From your point of view, what is the biggest challenge facing independent music publishers?
In my opinion, the biggest challenge facing independent music publishers is accurate data management. As licensee partners launch and/or continue to expand their offerings around the world, overall music consumption growth will exponentially increase the volume of data being exchanged globally. The ability for partners to ensure their songwriter metadata is kept up-to-date, accurate, and licensed across the globe will continue to become more difficult. Administration partners, such as CMRRA/SX Works, can offer valuable infrastructure support and help the independent sector manage the exchange of data to ensure their metadata is updated and accurate with licensee partners. Tapping into this infrastructure as an extension of their business will enable independent partners to focus on their core business of securing opportunities and nurturing relationships with their songwriters and business partners around the world.
What is the biggest opportunity?
We’re in a global ecosystem; music genres are blending with local cultures around the world, creating limitless boundaries for creativity. The evolution in technology from partners who respect copyrights, will support these new opportunities, allowing creators to collaborate and have success beyond their ‘home’ market. Independent music publishers have the opportunity to align themselves with like-minded business partners, allowing them to scale their business globally.
How do you anticipate the music industry changing over the coming years in terms of what you do?
I believe we’ll continue to see more tech companies (think the next big social media app) and business organisations (sports teams, gaming, fitness etc.) who understand that music creates meaningful engagement with their partners, customers, or audience. Companies must refrain from ignoring the rights process, and de-valuing the contributions of songwriters and music publishers. We need to create a simplified and workable path to license and administer this usage. In doing this, we will continue to build a strong infrastructure to ensure everyone in the value chain realises a monetary upside.
What’s coming up for you that our members should be aware of?
We are currently working on expanding the licensing of post-sync audio-visual activity. The term “post sync” refers to all reproduction activity that occurs subsequent to the initial synchronisation of music within film or television, such as streaming on platforms like Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, etc. This is an established source of revenue within several European territories already, and we are excited that the Canadian market will also soon benefit from this sort of monetization of the activity.
How can music publishers best engage with your company in particular to further their own business?
We believe CMRRA/SX Works is perfectly situated to support the independent communities’ business growth. Our parent company SoundExchange are leaders in technology, sound recording rights management, and administration; layer in CMRRA’s 50 years of deep musical works metadata, licensing, and administration experience, you get the first CMO equipped to service the sector with an integrated data set across both recording and publishing. As well, our Publisher Engagement and Industry Relation teams are meant to enhance the client experience. These teams have a wealth of CMRRA knowledge, along with in-depth experience across the industry and are equipped to help guide partners, answer questions, explain metadata, and rights administration in the most basic form. We are extremely dedicated to education. Independent publishers and self-published songwriters need to be equipped to make an informed business decision to support their strategies. We also feel a duty to ensure that the next generation is armed with fundamental information on the CMO and mechanical rights sector.
We would love to hear from you, please reach out to us at inquiries@cmrra.ca
