Music Law In The Digital Age

(Berklee Press). With the free-form exchange of music files and musical ideas online, understanding copyright laws has become essential to career success in the new music marketplace. This cutting-edge, plain-language guide shows you how copyright law drives the contemporary music industry. By looking at the law and its recent history, you will understand the new issues introduced by the digital age, as well as continuing issues of traditional copyright law. Whether you are an artist, lawyer, entertainment Web site administrator, record label executive, student, or other participant in the music industry, this book will help you understand how copyright law affects you, helping you use the law to your benefit. * How do you get fair compensation for your work and avoid making costly mistakes? * Can you control who is selling your music on their website? * Is it legal to create mash-ups? * What qualifies as fair use? * How do you clear another artist's samples to use in your own recordings? * What is the Creative Commons/Copyleft movement? * How do you clear music for use in an online music service or store? * Who decides who gets paid how much and by whom? You will learn the answers to these questions as well as: * The basics of copyright law, looking at the Copyright Act while explaining it in plain language * How revenue streams for music are generated under copyright law * The reasoning behind high-profile court decisions related to copyright violations *What licenses are needed for the legal online delivery of music * The intricacies of using music on sites like YouTube, Pandora, and Spotify * Deficiencies in current copyright law and new business model ideas

Today’s music marketplace is more complex than any previous era. It’s easy to feel paralyzed by the plethora of digital services and business models, to say nothing of corresponding revenue streams—all of which are established by copyright. In simple and easy-to-read language, Music Copyright: An Essential Guide for the Digital Age takes readers step-by-step through the world of music copyright, imparting tools to navigate this intricate system. Casey Rae demystifies the laws, business practices, and trends that enable—and sometimes frustrate—a rapidly evolving industry and empowers music creators, managers, and entrepreneurs to make informed decisions. Learn about the exclusive rights attached to expressive works and how they correspond to different roles and royalties within the music marketplace. The book provides: information on protecting and registering copyrights an explanation of recent developments in the courts and Congress pertaining to music copyright law valuable strategies for music licensing information on how to sign up for royalty collection societies and an array of other useful organizations and services

Learn the 10 Rules Every Artist or Band should know about music copyright law, the two copyrights in every song, the two worlds of music, and all the revenue streams that songs generate. The Music Copyright Manual is the essential guide to Music Copyright Law in this digital age. The book is divided in four main sections. In section one, you will learn what is copyright and how to establish one, along with copyright duration and transfer, and what is music publishing. In section two, you will learn all the exclusive rights you get with a copyright and the money streams associated with those rights and how to take advantage of those. You will also learn the keys to joint authorship and what a work-for-hire is and how to retain full ownership of your songs. Section three covers the new realities of the digital music world, including the most recent right of digital audio transmission. You will learn about the revenue sources from music streaming, Youtube, and master recordings. In the final section, music copyright infringement is discussed. You will learn what a plaintiff must prove, defenses, damages, and how to avoid being sued for copyright infringement.

The Death and Life of the Music Industry in the Digital Age challenges the conventional wisdom that the internet is 'killing' the music industry. While technological innovations (primarily in the form of peer-to-peer file-sharing) have evolved to threaten the economic health of major transnational music companies, Rogers illustrates how those same companies have themselves formulated highly innovative response strategies to negate the harmful effects of the internet. In short, it documents how the radical transformative potential of the internet is being suppressed by legal and organisational innovations. Grounded in a social shaping perspective, The Death and Life of the Music Industry in the Digital Age contends that the internet has not altered pre-existing power relations in the music industry where a small handful of very large corporations have long since established an oligopolistic dominance. Furthermore, the book contends that widespread acceptance of the idea that online piracy is rampant, and music largely 'free' actually helps these major music companies in their quest to bolster their power. In doing this, the study serves to deflate much of the transformative hype and digital 'deliria' that has accompanied the internet's evolution as a medium for mass communication.

​This book discusses the economics of the music industry in the context of the changing landscape brought about by innovation, technological change, and rapid digitization. The ability of digital technology to reduce the transaction costs of music copyright licensing has all but destroyed the traditional media business models of incumbent Performance Rights Organizations (PROs), music publishers, record labels, and radio and television stations. In a climate where streaming services are rapidly proliferating and consumers prefer subscription models over direct ownership, new business models, such as direct licensing, are developing. This book provides an overview of the economics of the traditional music industry, the technology-induced changes in business models and copyright law, and the role of publishers, copyright holders and songwriters in the emerging direct licensing model. In Part One, the author examines the economic aspects of direct licensing as an alternative to the traditional blanket license for copyrighted musical compositions, with an emphasis on the often monopolistic nature of PROs. In Part Two, the author focuses on the music publisher and the role direct licensing and competition may play in the changing business models in the music industry and the potential benefits this may bring to copyright holders, such as songwriters. To compliment this model, the author proposes a maximum statutory fixed-rate for musical performances to further streamline the royalty process, especially where distributors such as Google and YouTube are concerned. This book adds to the growing body of literature on the economics of music licensing in the digital age. It will be useful to those in the fields of economics and law, as well as music executives, musicians, songwriters, composers, and other industry professionals who are interested in understanding how technology, innovation and competition have reshaped the music industry.​

Draws on interviews with more than 100 musicians, managers, lawyers, journalists, and scholars to critique the music industrys approach to digital sampling.