News

The U.S. Copyright Office makes recommendations on how to modernize music licensing.

Touts Contribution of Major Labels In New Report The House Judiciary this morning convenes a second subcommittee hearing on music licensing.  Cary Sherman, CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), will testify. 

If you’re a SiriusXM or Pandora fan like us, it’s likely you’ve faced this situation: you’re in the car on a long drive, or you’re reading or making dinner, and the mood for music strikes you. You type in to your Pandora app an artist you like, or you start channel flipping through SiriusXM’s offerings. 50s on 5. 60s on 6. Motown station. You have a hankering for Aretha Franklin music (and similar songs), so you create an Aretha channel on Pandora. This genre of music may be decades old, but it still makes you groove or helps make a long drive bearable. And guess what? Pandora and SiriusXM know that too – after all, that’s why they offer those stations.

If there’s one thing we know for certain about the music industry, it’s that licensing is uniquely complex. One example why? Two licenses are required for every track – the sound recording (the artist’s recorded performance of a song, usually owned by the label) and the underlying musical work (the songwriter’s music and lyrics, such as in sheet music, usually owned by the music publisher).

Proposal to simplify licensing would benefit music fans and mean market-based rates for all music creators, says RIAA in filing with U.S. Copyright Office "Modernizing the licensing system for musical works is a win for everyone...must be a collaborative exercise," says RIAA CEO

Lawsuit Against Pandora Filed In New York Today, Follows SiriusXM Case In California Steve Cropper, Widow of Buddy Holly, Sam Moore, Dionne Warwick Lend Support

Google's Senior Copyright Policy Counsel Katherine Oyama testified today before the House Judiciary IP Subcommittee during a hearing on notice and takedown procedures. Now, we appreciate Katie and like her a lot. But with all due respect, we have a few quibbles with her testimony…

Remarks come as RIAA hits 35 million takedown requests to Google for illegal content

Representative Mel Watt (D-N.C.) today introduced the Free Market Royalty Act, legislation that would (among other things) effectively establish a performance right for terrestrial broadcast radio.

Asks Congress to facilitate discussion on DMCA in testimony before House IP panel