While it’s doubtful that anyone has ever claimed that the music licensing process is an easy one, many of us who are not involved in the industry have probably never realized just how complicated it really is.
Now we can all see the complexity of music licensing, rights, and royalties at a glance, thanks to a flowchart created by Pure, the company which just launched cloud-based music service FlowSongs.
During his presentation at the FlowSongs launch, Pure CEO Hossein Yassaie showed the flowchart as one of his slides. Yassaie noted during his talk that it took him about three hours to decipher the chart after it was explained, and that there were many instances when he felt like giving up.
“I didn’t believe it at first… being an intellectual property company we understand licensing,” he said. “But I have to say I have never seen anything as complicated as this.”
How did the process ever become such a trainwreck?
Basically, what you are looking at in the flowchart is based upon copyright legislation which was enacted in the 18th century and has simply been added on to as technological innovations have eventually brought us the digital world we live in today.
Though the process is obviously convoluted, and such that Pure wasn’t even able to resolve all of the digital rights issues prior to the FlowSongs launch, it’s one that everyone involved in digital music licensing has to deal with now in order to keep services legal.
“This is new ground in the industry… we’re trying to find a model that works for everyone. If we wait for the copyright legislation written in 1709 to be amended to reflect the reality of technology today, we’ll be waiting a long time to launch these services, but we start from a fundamental position that we respect copyright.” said Pure’s Director of Connected Services Pete Downton.
Unless somebody figures out a way to overhaul how rights and royalties are handled in the music industry, it’s going to remain a daunting and time consuming endeavor that’s more likely stifling not only the creation of new online services, but also the reach that an artist’s music has with their audience. It also gives listeners more of a reason to pirate music, since it’s often easier to find tracks on torrents than on legal services.
