Discussion of FCC, copyright, advertising and other legal issues of importance to radio and television broadcasters and other media companies
Principal Editor: David O’Connor
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, and a look ahead at an important deadline next week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
Last week, we discussed the controversy started by Neil Young removing his music from Spotify because of its carriage of Joe Rogan’s podcast. In that article, we looked at the relationship between music royalties and the decision of Spotify and other music services to emphasize podcasts and other talk programming over music. Today, we will look at how music rights and royalties impact decisions like those of Neil Young and other musicians who may have wanted to pull their music to support the protest over Rogan’s podcast.
At its most basic level, there is the question of how much the artists themselves stand to lose from the withdrawal of their music from a service like Spotify. Young himself said that he would lose 60% of his streaming revenue from pulling his music, which one source estimated to be over $700,000. Given the other streaming services that now exist, his music is still available and generating revenue on his catalog, though apparently less than the amount generated by Spotify. The 60% number in and of itself is interesting as, while artists and other music representatives complain about the Spotify per song payouts (likely because they offer a free, ad-supported tier with lower payouts than those from subscription services), the wider variety of services offered by Spotify seem to bring in big numbers of listeners – likely including many who would not subscribe to a pay-music service. Thus, because of the sheer numbers of listeners, and assuming that Young is representative of other artists, Spotify is responsible for the majority of the streaming revenue that has allowed the music industry to enjoy in recent years some of their most profitable years ever. Even with these banner payouts, as we noted in our article on the Spotify side of the equation, the music industry is still not satisfied, recently calling the payouts “appallingly low.” More on that issue in an upcoming post on the discussions of a US broadcast radio sound recording performance royalty.
Continue Reading Spotify, Joe Rogan and Neil Young – Looking at the Rights and Royalty Issues Behind the Story (Part 2 – The Rights of the Artists to Pull Their Music)
The last two weeks have been filled with stories about Neil Young, Joni Mitchell and other artists pulling their music from Spotify in protest of its carriage of the Joe Rogan podcast. While the political statements made by these actions generate the news, there are rights and royalty issues behind the story that are worth exploring. While Washington Post articles here and here touch on some of these issues, looking at them in more depth helps to explain the importance that Spotify places on podcasts and why it would be reluctant to pull a podcast that has so many listeners (reportedly over 10 million per episode), even if the podcast has content that may be objectionable. The issues raised by this controversy are also tied into two other stories that made the news for broadcasters this last week – Congressional hearings on the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act and on a potential sound recording performance royalty on over-the-air radio – topics we will cover in subsequent articles.
Let’s first look at the question of why Spotify, which started as a music service, has pushed so hard into podcasting. We will follow up with a discussion of the issues on the artist side of the equation in a second article. Spotify reportedly paid more than a hundred million dollars for the rights to the Rogan podcast. It has also invested heavily in other podcast companies – including buying podcast technology companies including Anchor and Megaphone, and podcast content aggregators including Gimlet and the Ringer. Deals with celebrities for their podcasts include those with former President Obama for his podcast with Bruce Springsteen, as well as an announced content creation deal with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. Why would a music service spend so heavily to get into spoken word programming?
Continue Reading Spotify, Joe Rogan and Neil Young – Looking at the Rights and Royalty Issues Behind the Story (Part 1 – Why Spotify Has Been Promoting More Podcasts)
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
My law firm partner, Jonathan Cohen, has been closely monitoring the developments in the regulation of social media and other big tech platforms by the current administration. He offers these thoughts on likely areas of legislative and regulatory action in this area in the coming year.
Many nights, the last thing I do before falling asleep is put down my phone, and the first thing I do upon waking is pick it up. I know I’m not alone in this. And how many times have we made an online purchase from bed? Internet-enabled digital technologies seem to have transformed life for most Americans, changing how we conduct business, connect with each other, and receive information and entertainment. The advent of these technologies in recent years is what former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, in his 2019 book From Gutenberg to Google, calls the “third major network revolution,” after the invention of movable-type printing and the innovations in travel and communications brought about by railroads and the telegraph. This new revolution is rapidly changing our information ecosystem.
Beyond the commercial opportunities and challenges presented for tech, media, and telecom companies, as well as content creators, the societal impact of this third major network revolution is fascinating and wide-ranging, but also potentially troubling. Illustrating the power that tech platforms exert over us, Taylor Lorenz of The New York Times recently reported on a conversation she’d had with a 10-year-old boy who was disappointed that no photos were available when he Googled himself. The boy felt that he wasn’t a real person until his photo came up in a Google search. Leaving aside the numerous sociological implications of the tech revolution, the tech sector is under scrutiny as never before. Its business model of tracking users’ online actions and using the data to sell targeted advertising and feed algorithmic amplification has been described by Harvard professor emerita Shoshana Zuboff as “surveillance capitalism.” Others call it the “attention economy.”
Continue Reading Hot Topic for 2022: Tech Regulation
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
As 2021 wound down, there were significant developments on SoundExchange royalties for webcasters – including broadcasters who simulcast their on-air programming through IP channels (such as on their websites and on mobile apps). While we covered many of these matters in our weekly Sunday updates on regulatory matters of importance to broadcasters, we thought that it would be worth summarizing all of the action in one place. Most, but not all, of these developments follow from last year’s Copyright Royalty Board decision raising webcasting rates for 2021-2025 (see our article here summarizing that decision).
The CRB’s decision was published in the Federal Register in October 2021. As of that date, all webcasters, if they had not already been doing so, should be paying the higher royalties ($.0021 per song per listener in 2021 for nonsubscription streams). SoundExchange has appealed the CRB’s decision (presumably to argue the rates should have been set even higher), as have the NAB and the National Religious Broadcasters Noncommercial Music License Committee. These appeals are pending and likely will be briefed and argued sometime in 2022. If you have not trued up your payments (the increase in royalties was retroactive to January 1, 2021), consult your legal advisor as to the effect that these appeals may have on your responsibility for that true-up.
Continue Reading A Look at Developments in SoundExchange Webcasting Royalties (Including for Broadcast Simulcasts) From the End of 2021
As the holiday season comes to an end and 2022 comes into focus, broadcasters have several dates and deadlines to keep up with in January and early February. We have noted below some of the important dates you should be tracking. However, as always, stay in touch with your station’s lawyers and other regulatory advisors for the dates applicable to your operations. We wish you a happy, healthy, and successful New Year – and remembering to track important regulatory dates will help you achieve those ends.
Let’s start with some of the annual dates that always fall in January. By January 10, full-power radio, TV, and Class A licensees should have their quarterly issues/programs lists uploaded to their online public file. The lists are meant to identify the issues of importance to the station’s community and the programs that the station broadcast in October, November, and December that addressed those issues. Prepare the lists carefully and accurately, as they are the only official records of how your station is serving the public and addressing the needs and interests of its community. See our post here for more on this obligation.
Continue Reading January Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters: Issues/Programs Lists; Digital LPTV Deadline; Audio Description Expansion; Children’s Programming, Webcasting Royalties; NCE FM Settlement Window; and More
