Songwriters struggle to get paid while the copyright system designed to protect their rights is partially to blame, but why? In this episode of Musonomics, Larry Miller takes a look at how the copyright and royalty payment system is failing a new generation of songwriters.
Continue reading “Songwriters, Consent and the Age of Discontent”
Remixes and mashups will not be subject to compulsory licenses anytime soon according to recommendations presented in a white paper released last month by the Department of Commerce (DoC). The white paper is the result of a 2-year study published by the Internet Task Force created to deal with our “Remix Culture.” The remix culture, as Lawrence Lessig states in his book Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy, utilizes multimedia as its language to communicate. It allows the consumer to quote content from various sources to create something from existing content that can be considered “new.” For example, sampling, taking short snippets from different songs to create a new song that can sound completely different from its original sources — a practice widely used in hip hop and electronic music. Remixing and sampling have become vital techniques and art forms in a new-look media landscape.
Continue reading “No Compulsory Licensing for Remixes, Determines DoC Internet Task Force”
From Adele to the streaming wars to a call for revision of arcane music licensing laws from the U.S. Copyright Office — in our final episode of the year Larry Miller talks with Neil Shah of the Wall Street Journal about the three most important music industry stories of 2015.
