UK music-rights collection: Where does all the money go?

I'm a composer, and make 90% of my income from royalties from production music (music, often written for libraries used in TV adverts and documentaries).

Your comment made me angry, as I don't love how composers are continuously dumped on by people who purport to look after their interests. However there is a lot of truth in it. Composers have failed to unionise in the same way as some other creative industries, and have also slit their own throats by chasing short term advantage over collective security, and by using pirated software. The advantage the latter gave to some composers in allowing them able to produce work at low rates (due to lower expenditure) has come back to bite us - our employers now expect everything to be done to a commercial standard either very cheaply or for free. Music libraries and commissioning TV companies now very rarely pay production costs, which can be very high. One big library makes composers use their own studio and facilities, then charges them a large amount for the privilege (the composers are not allowed to see a breakdown of costs of course). Making a fuss about any of this doesn’t usually do your career a lot of good.

Coercion is the norm for composers. If you refuse to sign over at least half, often more than half of your royalty income and IP rights to your work to your employer, be it a TV company, publisher, broadcaster or loosely related non-media company that trades in rights portfolios, the job is given to another composer (or at least that is the threat, which is widely accepted). Many music libraries provide very little information as to how your music has been used, and are quite happy to bypass the MCPS/PRS collection procedures for synchronisation fees (an important source of income now the PRS have cut broadcast royalties to the bone) and sell your music in bulk ‘out the back door’. The MCPS/PRS are quite happy for this to happen, shrugging their shoulders and repeating the mantra that 'times are hard' whilst making business ever easier for their buddies in the publishing industry (if they do not work in the industry themselves). Many younger, less experienced composers are now producing music for ‘royalty free’ libraries such as Audio Networks, and are often unaware of the fact that they will never see any return for their work. Audio Network, who have driven a bulldozer through the conventions that allowed composers to make a living, are notable for having had Tory MP John Whittingdale, chair of the House of Commons Culture Media and Sport select committee sit on their board of directors. Wonder why that is necessary? Other production music libraries are busy killing the golden goose in attempting to emulate the Audio Network model rather than making any attempt to save their own industry. The quality of production music is in a nosedive and experienced, successful composers are finding it hard to pay the rent.

Back in the day composers and publishers had a more or less symbiotic relationship - what was good for the publisher was good for the composer. This has gone now, and wherever profit margins are taking a hit, the industry makes damn sure it comes from the pockets of the composers, not publishers or financial middle men who have swarmed to the industry in recent years. Composers rarely dare to speak up, when they do, their forums have been infiltrated by publishing industry figures who filibuster and prevent any serious communication. Unions like BASCA are pathetic and represent narrow interests. The intense competition between composers for work and income keeps them from supporting each other and establishing a set of fundamental rights and expectations.

Of course, everyone knows the music industry is crooked - it always has been. The sheer extent of the corruption, and how nakedly apparent it is now, right to the top, is breathtaking. Many composers have invested thousands of pounds in equipment, years of their lives working for very little or for free to build up a body of work, so once established it is difficult to leave it as a career. They also work hard to produce work to a high enough standard to compete, yet it seems an increasingly pointless and depressing way of life.

A/C, for obvious reasons.

Re: PRS sucks!

The distribution is based on a sample - memory tells me that it's based on sales and radio play. The result is that that the richer mainstream artists get richer.

Re: Legal Piracy.

Because he follows the Ayn Rand school of thought.

Re: Nice work if you can get it...

Indeed, an obscene salary level for doing the best part of fuck all. Also somewhat higher than the previous dude.

I suspect she was just deliberately annoying you on account of how you kept calling her "young lady".

@AC

I get these as well, addressed to my company. I found a use for them - testing that my shredder is functioning correctly.

Another very helpful organisation in that regard are "TV Licensing".

Re: Organisational infighting ?

" ...taking a cut from ISPs by levying these commercial beneficiaries ..."

How does Virgin Media benefit from me downloading music from somwhere or tapping into a streaming service. I pay them a fixed amount a month for the ability to slurp data, and if I do slurp data then that increases their costs by stressing their network. So they don't benefit from me taking part in 'music sharing'.

If you believe that they are a convenient place to tap into, since they are a known entity with money sloshing around, then why not levy a fee on the Post Office for every music CD that they deliver. After all, that would be logically equivalent to a levy on the ISPs.

Re: Organisational infighting ?

Any sane approach to music sharing on the Net would involve one or other of these societies taking a cut from ISPs by levying these commercial beneficiaries in exchange for legitimisation of non-commercial use by ISP users. That would work like levying radio (the broadcaster pays, the listeners don't since they got rid of needing to have a radio reception license to fund the BBC in the early 60ies).

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How is this sane?

At the moment, we have a system where you pay to play music, which may or may not eventually go back to the content owner - if you play popular stuff it will, if you play unpopular stuff, well you're still paying the popular people.

Instead, you propose to replace it with a system where you may on the off chance you might play music, and have this money be distributed as before.

If the first is insane, the second is moreso. I'm not in the habit of being willing to pay for things I'm not getting.

Re: Organisational infighting ?

But why should I, as an internet user, subsidise the music industry?

I'm sorry that the musicians are having difficulty making a living selling things which are reproducible for free, but why should my film downloads subsidise the music industry? ;)

What about all the house plans I look at. Are the architects going to get a cut of my ISP income too? And what about authors? Will the ISP start paying them as well for all the ebooks available online? Will Mrs Fields and Cinnabon get a cut for all the alleged copies of their recipes floating around? Will the TV networks get a cut for the Simpson's episodes, Starsky & Hutch and Dick Turpin?

Tax & subsidise is not the solution.

Re: Where does all the money go?

To be fair though they did directly link to the information.

Distributions to members..............£557.2m

Re: Outdated and out of touch

It is indeed perfectly possible, but make one mistake and it's going to be very costly.