Music Business Times Radio-TV-Video News

Online music video site MUZU signs up global indies

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 01:41 GMT

The site www.muzu.tv, which pays artists through advertising when their music is played online, has won plaudits from the industry for its design, with users watching over 7 million videos a month. The latest deal is significant because Merlin, which represents the world's most important set of independent music rights, has not signed licensing deals with any other video music site including YouTube or MySpace. For Muzu, the deal will further boost its offering after it signed deals in some territories with the four major labels: Universal, EMI, Sony and Warner.

Unseen Jackson U.K. footage on the way

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 01:37 GMT

ITV is promising exclusive unseen footage of Michael Jackson from the private collection of the singer's friend Uri Geller in a forthcoming documentary, 'My Friend Michael Jackson: Uri's Story,' its production and distribution division said Friday. The documentary will show Jackson on a midnight shopping spree at London department store Harrods and visiting the grounds of Exeter soccer club, as well as footage from Geller's private archive showing the singer acting as best man at Geller's wedding. It will also feature interviews with Geller offering his frank recollections of the star and some of the controversies that surrounded him.

Spotify Looks For A New Tune

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:22 GMT

The way Americans listen to music online might be about to change. Music-streaming Web site Spotify, an online softwareprogram that gives Internet users instant and free access to more than5 million songs, is set to launch in the U.S. later this summer, following its rapid acceptance in Europe. Part of its popularity is its easy format. Type in the name of any artist or album or play list, double click on your choice and—presto—unlimited streaming. With 2 million users in the U.K....

Pandora: If We're Getting Taxed So Heavily By SoundExchange, Radio Should Be Too

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 00:22 GMT

Well, this is rather disappointing. Just days after caving in and agreeing to new webcaster rates that will harm pretty much everyone, Pandora has gotten right into bed with the RIAA/SoundExchange in supporting the Performance Right Act (the RIAA Bailout Act) to extend a similar unnecessary tax on radio. Pandora's reasoning is no surprise: basically it's saying that if it has to pay such a silly tax to help promote musicians, it's unfair that radio stations get away without paying something similar. But, still, it's disappointing.

Hands on with TuneWiki for iPhone

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 00:10 GMT

Yesterday I downloaded a copy of TuneWiki, the new free iPhone application that lets you listen to streaming radio and your personal media collection while displaying lyrics. I tried out Lyrics+ last week and was looking forward to seeing what TuneWiki would bring to the table. What I found was a mix of promising capabilities mixed with a few preliminary growing pains.

Pandora now pushing radio to pay for music, too

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 00:26 GMT

The campaign to get radio stations to pay up for the music they play marches on. With revenues from recorded music sales declining, rightsholders have turned their eyes in recent years to commercial US radio, which currently pays songwriters (but not performers or record labels) for the tunes that power their business. The record labels now have Pandora on their side. The influential webcaster just wrapped up its own music licensing negotiations with rightsholders last week as both sides at last agreed to a deal...

Sinclair Broadcasting Warns of Possible Bankruptcy

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 00:12 GMT

As the ongoing recession continues to take its toll on advertising, Baltimore-based Sinclair Broadcast Group said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it may be forced to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The company said that it had $1.33 billion of outstanding debt as of March 31, and currently lacks the cash to pay back roughly $500 million in notes that could come due in the next 18 months...

Court Rejects Challenge to Copyright Royalty Board Decision on Internet Radio Royalties - No Ruling on CRB Constitutional Issue

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 00:11 GMT

The D.C. US Court of Appeals released its decision for the most part rejecting the appeals of webcasters of the 2007 decision of the Copyright Royalty Board setting Internet Radio royalty rates for the use of sound recordings. The Court generally upheld the Board's decision, finding that the issues raised by the appealing parties did not show that the decision was 'arbitrary and capricious' - a high standard of judicial review that the Courts accord when reviewing supposedly 'expert' administrative agency decisions. On only one issue did the Court have concerns with the CRB's decision - that being the question of the $500 per channel minimum fees that it had required that webcasters pay. The Court found that per channel fee, which could result in astronomical fees for some webcasters regardless of their listenership, was not supported by the record evidence, and remanded that aspect of the case to the CRB for further consideration...

Warner Music Group and YouTube talking again

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 01:43 GMT

No deals have been worked out and there's a long way to go before any agreement is reached. But source say that the mini-cold war between YouTube and Warner Music may be thawing. Representatives from Warner Music and YouTube declined to comment. The two sides parted ways last December as YouTube was trying to renew its licensing agreement for Warner Music's videos. The impasse was a result of Warner's insistence on a deal that was in line with the terms offered to competitors. Another source said the disagreement between YouTube and Warner Music was much more complex than that but declined to elaborate. Since December, YouTube has struck licensing deals with all the other three top recording companies, Universal Music Group, Sony Music, and EMI. YouTube would likely be glad to once again be able to offer videos from all the majors. Warner artists would likely welcome a return to YouTube and the exposure the Web's No. 1 video site offers...

Pandora Secures $35 Million in Funding

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 02:32 GMT

It's been a good week for Pandora, the online radio station, with the recent updated licensing agreement between music representatives and online radio stations, which should give them a much better chance for survival. And now, perhaps not coincidently, Pandora has managed to secure another $35 million in funding ensuring a brighter future for a company that was on the brink of collapse...

A Shroud of Thoughts: A History of Music Videos Part III

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 02:27 GMT

After the heyday immediately following Hollywood's adoption of sound, the number of musical shorts declined from the Thirties into Forties. While musical shorts made for the big screen were less common in the Forties than they had been in the Thirties, there would be well over a thousand musical shorts made for the Panoram visual jukebox, the famous Soundies. Unfortunately, by the late Forties the Soundies would be history, while the advent of network broadcast television in the United States would send movie short subjects of any kind into a sharp decline. This did not mean the end of musical shorts...

Why The New Webcasting Rates Are A Death Sentence For Webcasters

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 02:25 GMT

When the announcement came out this week that webcasters had somehow 'come to an agreement' with SoundExchange over webcasts, what was unbelievable was that many presented this as a 'victory' for webcasters. Hell, even SoundExchange made public statements about how it was disappointed by the rates, but it was an 'experiment.' But when you looked at the actual numbers, this made no sense. The rates are ridiculously high when compared to royalty rates for traditional radio or satellite radio. Michael Robertson breaks down the numbers and explains away the myths of this deal. It will almost certainly bankrupt nearly every webcaster out there. Robertson focuses on the big webcasters, and points out that the 25% royalty rate promoted by the press isn't accurate at all, and for a company like Pandora the real rate will be north of 40% of revenue - which is not even close to sustainable...

Court Vacates Minimum Royalty Fees For Music Webcasters

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 00:45 GMT

A federal appeals court Friday handed a partial victory to Internet radio, vacating a $500 minimum fee per station for webcasters who broadcast recorded music but leaving intact other royalty rates. Commercial webcasters, under the leadership of the Digital Media Association, argued that the $500 minimum fee was unreasonable because it wasn't capped at a certain level. The fee could seriously endanger the existence of companies like Pandora Media or Live365, where users create their own individual stations or playlists. According to the court, some commercial Internet radio business models 'might be deemed to contain thousands or tens of thousands of 'channels,' making the combined fees prohibitively expensive.' The Digital Media Association also counts Microsoft, Motorola, and Amazon.com, among its members.

Soul Train vaults opened for DVD deal

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 00:39 GMT

Fans of television's long-running 'Soul Train' will now have the chance to purchase DVDs of the pioneering dance show. Soul Train Holdings has partnered with Direct Holdings Americas Inc., granting the latter the domestic home video and worldwide clip licensing rights to the 'Soul Train' library. During its 35-year run, 'Soul Train' evolved into a mainstream cultural institution that played host to such R&B and pop icons as Al Green, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, The Jackson 5, Prince, Elton John, Whitney Houston, Justin Timberlake and Beyonce. All told, the 'Soul Train' library houses more than 1,100 hours of archival footage. The show's last new episodes aired in 2006. Direct Holdings' Time Life brand will produce and distribute DVDs of vintage 'Soul Train' pisodes and launch a comprehensive marketing campaign to license show clips worldwide...

The Roots Branch Out

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 00:33 GMT

When The Roots agreed to back Jimmy Fallon, who took over Late Night from Conan O'Brien in March, some of their fans couldn't imagine the band filling the Paul Shaffer role of laughing at whatever the host said. Industry observers, meanwhile, wondered if The Roots would forgo the lucrative business of touring in an era when few bands survive on album sales alone. But for the members of The Roots, the show is a chance to craft a...

Smaller web radio stations not happy with royalty deal

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 00:28 GMT

While this week’s negotiated deal for online radio royalty payments may have saved Pandora, smaller stations may not come off as well. The chairman of one network has complained a minimum $25,000 annual fee could make many stations financially unviable. Under the deal with music industry representative Soundcast, which is expected to get Congressional approval soon, stations which bring in less than $1.25 million a year are exempt from paying per-song royalties. Instead they pay a proportion of their revenues...

The webcasting deal: What took so long?

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:22 GMT

How high were the webcasting royalties set by a federal copyright board more than two years ago? So high that the bacon-saving discount announced Tuesday for 'pureplay' webcasters will still require large ones to pay at least 25% of their revenues to SoundExchange, the agency that represents labels and performing artists. The deal calls for a minimum annual fee of $25,000 - not exactly chump change. Nevertheless, the rates imposed by the Copyright Royalty Board would almost certainly have been a death warrant - they were the equivalent of 70%, 100%, or even more of some webcasters’ total revenues. Those percentages seem outrageous, but consider this: The royalty set by the CRB for 2009 amounted to 2.7 cents per listener per hour of music streamed. The fact that such a fee would amount to 70% or more of a webcaster's income shows how little these companies have been able to generate from advertisers. The picture has actually worsened for webcasters this year as advertisers...

Premier League's failure to register copyrights in US limits YouTube claim

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:17 GMT

A New York lawyer involved in the case has said that if the ruling stands, overseas companies will be forced to register their copyrights in the US to protect their options in future litigation. They must do so within three months of a work being published. The Football Association Premier League, which is behind the English Premiership, filed its lawsuit against YouTube and parent company Google in 2007. It argues that YouTube is profiting from a knowing violation of its copyrights in the league and in footage of games in that league, a claim that YouTube denies. The claim is a class action lawsuit on behalf of the Premier League and music publisher Bourne Co and 'all others similarly situated', according to the court filing. It says that Google and YouTube should be denied the 'safe harbor' protection of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA).

Live365 Decries Webcasting Rate Deal; Submits Own Proposal

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 23:58 GMT

Live365, a provider of 'microwebcasting' services that power Web radio stations from over 5,000 users, said on Thursday that the royalty rate deal announced this week by SoundExchange will have detrimental effects to its business, and submitted its own rate proposal to the agency. 'This deal once again focuses only on a handful of major webcasters, those that are capable of earning more than $1.25M annually,' the company said in a statement, noting that its user-created stations 'will never reach even 2% of the revenue and listening limits set in this pureplay deal.' Additionally, the SoundExchange deal calls for an annual $25,000 upfront payment from all webcasters, 'a fee greater than these microwebcasters can earn with their niche...

Zookz: Unlimited downloads, one price

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:21 GMT

Hear that popping sound? It's the sound of executives in the music and movie industries taking an extra dose of heart medicine. Wednesday, a new site called Zookz began public beta-testing a service that will let users download an unlimited number of MP3 music files for a single monthly fee of $9.95. Users can also download an unlimited number of MP4 movies for the same price, or both music and movies for $17.95 per month. Those are unprotected, DRM-free downloads that can be transferred to any device or shared an unlimited number of times.

Is the Copyright Royalty Board Unconstitutional?

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:17 GMT

As this case demonstrates, billions of dollars and the fates of entire industries can ride on the Copyright Royalty Board’s decisions. The Board thus exercises expansive executive authority analogous to that of, for example, the FCC, the NLRB, and the SEC. But unlike the members of those similarly powerful agencies, since 2004 Copyright Royalty Board members have not been nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Instead, they are appointed by the Librarian of Congress alone, and only only be removed by the Librarian, but only for cause. Moreover, Board members are apparently unsupervised by the Librarian of Congress or by any other Executive Branch official...

Agreement ends royalty battle, though no one's declaring 'victory'

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:12 GMT

'This is hardly a victory for webcasters. It perpetuates a situation where the ability for the Internet radio industry to grow and prosper is hampered — to a nearly fatal degree — by the record industry’s blatant attempt to recoup some of the money lost by their mismanagement of all things digital.' 'This compromise stinks,' writes Jerry Del Colliano. 'If webcasters were dead with the last iteration of SoundExchange’s taxation, they are only half dead now. Dead nonetheless.' Other observers look to the new tiered system of royalty rates and see disincentives to growth and fear innovation will suffer. 'The incentives to grow are now gone. The more the company grows, the more it pays. The fees impose an artificial constraint of funding upfront to innovate. The agreement will kill innovation and smaller providers...

Google, YouTube win dismissal of some damages claims

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:01 GMT

A U.S. judge dismissed some damages claims in a copyright infringement lawsuit against Google Inc and its video-sharing Web site YouTube.com but left open the possibility that non-U.S. based rights owners could seek damages for live broadcasts, if they prevail. A group of sports and music copyright holders, led by the UK-based Football Association Premier League, had argued that foreign works were exempt from any registration requirements under the U.S. Copyright Act. But the judge ruled that damages are not available for any foreign works that were not registered in the United States, except those that fall under a 'live broadcast exemption...

Does anyone still want MTV -- or Viacom?

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:30 GMT

It's reality-check time for MTV. A growing number of music television fans have been reaching for the remote lately instead of sitting through another episode of Paris Hilton's search for a new BFF or the network's sex-charged 'reality' shows. For that matter, fewer viewers seem to want Nickelodeon, Comedy Central or Spike. Although recession-weary Americans have turned to entertainment for escape in big numbers this year, viewership at the biggest cable channels run by Viacom has been dropping. Ad sales are down because of the recession. And Paramount, Viacom's film division, can't seem to consistently turn a profit....

Jesse and Al Ecstatic To Be in the Limelight Again

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:23 GMT

They’ve barely been seen since Barack Obama won the White House, but since Michael Jackson’s death, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have barely left TV screens. 'The American public expects us to be at the forefront of every single issue whether we should be involved or not,' Jesse Jackson said. 'I know it gives people great comfort to see me and Al in front of cameras again. It provides a sense of continuity in this dark time.' JackSharp, as the dynamic duo calls themselves, have been all over the media since June 25, and plan more appearances following the memorial service...