Apple pays $163.3M for historical unmatched song royalties

Posted:
in General Discussion edited February 2021
Apple and a number of major streaming music services recently paid a total of $424,384,787 in accrued historical unmatched royalties to a body formed under the Music Modernization Act, with the large sum expected to be meted out to songwriters and publishers starting this April.

Apple Music


The Mechanical Licensing Collective on Tuesday announced it has taken receipt of royalty payments and corresponding usage data from 20 streaming providers as per 2018's Music Modernization Act's limitation on liability for past infringement, reports Variety.

Apple and its Apple Music was the biggest contributor with $163.34 million, followed by Spotify's $152.23 million. Amazon and Google also chipped in with respective payments of $42.74 million and $32.86 million. Smaller streaming companies like Pandora, SoundCloud, and Tidal also put money in the pot.

"Songwriters and music publishers have for years fought to ensure they were paid accurately and fully by digital streaming services," National Music Publishers Association President and CEO David Israelite said in a statement. "Unmatched money' has plagued the industry and today, thanks to the Music Modernization Act, we know that it amounts to just under $425 million - not including money previously paid out in multiple million-dollar settlements. The Mechanical Licensing Collective obtaining this historically unmatched money, doing the research to find its owners, and giving copyright owners a transparent process to claim what is theirs is exciting progress that paves the way for the future growth of streaming that will benefit the entire industry."

Designated by the U.S. Register of Copyrights in July 2019, the MLC is responsible for administering a compulsory license for the use of music by digital services. That includes the processing and payout of mechanical royalties from streaming in the U.S.

The MLC began to exercise a new blanket license for streaming services on Jan. 1. An improvement over a song-by-song licensing scheme that was previously in place, the blanket method is designed to deliver royalties to rights holders in a more timely manner, the report notes.

With help from digital service providers, the MLC developed and implemented specifications for song usage reports that inform royalty payouts. The group plans to provide more information about historical unmatched royalties through its website.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    Pretty sure the executive and the organization will take the biggest chunk of money.
    wookie01zeus423
  • Reply 2 of 4
    viclauyyc said:
    Pretty sure the executive and the organization will take the biggest chunk of money.
    Just like any class action suit where the lawyers get 95% and everyone else gets scraps.
  • Reply 3 of 4
    chadbagchadbag Posts: 2,026member
    I doubt the executive and the org will get the biggest chunk since this was set up by a law.  This is unlike a court case.  

    My question is:  what is historical unmatched royalties?  I assume this is royalties for songs for which the owner or rights holder is unknown for plays up through Jan 1 (when the new mechanism came into play).  Not sure how it worked before but I would have thought the same per song/stream payment would have been made to whomever was previously in charge and they would be sitting on the dough. 
    d_2
  • Reply 4 of 4
    viclauyyc said:
    Pretty sure the executive and the organization will take the biggest chunk of money.
    That could very well be the case, or it could not.  MLC pays the royalties to the rights holder; be it the publisher, artist, writer, or a combination of the aforementioned.  Mechanical royalties are separate from recording royalties (which most of us are familiar with). At it's most basic, this is about properly paying for song writing credit.
Sign In or Register to comment.