JTIP Blog

What’s The Issue?

It seems logical that the creator of a work would own the rights to that work. This general idea imports easily into some industries but creates problems in the music industry. The reality is that the main rights holder of a creative musical work is often not the musicians but collective management organizations (CMOs). After pouring countless hours, days, months, and years into perfecting a single music work or album, the musician often ends up not having total control over his or her work. The music industry is driven by smoke and mirrors where the distributors and records labels often do not disclose who owns the rights to which musical work. George Howard, co-founder of a digital music distributor called TuneCore and professor at Berklee College of Music, describes the music industry as one that lacks transparency. He explains that the music industry is built on asymmetry where the “under-educated, underrepresented, or under-experienced” musicians are deprived of their rights because they are often kept in the dark about their rights as creators.

As a result of the industry having only a few power players, profit is meek for musicians. Back in the day, musicians and their labels were able to get a somewhat steady source of income through physical album sales. However, with the prominence of online streaming, their main source of income has changed. The source of this issue seems to stem from how creators’ rights are tracked and managed.

A piece of music has two copyrights, one for the composition and one for the sound recording, and it is often difficult to keep track of both because the ownership of these rights are split amongst several songwriters and performers. The music industry does not have a way to keep track of these copyrights, and this is an issue especially when there are several individuals involved in creating a single musical work. With the development of digital ledger technology and its influence in various industries, it could be time that this development makes its way into the music industry and provide a solution to compensate musicians for their lost profits.

Blockchains: the solution?

     Lately, blockchain technology has been at the forefront of conversations. For example, the variation in Bitcoin’s pricing has been a hot topic. Blockchain technology seems like a mouthful, but it is simply a “database maintained by a distributed network of computers.” Blockchains allow information to be recorded, distributed across decentralized ledgers, and stored in a network that is secure against outside tampering.

With the advancement of online music streaming, and entertainment going digital, blockchain seems like the perfect tool to be used in this industry. Since the issue of weakened profits seems to stem from disorganized tracking and monitoring of creators, blockchain technology could be utilized to improve the systems used for licensing and royalty payments. A blockchain ledger would allow a third party to track the process of a creative work and be an accessible way of managing intellectual property rights of these creative works. By tracking and monitoring their works, musicians could potentially gain back their profits, or at least recuperate some of their losses.

     In 1998, there were several companies that came together to create a centralized database to organize copyrights for copyright owners so that royalty payments would be made in an orderly fashion. This effort was called the Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMIT) and its purpose was to “create an open framework for sharing encrypting music by not only respecting copyrights, but also allowing the use of them in unprotected formats.” Unfortunately, this initiative failed to provide a universal standard for encrypting music.

The latest venture was the Global Repertoire Database (GRD) which aimed to “create a singular, compiled, and authoritative ledger of ownership and control of musical works around the world.” This was a very ambitious move and required two rounds of financing which consisted of the initial startup funds and the funds to cover the budgeting for the year. Although there were significant contributions to this mission, some collection societies, such as the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), started to pull out of the fund due to GRD’s failure and debt that it accumulated.

Even though this venture failed to provide a centralized database that could resolve royalty and licensing issues, there is now a growing consensus in the music industry for a global, digital database that properly, and efficiently, manages copyright ownership information. The next venture could utilize blockchain technology because of the advantages for storage, tracking, and security that it offers. In addition, not only could blockchain provide a centralized database so that music content information is accurately organized, it could provide a way to close the gap between creators and consumers and dispose of intermediaries. This would allow for a more seamless experience and transparency for the consumer and allow the creators to have more control over their works. Further, this ledger would allow these creators to upload all of their musical work elements, such as the composition, lyrics, cover art, video performances and licensing information, to a single, uniform database. This information would be available globally in an easily verified peer-to-peer system.

     On the other hand, since blockchains are tamper-resistant, the data could not be “changed or deleted without affecting the entire system” even with a central authority. This means that if someone decides to delete a file from the system, such a deletion will disrupt the whole chain. There could also be issues with implementing such a large network of systems, or computers, due to the sheer amount of music that is globally available. Additionally, to identify each registered work, the right holders have to upload digital copies of their works which would require an extensive amount of storage and computational power to save entire songs.

Nevertheless, blockchain could provide the base for implementing a centralized database using a network of systems, or computers, in order to organize royalty payments for these musicians. Proponents contend that, with the help of Congress, this could be made possible. Congress recently introduced Bill HR 3350, Transparency in Music Licensing and Ownership Act. This act, if passed, will require musicians to register their songs in a federal database or else forfeit the ability to enforce their copyright, which would prevent them from collecting their royalties for those works. Although this might seem like an ultimatum, this proposed Act would provide the best way of changing how the music industry stores its information to provide an efficient way to distribute royalties and licensing payments to these artists.

Conclusion

     People are split in their opinions about blockchain technology in the music industry. There are some who see this as a more accurate way of managing “consumer content ownership in the digital domain.” Others do not see this as a viable plan due to its lack of scalability to compensate for the vast amount of musical works. Even with the development of the music industry into the digital field, the goal is always to protect the artists’ works. Plan [B]lockchain ledger may not completely solve the royalty problem in the music industry, but it can provide a starting point in creating a more robust metadata database and, in combination with legislative change, the musical works could remain in the hands of their respectable owners.

Jenny Kim is a second-year law student at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law.