The Copyright Tribunal has endorsed an out of court settlement reached between publishing royalty society MCPS-PRS and various online and mobile music companies last year.
As much previously reported, as the digital music sector grew, MCPS-PRS found itself in dispute with both the UK's record label trade body, the BPI, and various online music firms over the royalty that should be paid to songwriters and publishers for music sold or streamed via online services. The labels and web firms argued the publishers were asking for too big a cut, and eventually the dispute was referred to the Copyright Tribunal, the statutory body that ultimately rules on copyright royalty disputes.
The Tribunal was due to meet last October, but days before the court hearing began the BPI and MCPS-PRS reached a settlement, as did various online companies on various different royalty issues. It was those various out of court agreements with the web firms that the Tribunal gave its approval to this week - recommending that those agreements form the general framework for online royalties moving forward. Among them were agreement that songwriters and publishers will receive 8% of gross revenues generated by on-demand online music services, 6.5% from interactive webcasting services and 5.75% from non-interactive webcasting.
Confirming Tribunal endorsement of those agreements, MCPS-PRS's CEO Steve Porter said yesterday: "This is a great result for music creators. We are happy that the Tribunal has endorsed our approach to this licensing of music used in online services. The uncertainty has finally been removed and we have a template for the future that recognises and affirms the value of the creative process to the online music business".