The Lesson Behind Rebecca Black Pulling "Friday" From YouTube

Today comes the news that Rebecca Black’s “Friday” video is no longer available on YouTube. No great loss there, but what is intriguing is that apparently the video was pulled due to a copyright claim filed by Rebecca Black herself. While it’s not exactly clear what's behind this, the video had amassed 167,370,534 views before it was taken down.

The second interesting piece to this is that ARK Music Factory, the company that produced the song and video, had experimented with a $2.99 YouTube rental earlier this week. From a sales perspective, this was about 150 million views too late, but that's not the point. Regardless if you like or abhor the song, there's a bigger lesson here.

Just a little background: Rebecca's mother paid ARK Music Factory $2,000 to produce the song and video. As these things go, no one expected anything other than a vanity release with a few thousand views if she was lucky. Much to everyone's surprise, the video blew up, went viral and was quite the rage for about a month or so, although more for the general awefullness (is that a word?) of the song and video than anything else.

Now here's where the business part of it gets intriguing. If ARK/Rebecca had the presence of mind to set up as a YouTube affiliate after they saw it blowing up, it's possible that about $100,000 could have generated from adverts (which is a pittance for 150 million of anything). It's also rumored that there was about 300,000 digital sales of the song (although there's no way to verify that), which would've brought in about another $200k. The big question is - who got the money?

This is where the lesson comes in. Was the $2000 Rebecca's mom paid ARK a buy-out? If so, what did it buy out? Who owned the song? Who owned the publishing? Was there even a contract that stipulated any of this? Did ARK or the Black's try to get around a signed agreement?

Without knowing any of the details, on the surface it seems like ARK wanted to generate some last minute revenue so they slapped a $2.99 rental on. The Blacks, unhappy with their end of the payout, retaliated by filing a copyright claim to take the song down. YouTube doesn't necessarily care who owns the rights; all it cares about was that someone claimed copyright infringement, so they play it safe by taking action, so the song came down.

So the lesson? This is a highly unlikely scenario that probably won't be repeated for a long time (at least in this fashion), but it's always, always, always best to have these things worked out ahead of time just in case some unforeseen success occurs. Establishing ownership of any intellectual property up front is by far the least painful scenario in any creative venture - even one as far fetched as Rebecca Black's "Friday." You've been warned.

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The Music Copyright Enforcers

Here's an excellent article from the New York Times about copyright enforcement. It's long but filled with interesting information on how the publishing rights organizations (BMI in this case) collects the money that it doles out to songwriters and publishers.

To summarize, the way a publishing rights organization (PRO) collects money is by making licensing deals with the various broadcast entities like television networks and radio, but also with any business that plays music. If you own a restaurant, gym, or just a retail store playing background music, you need a license and must pay accordingly. Even clubs where live music is played must have a license. As you might expect, collecting from a small mom & pop store, bar or club that doesn't have a lot to begin with isn't that easy.

I've been on both sides of this equation. As a songwriter, I loved the fact that someone was actually out there scouring the country to collect money for me (although I'd only see a very very very small piece of it). As a former restaurant owner, I hated the fact that we had to pay what we thought was an excessively high fee for the privilege of playing background music in our establishment, although we did pay it.

The article also has some great info on how the PRO's started, and some of the their high-teck tracking technology.

It's a great article and worth a read - The Music-Copyright Enforcers.

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New Artist Checklist

I've posted a previous article a few months ago about SoundExchange, the company that collects and distributes royalties for online and satellite music streaming. It's something that every musician should register for if you have music that's playing online, since that's the only way you'll get paid as a performer (ASCAP, BMI and SESAC only collect for mechanical and performance royalties for songwriters, not musical performances).

They've recently posted a New Artist Checklist that's so good that it deserves reposting. Even if you've been around for a while, chances are you missed at least one of the following. Check it out.

Register your copyrights Copyrights to your original creative works exist as soon as you fix the sounds or words or notes to a medium (written down or recorded). But to secure additional legal rights, you must register your copyrights with the US Copyright Office. Electronic registrations can be processed much more quickly than mailed registrations. Also, sound recording and music composition recordings can be registered together, which, if you own both, is cheaper than doing them separately.  Draft an agreement between band members In the glow of the creative process, it’s easy to forget to put things in writing. Write out an agreement in case issues come up at a later time (and they often do). The agreement should address the rights and responsibilities of the band members including who owns what percentage of the business, what property is owned or controlled by the business (including the band name, web site, and equipment) and who funds the bands and looks after its finances. Break out the percentage of ownership rights of each track – who wrote it? How will you split royalties? Discuss what will happen if band members depart, or new members join. Again, we suggest you consult a qualified attorney, to see if and when incorporation or a formal partnership would be recommended to help protect your assets. At any stage, it’s important to have some kind of written agreement in place.  Trademark your name and logo The US Patent and Trademark Office oversees trade and service marks. Make sure no one else owns the rights to your name and/or logo and if not, be sure to register it. It may be your only way to prevent someone from claiming he or she owned the name first, or claiming to be you later. Registrations can be made in different “classes” to cover recordings, live performances, merchandise and other classes, so make sure you cover the bases. Registration costs can add up in a hurry, but a band or artist name and brand may become one of your biggest assets, so it’s well worth it to protect it early.  Form a company (or companies as necessary) for your label, songwriting/publishing, touring, merchandising, etc.) It’s important to look at your work as a small business, not just a creative hobby, and to get all your legal protections in place. Forming a company, partnership, sole proprietorship or LLC and keeping separate financial records can help ensure that you’re compliant with taxes and can protect your interests. A consultation with an entertainment attorney and/or an accountant is strongly recommended.  Pick a songwriting Performing Rights Organization and register – ASCAP, BMI or SESAC If you’re a songwriter or publisher with a song copyright, you’re entitled to collect royalties from public performances of your musical compositions (for instance, the royalties that you are entitled to receive when the songs you wrote are played on the radio). ASCAP, BMI and SESAC take care of this kind of licensing, collect fees from them and pay them to you. They all cover the same copyright, so you only need to affiliate with one. Check out their websites and see which might be best for you.  Register with SoundExchange If you performed on and/or own the masters of a sound recording, you can collect royalties from anyone who streams that track digitally (webcasters, satellite or Internet radio, etc). SoundExchange is the only organization designated by the US government to collect and distribute these royalties, so register now to claim your money. It’s totally free.  Arrange for Distribution Set up an account for digital distribution with an aggregator like IODA, INgrooves, TuneCore, The Orchard or similar companies which allow you to make your music available to the public for digital downloading at popular sites like iTunes,Amazon and others. Be sure to properly enter all metadata accurately during this process since it will propagate everywhere after that. Understand the obligations, splits and commitments you make by entering into an agreement so that you know how it may limit other opportunities.  Embed metadata about each track into each digital file. If a music service opens your file or pops in your CD, and sees ‘Track 1’ and ‘Artist Unknown,’ you could miss out on royalties. While services and webcasters are supposed to report all the tracks they play, they’re busy, and you need to make it as easy as possible. Many millions of dollars have been earmarked for “promo only,” “self-released” and “artist unknown.” Include, at the very least, the artist or group name, copyright holder or label name, and track and album titles, and the ISRC number, if available. Most mastering software includes the ability to embed this data, and online services are available.   Buy/register your website address and social network domains  Start your online marketing and fan building by registering and creating your domain names. It’s common practice for vendors to buy up domains in hopes they’ll be able to jack up the price to sell them back to you when you need them, so pin down the names as soon as you can. Also, create your band’s official profiles on the various popular social networking and sharing sites such as MySpace, Facebook,Twitter, iLike and YouTube.  Check out organizations and associations which may benefit you  There are lots of groups out there doing great things for musicians. Not all of them will be right for you, but a few of them may be. Consider unions like the American Federation of Musicians and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, which represent a wide variety of musicians and performers, at all stages in their careers. Check out what groups like The Recording Academy and musicFIRSTare doing to protect your work. There are also payment funds, including the Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies and the AFM & AFTRA Intellectual Property Rights Distribution Fund, which may have funds to offer for certain kinds of work you’ve done. Many regional and local organizations are also available, and many of these groups offer member benefits and discounts on services you may use. Educate yourself about all the associations which may be open to you, and find out what choices can help you advance your career.   Build your web presence Use your site and social network profiles to sell merchandise, display a photo gallery, and dispense news updates and tour events. Keep the information fresh and interesting. Cross-link and expand your social network communications to drive fans to your website. Consider periodic email or other mass-blasts to keep your audience informed. Be authentic and consistent.  Get health and equipment insurance You want to be able to rock on for years to come, so don’t take any risks. When you’re on the road or at gigs, equipment can disappear, so find affordable but adequate insurance. In addition to private companies, some labor unions and organizations, offer health plans, but do your research to find the right plan for you. Check out the Health Insurance Navigation Tool (HINT) program—a good place to start looking, and get some free advice.  Build your team and assign responsibilities (merchandising, bookings, social media, accounting, licensing, publicity, email management, etc.) Build your business by having the right helpers in place. Assign those tasks to the person or group best suited to them. Many online enhancements or replacements for hired help are available (SonicBids, CDBaby, TopSpin,ReverbNation, Rumblefish, FanBridge, Nimbit and others) which allow artists to take on many of these tasks themselves.  Create great music!  There is no substitute for creative productivity. This is what artists do. So create often and let your audience know what you’ve been up to. It’ll take a lot of work, but before you know it, you could be living the dream.  ----------------------------------- Follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business. Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.