Stay Informed About The Copyright Royalty Board & Sony

Music publishers and songwriters are currently in the middle of the Section 115 rate proceeding to set royalties for our mechanical rights to become effective January 1, 2018.  Universal Music Group (UMG) and Warner Bros. (WB) on the major label side have already settled with the NMPA a few months ago so those non-streaming rates are now set.  The NMPA had hoped that Sony Music Entertainment (SME) would join UMG and WB in the settlement so that the music industry could remain united and then they could focus the remaining fight on improving the royalty rates for interactive streaming.  However, instead of settling, SME has decided to take a hostile position and remain in the CRB proceeding to fight songwriters and publishers on not just the royalties that SME pays to them, but also fight us on the royalties paid to us by the digital streaming services.  All songwriters and publishers need to be aware of this and there is a fair amount of articles on the internet that can be found on the subject, particularly at billboard.biz