p2pnet - rss feed: 12th annual NMPA report
p2pnet.net News Feature:- The National Music Publishers’ Association has just released its 12th annual international survey of music publishing revenues detailing income from 46 territories for 2001.
Total global publishing revenues in 2001 fell by 4% to $6.6 billion, it says, although revenues from the use of music on tv and on radio rose by 5.7% and 7.5%, respectively.
But, “Piracy has continued to spread like wildfire throughout the global recording industry, with many key territories watching their legitimate CD sales suffer serious declines in the face of increased unauthorized downloading and CD burning,” says NMPA boss Edward P. Murphy, going on:
“Economic uncertainty also affected much of the world in 2001, and continues to this day. Without a base of consumer confidence, the worldwide music industry will likely continue to struggle in future months. In addition, ongoing economic and intellectual property protection troubles in such developing regions as Latin America and Southeast Asia are continuing to be felt on a global basis.”
Not to worry, though. “Encouraging measures” are being taken around the world and, “Through lobbying efforts, increased law enforcement, and cooperation with the major players in cyberspace, it seems likely that solutions to various problems can be achieved. Lawmakers are still learning about the potential pitfalls in this area, and NMPA and other copyright directed associations have pledged to work with them to find adequate resolutions.”
Moreover, “The authorized availability of music on the Internet will be a victory for copyright owners, Internet services, and consumers alike. Achieving that goal is of vital importance to the entire global music business.”
The NMPA is in raptures over last year’s Online Piracy Resolution, the first of its kind, it says.
“Unanimously” passed by the California Assembly’s Arts, Entertainment, Sports, Tourism, and Internet Media Committee, it, “calls for parents to educate their children about the illegal nature of piracy and asks universities and other such establishments offering broadband connections to introduce ‘employee policies and technical measures to ensure that their networks are not being misused to infringe copyrighted work’.”
Unfortunately, news of the MPAA ‘inititative,’ under which it’s providing free software so parents can spy on their children on behalf of the entertainment industry, hadn’t been published in time for inclusion in the NMPA report, a masterly mix of fact and fiction, misinformation, dissemblement and outright lies to give an ‘unbiased’ view of what’s happening in the world of music, with emphasis on ‘unauthorized file sharing’.
It singles out areas such as Asia for special treatment, but one of the most interesting sections deals with the United States and will no doubt be used by more than one politician as résumé fodder when the time comes for him/her to join the private sector.
For your education and entertainment, and so as not to lose any of the flavour, we’ve included it in full below.
Read on
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In 2002, the U.S. market experienced its third consecutive year of decline, with a 10.2% loss in unit sales to 905.5 million, per IFPI [International Federation of Phonographic Industries, the Big Four record label cartel’s in-house international enforcer] and a corresponding loss in value of 8.1% to $12.3 billion. The effect of the Internet on major album releases was cited as a major factor by IFPI for the decline.
In September 2002 came word that attorneys general in 41 states and three U.S. commonwealths had reached a $143 million settlement of price-fixing charges against the five major U.S. distributors and retailers Trans World Entertainment, Tower Records, and Musicland Stores. The suit, filed in August 2000 in federal court, alleged that from 1995 to 2000, the companies had conspired to inflate the price of CDs, costing consumers millions of dollars. The suit further claimed that the majors and retailers illegally used minimum advertised pricing (MAP) policies to raise CD prices.
Under the settlement, which admitted no wrongdoing on the part of the majors, $67.38 million in cash is to be distributed to the settling states to compensate consumers who overpaid for CDs during the 1995-2000 period, as well as to pay settlement administration costs and attorneys’ fees. In addition, 5.5 million CDs, valued at $75.7 million, will be distributed to public entities and nonprofit organizations in each state to benefit consumers and promote music programs, with the companies paying artist royalties on the CDs.
On Capitol Hill, two limited bills were introduced in Congress during 2002. In the Senate, Ernest Hollings (D-SC) introduced a controversial bill that would have called for new technical anti-copying standards and devices, while in the House, Howard Berman, (D-CA) introduced a measure that would have permitted copyright industries to employ several so-called “self-help” technical measures to slow down and defeat computer networks that allow unauthorized file sharing. Neither bill made its way out of committee.
Also failing to get out of committee was the Music Online Competition Act (MOCA), re-introduced by Rep. Rick Boucher (DVA). The bill would have amended sections of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) to require record companies and other content providers to offer their products to all Internet-delivery companies on the same “nondiscriminatory” terms, to exempt Internet services from paying royalties to music publishers for ephemeral copies and archival “back-up copies,” and to ensure direct payment of the 50% split of compulsory license Webcast royalties to recording artists.
Boucher also introduced the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act, which would modify the DMCA to enable hardware manufacturers to introduce multipurpose technology as long as it is capable of substantial non-infringing use. The bill also stalled in subcommittee.
Meanwhile, House Judiciary Committee Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) called for comments from the industry and others on approaches to dealing with online piracy, with expectations that his committee will hold hearings in 2003 on the issue.
The only music-related measure passed by Congress in 2002 lowered the rate of the new phonorecord digital-performance royalty, for webcasters with revenue of less than $1 million a year.
Music industry and Internet trade groups are continuing negotiations for a joint agreement on phonorecord digital-performance royalty rates for those webcasters who want a statutory license rather than choosing to negotiate directly with labels. The old rate structure ended Dec. 31, 2002. The rates would apply to webcasters with a revenue of more than $1 million, with rates for smaller webcasters already set through 2004.
In the meantime, despite the continuing growing threat of piracy, the major recording companies have announced that, in a compromise with computer companies, they will not seek legislative intervention to prevent digital piracy through technological means. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and two trade groups representing computer makers and software companies—the Business Software Alliance and the Computer Systems Policy Project—said they had agreed on several basic principles that would help ease tensions between their industries, and that they plan to convene a meeting of senior industry executives to discuss technical solutions to combat the illegal copying of digital material.
As part of the agreement, the RIAA said that under most circumstances it would oppose legislation that would require computers and consumer electronics devices to be designed to restrict unauthorized copying of audio and video material. For their part, the computer groups said they would not support legislation seeking to clarify and bolster the rights of people to use copyrighted material in the digital age, which the recording industry has opposed as unnecessary. The Senate Commerce Committee held hearings on January 30, 2003 to investigate the question of whether giant radio concerns wield too much power over the music industry. Lobbyists at the hearing for the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and Clear Channel Communications, which owns over 1,200 stations and is also the country’s largest concert promoter, cited studies they claimed proved that the 1996 deregulation of radio has been beneficial to listeners and asked the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to eliminate other media cross-ownership rules to allow radio to better compete in the digital age.
A group of recording artists, smaller broadcasters, concert promoters, artists’ groups, and musicians’ unions, however, have alleged anti-competitive behavior on the part of Clear Channel. Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) reintroduced his Competition in Radio and Concert Industries Act in 2003, which would prohibit anti-competitive practices in the radio and concert industries.
So-called “pay for play” practices, wherein up-and-coming acts are allegedly urged to supply exclusive promotional concerts to certain radio outlets, have been at the center of the ongoing radio controversy. The RIAA, which did not testify at the hearing, joined with artists’ groups and unions in a coalition letter to the FCC sent during the summer of 2002, warning about the dangers of consolidation and condemning “pay-for-play” arrangements.
Members of both parties on the Senate Judiciary Committee are reported to be preparing their own legislation to address the anti-competitive concerns.
In February 2003, several major music industry and artist groups, including RIAA, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) and the American Federation of Musicians (AFM), agreed to a joint settlement for royalty rates and terms with cable/satellite music subscription services Music Choice, DMX MUSIC and Muzak. The agreement, which avoids the need for a Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel (CARP) proceeding, covers the period of January 1,2002- December 31,2007. Under the deal’s terms, SoundExchange will collect royalties from the digital music channels and distribute them to artists, record companies and other copyright holders.
In April 2003, SoundExchange announced an agreement with webcasters on royalty rates and terms to apply to commercial subscription and non-subscriptionbased webcasters and Internet radio. The parties submitted the proposal to the Copyright Office for industry-wide adoption.
The agreement allows non-subscription webcasters to pay on a perperformance or aggregate tuning hour basis, and offers an additional gross revenue option for subscription services. The rates are: 0.0762 cents ($0.000762) per performance, the same rate as established by the Librarian of Congress after the last CARP; 1.17 cents ($0.0117) per aggregate tuning hour; or 10.9% of gross revenues. The deal does not impact the ability of eligible small commercial webcasters to elect rates and terms adopted under the Small Webcasters Settlement Act. The agreement also does not address rates and terms for noncommercial webcasters or simulcasts of over-the-air broadcasts.
In addition to seeing not only significant declines in record sales but also several high-profile record company executives exiting their posts, the record industry also endured California state senate hearings into its accounting practices.
In January 2002, California Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Culver City) introduced a bill that would have repealed the music industry’s exemption to the state’s “seven-year statute.” The exemption allows record companies to sue artists for undelivered albums if they exit their contracts after seven years. The bill was later rescinded by Murray, who said he would introduce an artists’ rights package of legislation in 2003 that would revisit the seven-year repeal bill, label accounting practices, and artists’ health care and pension benefits. As part of the battle against such unlicensed services, record companies Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, BMG and EMI each launched expanded commercial download initiatives in the fall of 2002, making tens of thousands of tracks available online. Additional content was cleared for distribution through online subscription services, including Rhapsody, Pressplay and MusicNet,which all completed cross-licensing initiatives during 2002 and now each include content from the five majors and dozens of independent labels.
On September 26, 2002, the RIAA announced the launch of an aggressive multimedia campaign to educate the public that unauthorized downloading of digital music is illegal. The campaign, by the Music United for Strong Internet Copyright (MUSIC) coalition of which NMPA is a member, followed published estimates that over 2.6 billion music files are downloaded illegally each month, mainly through the likes of Kazaa and Morpheus.
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See:-
educate their children - MPAA: brainwashing children, p2pnet, April 27, 2004
inititative - MPAA Spy Parent software, p2pnet, November 19, 2004
