Songwriters and publishers are due nearly $400 million in additional payments following the Copyright Board's final determination of Phonorecord III in August, according to information from the Mechanical Licensing Collective (the MLC) released on Friday (February 23).
During Phono III's general license period (2021-2022), the MLC reports that digital service providers such as Spotify, Amazon Music, YouTube and Pandora underpaid rights holders by $419.2 million — 281 million from engineering royalties and $137.8 million from performance royalties. These underpayments were due to the fact that final rates were higher than interim rates during the more than four-year royalty dispute between publishers and streamers.
However, DSPs actually overpaid publishers for mechanical rights during the historic Phono III period (2018-2020) by $28.8 million. That would reduce the total bonus owed to songwriters and publishers to about $390.3 million.
DSPs were given until February 9 to review and adjust their previous payments following the CRB's final determination, although several did not submit the required adjustment reports by the deadline, according to the MLC, which expects the adjustments to rise by another $10 to $15 million once these additional reports appear.
MLC notes that the amounts are estimates only and are subject to change pending its official calculations.
“We are extremely pleased that songwriters and music publishers will finally receive the more than $400 million they are owed in engineering and performance rights from 2021-2022,” said the NMPA president/CEO. David the Israelite in a statement. “Our court victory supporting the rate increase we achieved in 2018 will finally give music creators and copyright holders the windfall they should have received years ago. The fact that most of this adjustment will be distributed by the MLC in a completely transparent and expedient manner is another huge benefit of the Music Modernization Act (MMA), and while we would prefer it to be paid sooner, this is welcome and critical. pick up now.”
A full breakdown of the adjustments by the individual DSPs is available at the MLC website.
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/business/streaming/songwriters-music-publishers-due-400m-streaming-payments-1235614263/
