HHR New Media, Entertainment and Technology Group

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•  Yahoo is getting out of the stand-alone Internet radio business.  It has reached an agreement with CBS Radio for the operation and ad-sales operations for LAUNCHcast radio channel.  Yahoo employees will continue to handle programming.  According to this report in the WSJ, the decision was driven, in part, by rising royalty rates for streaming music.
• Here’s an interesting piece from Advertising Age discussing the use of widgets in advertising and marketing campaigns.  The upshot:  the surface is only beginning to be scratched.
• A piece in the New York Times Bits blog discusses how YouTube’s slogan “Broadcast Yourself” can also, inadvertently, mean “Broadcast Your Taste in Videos.”   Apparently by suscribing to a YouTube channel, your user name and picture are posted on the channel page, for all the world to see.  And there is no wasy to keep your subscription private.  We will have a longer post on these type of privacy issues soon.  Stay tuned.

  Royalty Rate Analysis

After months of hearings, testimony and deliberations, on October 2, 2008, the United States Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) announced newly established rates for royalties to be paid to writers and composers (as opposed to performers) whose musical compositions are made and distributed as sound recordings (i.e., phonorecords), including via (1) physical recordings (e.g., CDs, tapes, vinyl, etc.), (2) permanent digital downloads, (3) ringtones, (4) limited/tethered digital downloads and (5) interactive streaming. Continue Reading »

As we previously noted, it was recently reported that in the midst of the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) hearings, the publishers, record labels and digital music providers (DiMA) agreed to a settlement on the royalty rates for limited downloads and Internet streaming, that are scheduled to ratified this October by the CRB. Given the sides’ position throughout the process on this issue was so far apart, it seemed as though these rates, in particular, would certainly be left to be decided by the CRB judges. But in the wake of this news of agreement, the logical conclusion is that the parties agreed on a revenue equation for the rates, as has been the case in other countries for publishing royalties, where the publishers are guaranteed the greater of a certain percentage of revenue or an amount per subscriber, download, stream, play, etc. Continue Reading »

It was recently reported that in the midst of the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) hearings, the publishers, record labels and digital music providers (RIAA, DiMA, etc.) agreed to a settlement on two of the five royalty rates scheduled to be set this October by the CRB. This news surfaces from comments made by National Music Publishers’ Association’s president/CEO David Israelite on June 18^th, 2008, at a recent trade association meeting in New York. Specifically, it seems the sides have reached an agreement on the rates for limited downloads and Internet streaming, but still remain worlds apart on the other rates, which include, digital permanent downloads and ringtones. The confidential agreement still requires approval by three CRB judges, however, there is little chance they will balk at a pack reached by the two sides. Continue Reading »