AfterDawn: News

Songwriters & composers challenge BPI

British composers and songwriters hit back at the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) yesterday in the battle over royalties from music download sales. Music downloads are just a small fraction of the overall music market currently, but in coming years music downloading will become a multi-billion dollar industry. The BPI, who's members includes big shots such as Sony BMG, Universal, EMI and Time Warner, wants to cut the royalties songwriters receive per 79p download by half.

That means instead of the current 5p per download, songwriters will get just 2.5p. Songwriters and composers were not willing to just sit back and let that happen however. The Music Alliance, a body representing some 44,000 songwriters and composers through the Performing Rights Society and the Mechanical Copyright Protection Society lodged a counter-claim yesterday demanding an increase in royalties to between 7p and 9p per download.



The group also challenged the record labels to reveal just how much money they are currently receive from digital downloads. The Music Alliance has said that if the BPI gets what it wants, then BPI members would receive 40p - 50p per download whereas composers and song writers will get just a few pennies. "We have now submitted our reasons for why the record industry should adopt fresh economic thinking in a digital age to sustain the composing community upon which they rely." said Adam Singer, head of the Music Alliance.

Source:
Independent Online

Written by: James Delahunty @ 3 Dec 2005 14:21

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• 3 comments

• yeardley

  I like the idea behind their counter-claim, but come on, they really should have just gone all the way:
  
  "Sorry? You want to reduce my share from 5p down to 2.5p? Right -- tell you what, kick it up to 78p, you keep 1p, and we'll call it a day."
  
  Honestly, if these composers and songwriters could put the needles and pipes down for one day and put their brains to work, they would have hired a few programmers, web-designers, attorneys and office-lackeys to build their own network of sites a long time ago...in a system where they host their own music, collect 100% of the revenue, and after paying the above-mentioned employees, they take home what they really deserve for producing the content that is being purchased in the first place.
  
  Attention all musicians! Grow some balls!

  3.12.2005 17:10 #1

• A_Klingon

  Dear musicians:
  
  We support YOU! We do not support the megacorps.
  
  Dear musicians:
  
  We want to pay YOU! Not the megacorps.
  
  Dear Musicians:
  
  Without you, there ARE NO greedy megacorps! They are very dead *without* you. WE are blessed *because* of you!
  
  Please help us to help you. If you can, please - as a first step - try to set up an independant website.
  
  God bless musicians - all of you!

  3.12.2005 18:53 #2

• Lethal_B

  Good point. If I were a *decent* musician. there's no way I would stand for that. They could run it themselves and ultimately sell them for only 50p per download- and make ten times what they do now!

  4.12.2005 04:45 #3