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Music Government The Almighty Buck United States

Senate Passes Music Modernization Act With Unanimous Support (billboard.com) 159

Posted by BeauHD from the major-reform dept.
After the House's unilateral support back in April, the Senate has unanimously voted to pass the Orrin G. Hatch Music Modernization Act, which is named in honor of the Republican senior senator from Utah -- a songwriter himself -- who will retire at the end of the year. Billboard explains the bill: The bill creates a blanket mechanical license and establishes a collective to administer it; reshapes how courts can determine rates, while making sure future performance rates hearings between performance rights organizations BMI and ASCAP and licensees rotate among all U.S. Southern District Court of New York Judges, instead of being assigned to the same two judges, Judge Denise Cote for ASCAP and Judge Louis Stanton for BMI, as its done now; creates a royalty for labels, artists and musicians to be paid by digital services for master recordings created prior to Feb. 15, 1972, while also eliminating a Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 carve out for "pre-existing digital services" like Sirius XM and Music Choice that allows for certain additional considerations not given to any other digital service when rates are set; and codifies a process for Sound Exchange to pay producers and engineers royalties for records on which they have worked.

Over on the music publishing side of the business, there was much happiness too. For example, ASCAP noted that the legislation reforms an "outdated music licensing system and give music creators an opportunity to obtain compensation that more accurately reflects the value of music in a free market." Billboard notes that the revised Senate version "will go back to the House where it needs approval due to all the changes made to the bill in order to get it passed in the Senate." Once the House approves, it will then head to President Trump's desk.
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Senate Passes Music Modernization Act With Unanimous Support More

Senate Passes Music Modernization Act With Unanimous Support

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  • Anyone have a handle on what this actually does ? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Crashmarik ( 635988 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @03:25AM (#57340290)

    Reading the article it sounds like streaming services are going to have to pay more to stream songs written before 72 in particular and more for everything in general. The article though is notably lacking in details, and keeps falling back to vague platitudes like

    The result is a bill that moves us toward a modern music licensing landscape better founded on fair market rates and fair pay for all. At long last, a brighter tomorrow for both past and future generations of music creators is nearly upon us.”

    I guess it's also nice for MOM and APPLE PIE.

    • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Funny)

      by theM_xl ( 760570 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @03:31AM (#57340296)

      How in the nine hells will they manage a brighter tomorrow for past generations, given the fact that those are DEAD?

      Does this bill have provisions for necromancy?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mccalli ( 323026 )
        Well, arguably the current laws do. That sounds like it's addressing copyright protection and royalty payments to a musician's estate to me. I know no detail about this, just going on what the quote says.

        • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Interesting)

          by rtb61 ( 674572 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @04:14AM (#57340386) Homepage

          If you actually read the text of the bill, you will find they made wire tapping illegal without seeking copyright permissions from the person being recorded and they can charge a royalty but it would depend whether their life is a dramatic work or not, apparently.

          The other weird thing, it gives absolutely no recognition of the public domain, so public domain works can be taken out by a similar new work. Fair use has also been specifically limited to legally recognised libraries, archives and educational institutions. The individual is not entitled to fair use and can have their public domain work stolen by a similar work by a pigopolists. You can rerecord a public domain work and deny the original public domain with new copyright.

          • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Funny)

            by sheramil ( 921315 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @04:16AM (#57340390)

            ... and they can charge a royalty but it would depend whether their life is a dramatic work or not, apparently.

            I would suppose that if you are worth wiretapping, your life is either dramatic or is about to become so.

            • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

              by Anonymous Coward

              "I would suppose that if you are worth wiretapping, your life is either dramatic or is about to become so."

              For the common joe, this doesn't matter too much for him. However consider now if you wiretap a cop, in addition to getting harrassed and brought downtown on bogus charges, you'll get a potential day in court or at the very least a stiff copyright fee.

              But consider that this is the kind of thing that a politician would want the most given the lives they choose to lead.

          • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Interesting)

            by swillden ( 191260 ) <shawn-ds@willden.org> on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @07:07AM (#57340782) Journal

            The other weird thing, it gives absolutely no recognition of the public domain, so public domain works can be taken out by a similar new work.

            Cite?

            Fair use has also been specifically limited to legally recognised libraries, archives and educational institutions.

            I don't see that. I see the section about pre-1972 works (section 1401) that describes Fair Use for these works, and it only mentions libraries, etc., but references section 107 which defines Fair Use, and which the bill does not modify. Since it doesn't change sec. 107, I don't think it changes the scope of Fair Use.

            On both points, if you were right I'd expect to see the ACLU and similar organizations complaining, but I don't.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward

        How in the nine hells will they manage a brighter tomorrow for past generations, given the fact that those are DEAD?

        *

        The dead artists quite often ( nearly always ) have heirs.

        Royalties from music being played or licensed are paid to those heirs.

        Royalties can result in very significant sums of money being paid to the heirs, who are ( by the very definition of the word heir ) still alive.

        You may not think this makes sense, but I assure you that virtually every such heir thinks it makes very good sense indeed.

        Nothing in this world is free, and only a thief or a fool believes otherwise.

        • Nothing in this world is free

          Gravity is free.

        • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @05:37AM (#57340570)

          Actually you have just described something free - the income for the heirs who may never worked, never contributed to anything, they just got the right to the "royalties" for creation of someone related to them. Their ancestor actually already got paid in their life for his artistic contribution from which they and their heirs might have benefited. And now they just get money for nothing. It's not even money for guarding and protecting vision of an artist which i would understand but just the money like they were actual contributors. And if the author gives its creation away to everyone for free for the good of public he now can be overturned by some random shi*head who can just rerecord his art and get again something for free - not only he does not need to pay the actual author but he gets what's is not his - again - for free. It's just a way to pay more for creative works to the rights holder and not to the authors. Counter intuitive, counter productive etc. Like always - good intentions are not enough to conclude in the good legislation.

        • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Insightful)

          by stealth_finger ( 1809752 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @06:27AM (#57340678)

          Nothing in this world is free, and only a thief or a fool believes otherwise.

          Unless your an heir of someone who wrote some popular music before you were even born. Then you get to ride their coattails to bags of free money.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by jbengt ( 874751 )

          Nothing in this world is free, and only a thief or a fool believes otherwise.

          Unless you're an heir to a copyright.

      • Listen, dude. If you don't retroactively increase past incentives for people to have promoted the progress of the useful arts and sciences, then they'll turn out to not have done it. Is that what you want? I was listening to The Doors just last night, and I don't want my files to suddenly disappear all because some entitled jackass doesn't feel like to have been supporting Jim Morrison's drug habit.

    • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Interesting)

      by mentil ( 1748130 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @03:57AM (#57340346)

      Anything that passes with unanimous support is generally about as good for the public as the DMCA and the PATRIOT ACT. Hey, guess who introduced the Sonny Bono Copyright Act to Congress (wherein it passed through the Senate unanimously)? It was Orrin Hatch...

    • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Informative)

      by pots ( 5047349 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @05:51AM (#57340604)
      Here's [eff.org] the EFF's take on it. Apparently it's a combination of the Music Modernization Act (a mostly positive bill updating how compensation works for artists and rights-holders on streaming services), with the CLASSICS Act (another copyright extension and expansion thing).

      • Re:Anyone have a handle on what this actually does (Score:5, Insightful)

        by xxxJonBoyxxx ( 565205 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @10:29AM (#57341660)
        Thank you for the link. It was much needed.

        It should also be pointed out that no one has heard a wiff of this through major news outlets because they've been consumed with made-for-TV hearings to appoint and/or tear down some guy to fill some other similar guy's post. It's almost like both sides of the aisle want that circus to avoid any light to shine on the bipartisan screw-the-little-guy crap (like this) they work out at the bar after the show is over for the day.

      • Thanks. Can't believe this wasn't in the article. Oh hell of course I can, it linked to Billboard.

    • Well, the senate passed it so its safe to assume its pretty horrible for the American people and probably the entire world.

      • Well, the senate passed it so its safe to assume its pretty horrible for the American people. ...

        Is it sad that this is EXACTLY what I thought as I was reading the summary?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      If you asked a congresscritter theyd probably know no more about the leslation that they voted for than the vapid story 'summarization'...

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      it allows trumps associates to monetarise their singing to the fbi,

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sls1j ( 580823 )
      I thought the same thing. It only states what it's suppose to do, not what the actual provisions are. I suspect that the platitudes won't be fully realized instead we'll have something else.
    • What it seeks to do is make music more expensive for consumers and make it more difficult for indie musicians to make money. Business as usual, and something that has not worked to protect musicians' income in the past. Fitting that it's named after Orrin Hatch, a man who has always worked against consumers (although he has tried to make invisible glasses affordable for all so we can be like him).

    • If you write a song tomorrow, there will be a big corporation who has the power to sell the rights to that music without your permission, and you'll have to jump through their hoops if you want to get a portion of that money. They'll keep the rest as a fee for the privilege of them screwing you over.

      Further more, if you try to sell the rights to your own song without involving them, they'll DMCA the results into oblivion.

      This corporation will also be able to charge people for everything in the public domai

    • There's a lot in it but I'll hit some high points.

      Pre-1972 works

      You can basically break everything "recorded audio" into one of four groups for things pre-1973.

      1. Pre-1923: All audio recording pre-1923 will have their copyright expire three years after this becomes law. Since the President has not sign this into law, that three year clock hasn't started.

      2. 1923-1946: They will get a 95 year (that is expires in 2018 to 2041) copyright from date of publish, plus a five year transition period. So expire

  • Software companies are going the subscription way (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @04:50AM (#57340484)

    So I think it's time to establish recurring royalties paid to software developers for software they have worked on too. While we're at it, builders too, because houses are rented out as well. Everybody should get rent for what they did once.

    • Many coders are "Work for Hire", so no royalties. Software should be under patent not copyright, as a cross compiler renders the files sufficiently different it should void the copyright.

  • perverse (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    if anything in the Internet age, copyrights should be shorter because now artists have a much faster ability to sell and market their works than 40 years ago when every sale involved a physical medium that had to be produced and shipped about

  • "More value in the free market" (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Nothing says "free market" like price fixing

  • ...ASCAP noted that the legislation reforms an "outdated music licensing system and give music creators an opportunity to obtain compensation ...

    Typically in the past whenever the music industry talks about compensation for the music writers or performers they are not speaking about the writers or performers of the music, but the music companies that own the rights to the music. Now I see a new word, "creators," and I wonder if anything has changed, or has the music industry once again purchased Congress to increase the income of the music industry while giving a mere pittance or nothing at all to the artists who write and perform the music.

  • Finally, now on to the lesser matters. (Score:3)

    by Pascoea ( 968200 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @09:27AM (#57341280)
    Well fuck, now that we've got this nail biter figured out (whatever the hell it is, I couldn't actually tell from the summary) we can finally move on to some of the issues that are far less important than making sure the music industry can still print money. Or maybe I'm wrong, and this does help fix healthcare, balance the budget, etc.
  • Why is the government involved in the dealings between private parties?

  • Translation (Score:5, Informative)

    by PortHaven ( 242123 ) on Wednesday September 19, 2018 @10:01AM (#57341466) Homepage

    The music cartels have ensured they now ALL get a chunk EVERY time:

    See there are several music cartels, and they fall into a segment groups.

    RIAA collects royalties for "recordings". So whenever you bought a vinyl record, cassette, or CD. They collected royalties for the artists. Let's say you wanted to do a cover of a song and release it on your album. You pay RIAA. But believe it or not, that doesn't necessarily mean you can play that cover live...nope...that's a different cartel. Oh, but let's also add, that the royalties are paid to the copyright holders. Which were usually the record labels themselves, (which formed RIAA), and have spent a century ripping off artists by tacking on fraudulent expenses and failing to pay.

    Performance and broadcast rights. ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC collect the performance rights. This is what classic radio stations paid. They never paid RIAA ^^^ up above. It is also what most churches pay in order to display the words of the songs on projectors, or print them in hymnal books. It is also who you pay for music in your restaurant, elevator music, and I believe your "on hold" music. Oh, but get this...once again it goes to the copyright holder. And what goes to the artist, often goes to only a select few. Huh what? Well see these royalties go to those on record as having "written" the music/lyrics. So if the drummer wasn't involved in writing the song, he doesn't get paid.

    ***

    When the advent of digital music and streaming came about it started to cause a bunch of issues for the cartels, as they kind of got into a turf war with each other and with artists. For example, record labels signed licensing deals with the like of iTunes. But while many artists only received 15% on an album sale, licensing deals were 50/50. But the record label cartels paid the artists as if they were sales.

    Then you had the digital streaming radio. Were these broadcasts (hence under BMI/ASCAP/SESAC) or were these recordings (thus under RIAA). RIAA made an argument that buffering, and caching and the like constituted recording. Mind you, radio has done this with on-air delay for years. But RIAA didn't want to take on the broadcast radio, because gee, who would buy their albums if they never played them.

    Thus was the DMCA and SoundExchange. Now here is the thing, SoundExchange required every online music broadcaster to pay them a royalty per play. But SoundExchange ONLY paid out based on certain number of plays, and those plays as a percentage as a whole. Now at the time 90% of the music played was by independents and micro-labels. But here's the thing, the big labels push a handful of artists and albums in any given season. Listen to yada yada radio, and count how many songs you ever hear. Probably 80% are the same 100 songs on a given station. Hence the popularity of college radio which might play a song from some obscure band once. So suddenly, these big stations start streaming. And their playlists do something interesting...

    College radio and independent streamers.
    1,000 independent artists, each play 10 times = 10,000 plays

    Big Music
    10,000 plays, of a 100 artists. Big Music artists show up as 100 plays each.

    SoundExchange did a couple of things, a minimum number of plays/royalty amount to receive a payout. And a time to claim such. Otherwise, it just went to the cartel. So basically, they now collect the royalties for all the independent bands, but never pay them out. Talk about piracy? Or even more so akin to the East India Company - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    They had succeeded once again in successfully !@#$% over the artists, the independents, college radio, and most consumers. But there were still dubious areas that the music cartels were fighting over. Hence this law, which basically ensures they ALL get a piece of the action everytime.

    And once you understand all this, it's why you usually quit giving a !@#$% about all their hype on pira

  • The other Orin Hatch Act honors the invisible glasses enthusiast by requiring that insurance companies provide coverage for such glasses and associated costs. Ironic, for a man so against healthcare (as well as affordable housing and education, and who has sought to limit DEA authority over drug companies, and who equated homosexuals to nazis).

    Hey, he's a musician, so let's ignore all the shitty things he's done while cozying up to the pharmaceutical lobby and consistently trying to limit the rights of pe

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