Pan-European copyright system?
p2pnet.net News:- A single Europe-wide copyright and licensing system for online music has been proposed by the European Commission.
“We have to improve the licensing of music copyright on the Internet,” says internal market and services commissioner Charlie McCreevy.
“The absence of pan-European copyright licenses makes it difficult for new European-based online services to take off. This is why we are proposing the creation of Europe-wide copyrights clearance.
“Central clearance is not about making content available on the cheap. It offers a model whereby Europe’s creative community will get the lion’s share in revenues achieved online.”
The present structures for cross-border collective management of music copyright, developed for the analogue environment, “prevent music from fulfilling its unique potential as a driver for online content services,” says the EC in a study, going on:
“The Commission proposes options to remedy this situation as only music has the real potential to kick-start online content services in Europe in line with the Lisbon agenda.”
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July 8th, 2005 at 4:56 pm
“It offers a model whereby Europe’s creative community will get the lion’s share in revenues achieved online.”‘
I just hope that the above is not deceptive. Actually my expectation is that by the time the system is in place the creatirs will get almost nothing and the middlemen (publishers/record companies) will be declared to be the “creative community” and will get the lion’s share as a result of leonine contracts that appear to be pussy cats when signed.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
July 9th, 2005 at 4:33 pm
I fully expect it will be the situation where the “Lions share” will go to the music publishers and record labels, the same non-creative intermediaries that have controlled the music and recording industry so far. In the past when there was a promotional aspect that was relevant the percentages might have made sense, but given that the technology has reduced the value-add of the middle-man it is about time we also reduced the revenue-subtract of these largely unnecessary middle-men.
I wrote about the monopoly issues in Canadian New Media last week:
http://www.flora.ca/cnm20050708.shtml
“The Canadian Independent Recording Artists’ Association (CIRAA) reports that less than 5% of Canadian musicians are signed to labels. While most of those musicians who do have recording contracts are not with the major labels represented by CRIA, CRIA reports that they represent over 95% of the Canadian recorded music market. This is a clear indication of a non-competitive market in need of correction.”