a drain upon socially productivity for no other reason but greed, oh yes, apparently also ego and poseur status as if that has public worth.

      Why should taxpayers fund content that is not of social worth. Why should taxpayers fund destructive content. Why should taxpayers protect content that attacks social values and worth. Who is fooling who here.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    18. Re:If the money really goes to songwriters... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your saying SELL when you mean LEASE or RENT.

      Try to get it right next time.

  3. Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 1

    Let the music industry try to make their own streaming service. I'd love to see the crap that produces.

    --
    If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
    1. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by theurge14 · · Score: 2

      The music industry should closedown the music it sends to Spotify and Pandora.

      Let the streaming industry try to make their own content. I'd love to hear the crap that produces.

    2. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 1

      Let the music industry try to make their own streaming service. I'd love to see the crap that produces.
      Let the streaming industry try to make their own content. I'd love to hear the crap that produces.

      Whoever wins, we lose.

      --
      #DeleteFacebook
    3. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      end copy"right"

    4. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by Pseudonym · · Score: 1

      See also: Netflix, Hulu, Amazon...

      My prediction, should they try this, is exactly what happened to video streaming services. They would make a modest amount of good quality music that, apart from one or two minor hits, essentially nobody will listen to because it's too niche or only those who use their particular service has a chance to hear it.

      --
      sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
    5. Re: Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      While we are at it, let's close down the making of vinyl records - because without the music records would be nothing!

      That's the tired arguement that was actually made by the music industry back in the day. And the same was said about radio - until it became really apparent that they needed radio to make vinyl sales.

      As much things change - they still stay the same.

    6. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "He who has the audience, writes the rules".

      Artists are a dime a dozen. The days where the record companies decided who got a contract, and paid radio stations to give them airtime, is over.

      Nowadays you don't need a record company, and basically zero fucks are given about radio. What you need if you want to thrive as an artist these days isn't a record company, it's an audience since such no longer can be created with pure marketing.

      Does record companies have audiences? No. Who has an audience? Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon etc. Now, if you're a "starving artist", who do you need? The record companies, or the streaming services where your audience is..?

    7. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by RhettLivingston · · Score: 1

      I think we're already hearing it. But, if you get into the science of it, you'll find that it is what the mainstream user wants.

      As the traditional music industry has lost control, music has been gradually becoming simpler, louder, and more homogenous. Why? Because there is no elitist industry determining what we get to hear for us. The mainstream users are finally getting the upper hand and they don't want to hear what more musically "gifted" people say is good.

      There are many fields or aspects of culture that have gone through this transformation. The professionals always complain when they lose the subsidies they've been getting from the masses. The masses don't care. They never appreciated the work of the professional at the same depth. They couldn't as they hadn't the gifts or training/brainwashing to be able to. Eventually, it settles out and the professionals figure out how to support their own ecosystem without the subsidies. Or not, and that aspect of the field dies. A few lament it, but the mass moves on.

      Eventually, yes, the mainstream music will all be generated. Perhaps you can stall that for a while by pulling the elitist content. But it will eventually happen. Eventually, most music will be generated on the fly precisely to match the listener's desires. And, frankly, I think even the elitists will find that their true desires were never what they thought.

    8. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by Altrag · · Score: 1

      music I pay attention to has been gradually becoming simpler, louder, and more homogenous

      FTFY. More music of all sorts is generated. But without the gatekeepers telling you what you should like, you have to put in the effort to search it out yourself. And frequently as you note, short-term "popular" songs are not the same as long-term "good" songs.

      Of course a lot of the websites don't make it particularly easy. Their algos will certainly take into account the things you've marked as "Like" (or whatever they call it in their system,) but it also takes into account things like "most popular" (which will often be the catchy-yet-terrible styles) and "recently listened to" (whether you hit like or not -- so make sure to use the dislike button as well!) and so on. Basically you get funneled toward popular crap even if you're intentionally trying to avoid it, because by definition its popular.

      But of course they do that because that's what most people want, or at least are sufficiently happy with to not complain (or stop using the service..)

      If you want to find "good" music, try joining some music-related forums or discussion groups and things like that. Places where you can ask real people for real opinions. Relying on services like Spotify to do that for you is silly.. their goals simply aren't in line with yours.

    9. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by sound+vision · · Score: 1

      The ones who lose are the ones who let these companies be the gatekeepers and tastemakers of music.

      It's hard to get away from them entirely, given that (for example) the majority of radio stations in the country are owned by them, but I do my best. I flip the radio off, plug my phone into my car by 3.5mm cable (no Apple tax either), and listen to whatever MP3s and FLACs I damn well please. Plenty of it's made by people with no industry affiliation I paid directly, or by dead people, or people who have chose of their own accord to release the music at no cost.

      Which isn't to say I don't enjoy big-name stuff like, say, the Red Hot Chili Peppers as well. But that stuff I generally pirate. I know the corporate leeches get most of the money from their record sales... Insert boilerplate comment about going to shows and buying merch instead... but more radically than that, I don't really give a damn if the artist gets paid or not.
      What gets lost in the whole discussion about money is the purpose music should play in people's lives and in our culture. As a musician myself, I play because it entertains me and if I make something good (which is rarely) that sense of accomplishment and hearing the music is its own reward. I'd certainly accept money and fame for it, but I don't presume to demand it. To continue with the RHCP example, I never spoke to Flea and told him, "Play me some slap bass and I'll buy your record." In the absence of people willing to pay, Flea would still be sitting shirtless in a bathtub somewhere, going crazy on that bass. That's what Flea does, that's what Flea loves. There's no implied social contract where *playing*, providing no concrete material benefit for anyone, means you get paid a living wage.

      If there is someone out there who *only* makes music for the paycheck... I've got no interest in hearing it, and they're in the wrong line of work. It's a labor of love.

    10. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wait, so you're telling me that you make music because of the sense of pride and accomplishment that it brings you?

    11. Re:Spotify and Pandora Should Closedown by sound+vision · · Score: 1

      Yes, and also for the experience of hearing the music itself. What about that do you have trouble comprehending? I think it shouldn't be difficult, even for someone who doesn't make music.

  4. "insufficiently uncompensated" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Well, that sounds easy enough to fix.

    1. Re:"insufficiently uncompensated" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Well, that sounds easy enough to fix."

      As of today, all writers will be sufficiently uncompensated. Lucky them!

    2. Re: "insufficiently uncompensated" by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      There used to be a time where professions with writing had actual writer training or education. And there existed proofreading and editors so that mistakes were far and few between. Also, I think /. uses a trolling algorithm where they seek low quality writing by design.

  5. 2c for you and 30c for the payment processor by tepples · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Nothing prevents you from paywalling your page.

    Other than the lack of a widely used multi-site micropayment service that respects viewers' privacy.

    Credit card processors charge a merchant on the order of 30 cents per transaction plus 3% of the value, and the 30 cents greatly overwhelm (say) 2 cents to view an article. Nor is a user who wants to view a single article on a particular site going to want to spend $6 on a 300-pack of article views and waste the other 299 because the purchased views aren't portable to another site.

    A multi-site micropayment service would work in one of two ways.

    Flat fee Adult Check (because grown-ups can pay for nice things) was a flat $10 per month and paid participating publishers per page view. It was sued out of business when too many participating publishers displayed infringing scans of photos taken from Perfect 10 magazine. Page views Google Contributor charges for a pack of page views. It's pretty much ideal except for two things: First, it charges for reloading an article that the user has already seen recently, which could encourage sites to engage in view fraud by failing to invest in a reliable connection so that the viewer will reload the page more often. Second, it's run by the same company that also runs an ad network. This means Contributor views still get counted toward the click-stream for Google's "interest-based advertising" features, even though the page is served without ads.
    1. Re:2c for you and 30c for the payment processor by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      Other than the lack of a widely used multi-site micropayment service that respects viewers' privacy.

      You could use satoshis. They are currently worth about a hundredth of a US cent, so can be used for very small transactions.

      Of course, there is also a $30 blockchain transaction fee, and it takes a week to clear, so it isn't a perfect solution.

    2. Re:2c for you and 30c for the payment processor by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 1

      Other than the lack of a widely used multi-site micropayment service that respects viewers' privacy.

      Actually, coinminers could do that easily. The problem is sorting out how much of your cpu usage is fair. I would argue that anything that uses roughly the same or less than the energy that it takes to stream an automatically playing audio ad (no video) in real-time.

    3. Re:2c for you and 30c for the payment processor by nasch · · Score: 1

      There's an issue of mental cost. Even if it's only 2 cents, the reader has to decide if it's worth it. Maybe they only have six cents left in a bundle and don't want to bother with refilling it. The money is not really the obstacle.

      http://nakamotoinstitute.org/s...

    4. Re:2c for you and 30c for the payment processor by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 1

      Reddcoin or Dogecoin would be perfect for that.

      --
      #DeleteFacebook
  6. I want some! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I did work back in 1985 or so for a guy. I poured a foundation for his house. I think he still lives in the house or maybe he sold it for a profit, I dunno. Can I get a court to rule that he owes me more money for that work? Just because.

    1. Re:I want some! by Mikkeles · · Score: 1

      Check your contract with him. It'll indicate whether or not you're owed anything.

      --
      Great minds think alike; fools seldom differ.
    2. Re:I want some! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Check your contract with him. It'll indicate whether or not you're owed anything.

      Well, if the publishers can go to the CRB to change the terms they are/were/have been under, why can't he do the same?

  7. Money breakdown by Solandri · · Score: 5, Informative
    This got me curious how a dollar earned by Spotify is split up.
    • 58.32% sound recording owners
    • 29.38% Spotify
    • 6% mechanicals
    • 6.12% performance

    It looks like Spotify's share will go down from 29.38% to 24.78%. (The details of the 10.5% "mechanical" rate that's being increased are in footnote 3, which I've read twice and still don't really get.)

  8. Brilliant by argStyopa · · Score: 1

    Squeeze the guys playing by the rules harder, forcing them to push price hikes to their customers.
    It's not like the guys who run Pandora are bajillionaires from it. Yet there seem to be lots and lots of millionaire musicians?

    I'm sure this won't drive anyone to piracy at ALL.

    --
    -Styopa
    1. Re:Brilliant by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ... guys who run Pandora ...

      Translation: One entrepreneur didn't make easy money so all artists should be scammed.

      ... lots of millionaire musicians ...

      Which they got from building their fan-base and numerous world-wide tours and paying-off a loan they took (from their boss) to make music in the first place. So how rich are Sony and Universal after getting 58% of the price of a zero-cost product? But please, don't talk about their money, we want to be fair.

    2. Re:Brilliant by geek · · Score: 1

      Musicians have always made their money on concerts. Thats one of the reasons The Grateful Dead never gave a shit about bootlegs. The draw and money was you paying to come see them. These days thats too much work. Musicians, and I use that term very generously, these days want to release an album and then go party and buy shit to show their bling.

      Music just isn't what it used to be. I look at the top charts and I struggle to find one that even plays an instrument. I haven't been to a concert since the 90's because there just isn't anything I want to see, plus the prices have skyrocketed.

      If Spotify and others raise rates I'll just cancel and go back to torrenting FLAC's. Fuck it. I'm literally trying to give these pukes money and all they want to do is fuck me harder and bitch about how they don't make enough. It's like going to out to eat and the server spending the entire time you're trying to eat whining about how they aren't paid enough. It would make you not want to come back and generally wouldn't make a rational person very sympathetic.

    3. Re:Brilliant by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I haven't bought an album (physical or electronic) in a decade or so, but I've been subscribed to a streaming service for about 5-6 years. I hope the music industry doesn't push me back to the "not a customer" status, for their sake.

    4. Re:Brilliant by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Music just isn't what it used to be. I look at the top charts and I struggle to find one that even plays an instrument.

      Because the people who are supposed to be rabid purchasers of pop music, i.e. ages 12-35, stopped buying long ago. Why should they when they can get complete catalogs of any musician they want for free? Very few pop musicians are able to support themselves these days, except for the top divas who are telegenic (like Taylor Swift and Justin Timberlake), and maybe some of their bandmates.

    5. Re:Brilliant by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Contemporary "artists" are not only competing with musicians of their own era, but basically every other recorded artist since the introduction of vinyl, many of which has been remastered to CD. Further, generally speaking, music produced the last 20 years is easily forgotten crap and if you crave music, you can easily raid your parents or grandparents record collections.

      But that of course has no bearing, it's all those dirty pirates, damn them. It's so much easier when you can point your finger to some scape goat rather than looking at what's really going on, especially when it involves taking a critical look at yourself and your business, isn't it?

    6. Re:Brilliant by argStyopa · · Score: 1

      "... if you crave music, you can easily raid your parents or grandparents record collections...."
      What?

      Clearly, we missed something that needs to be immediately legislated away. OBVIOUSLY handling music to your children is EXPLOITING desperate musicians.
      Thanks for the reminder.

      - Your friends,
      The RIAA

      --
      -Styopa
  9. Corporate welfare by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... create a new governing agency ...

    It doesn't change what artists get paid. It removes clearing house duties from the distributors (Spotify, iTunes, etc) and makes the government responsible for paying artists. While it is a duty of government to transfer money between appropriate parties (eg. child support), I wonder why a private agency isn't being mandated for this. Most other industries have heavily-regulated and privately-owned clearing houses (eg. debit/credit card transactions). I suspect the government will be absorbing some of the costs of doing business.

  10. Free market by Phoeniyx · · Score: 1

    "While an effective ratio of 3.82 to 1 is still not a fair split that we might achieve in a free market, it is the best songwriters have ever had under the compulsory license...".. How is this not a free market? So many streaming services, where some are even illegal streaming services. The song writer / singer is free to use whatever platform.. No? Or choose not to use their own platform. Didn't a bunch of music producers even create a platform just to give more money back to the artists? How is that going?

    1. Re:Free market by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wrong, the record companies are free to choose whatever platform. Precious few performers and songwriters get any say in what can and can't be done with their music since they very rarely own the copyright.

      numbnuts

  11. Good thing we don't have Royalty in the USA by goombah99 · · Score: 1

    or are they talking about the Kanas City team named after Lourde's song

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
  12. SOunds like a Beatle's song by goombah99 · · Score: 1

    Tax Man

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
  13. "Songwriter" or "copyright holder" ? by TheDarkener · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm assuming it's the latter as the CRB likely doesn't have the right to renegotiate artist/label contracts. Which means the record labels are simply going to be cashing in more. Hopefully they won't pull any bullshit like adjusting rates accordingly so artists still get as much of a percentage as before, and artists will benefit equally (whatever that means, given the atrociously low percentages artists get for their works).

    --
    It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
  14. pay for effort by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So, if you take say 5 years to create an album then yes u can demand say 50% or 10% per year. If it takes you 1 year then 10%...5 weeks then 1%. Make up the rest touring. If you write a book same thing, but maybe since the number of words is much more then you offset the % a bit and say double it: 20% for a book that took 1 year to write. Why should someone pay some large % for something that took 1 day to make, when it can be copied so easily.

  15. Always "of revenue" never "of profit" by GumphMaster · · Score: 1

    As usual the music cartel want their cut from revenue as if the cost of storing, managing, and delivering their product for them is zero. The cartel well knows that if it was "of profit" their own "Hollywood accounting" would be used against them.

    --
    Patent litigation: A doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction... in which everyone seems willing to push the button
  16. killing the golden goose? by sad_ · · Score: 1

    Next up is higher pay for in the music industry, spotify's own earnings decrease and decrease as more and more fees are added to pay for the music industries greed. Then spotify goes belly up, and music industry loses a gigantic boatload of easy money. Comes up with all kind of excuses and why it's not their fault.

    --
    On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
  17. Not apples and apples. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    When you buy an album or a song, you can play it thousands of times.
    Streamers are paying per play.

  18. Massive overreach by ryanmc1 · · Score: 1

    Sounds like a massive overreach by the Government. They really need to stay out of private contracts between adults. The only reason the courts should be involved is if someone broke the law. In addition, if the songwriters are not happy with the terms, don't sign. Maybe I am crazy, but I don't see any good long term benefit from this. As always the Government will expand this further. For those of you that support this action I hope some day when the Government starts reaching more and more into your private lives you are happy that you supported this action.

  19. Why is the Government Mandating This? by Hercules+Peanut · · Score: 1

    I get the indignity of the percentages, the cut from revenue and not profit, the general disgust for the music industry, but what about the government? Why does the government need to be involved at all? Since when does the government negotiate contract rates and business deals? This seems wrong in all kinds of ways.