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CMU Digest
CMU Digest 18.06.18: Sony, SGAE, Stream Ripping, Young Fathers, StubHub
By Chris Cooke | Published on Monday 18 June 2018
The key stories from the last week in the music business…
Sony Music started sending out memos to managers and labels explaining how it plans to share the profits generated by selling off its Spotify stock. The major recently confirmed it had now sold about half of its shares in Spotify and that the profits of that sale would be shared with artists and the indie labels it distributes. The memo said that those payments would start being made in August and would not be subject to recoupment of advances and other label costs. [READ MORE]
The International Confederation Of Music Publishers said its members were considering “alternative licensing options” in Spain because of continued frustration about the governance of the country’s song rights collecting society SGAE. The most recent controversy at the Spanish society relates to the distribution of TV royalties. The global body for collecting societies CISAC said SGAE was now responding to its own review of that controversy, though the Spanish society still rejects some of ICMP’s specific complaints citing rulings in the Spanish courts. [READ MORE]
At least three stream ripping sites ceased operations under legal pressure from the music industry. Music rights owners still see websites that allow users to generate permanent downloads from audio or video streams as a top piracy concern. With the biggest stream ripping site – YouTubeMP3 – having gone offline last year following legal action by the Recording Industry Association Of America, three more sites have now followed suit citing either the YouTubeMP3 action or a specific cease and desist letter from the record industry. [READ MORE]
Scottish outfit Young Fathers were dropped from a German arts festival because of their support for the pro-Palestine Boycott, Divestment And Sanctions (BDS) movement, which advocates boycotts against Israel. Organisers of the Ruhrtriennale festival acknowledged that criticism of Israel does not constitute anti-Semitism, but said they nevertheless wanted no connection to the BDS campaign. Young Fathers said the decision was “wrong and deeply unfair”. [READ MORE]
A court in California allowed a class action to proceed against secondary ticketing website StubHub. The lawsuit says that the ticket resale site’s practice of adding its fees at the end of the transaction process violates Californian unfair competition and false advertising laws. The eBay company wanted the action to be dismissed, but the judge ruled that the lead plaintiff had made a sufficiently strong case for the litigation to proceed, for now at least. StubHub – alongside Seatwave and Get Me In – recently agreed to start declaring fees upfront in the UK, under pressure from the country’s advertising regulator. [READ MORE]
The big deals from the last seven days in the music business…
• Warner, Sony/ATV, Beggars and Bucks signed up to start-up app licensing platform OCL [INFO]
• Snapchat partnered with Pandora [INFO]
• Arsenal FC partnered with Tidal [INFO]
• Nas’s label Mass Appeal signed a distribution deal with Universal [INFO]
