Tag: Frozen Mechanicals Crisis

Do Songwriters Want the Cheese or to Escape the Trap in Phonorecords IV?

By Chris Castle

Here it is.  The US economic data is undeniably leading to a stagflationary outlook reminiscent of the 1970s.  If you don’t have first hand knowledge of the inflation that started under Nixon and Arthur Burns, burned through Ford and Carter and finally came to rest with Federal Reserve Chair Paul Volker and President Ronald Reagan that ultimately resolved in the low inflation that began trending downward in 1983, trust me; it was awful.  

This is why it is insane–if not actually cruel–to force songwriters to take a fixed five year mechanical rate with no downside inflation protection in the form of a cost-of-living adjustment. What is bizarre is that this just happened in the streaming mechanical for the Phonorecords IV proceeding, in case you didn’t hear it over the sound of the backslapping.

It appears that songwriters will get the cost of living adjustment (or “COLA”) on the physical mechanical side–you know, the one the smart people told us was unimportant–but failed to get it on the streaming mechanical side which the smart people tell us is critical to the continuation of life as we know it. Even though it certainly looks more likely than not that growth of the money supply and government debt produces the rocket fuel for the inflation that took 1200 points off of the DJIA in one day. 1970s all over again, including James Taylor crooning “Fire and Rain.”

But economists are beginning to remind us that what makes anyone think the 1970s is the worst it can get?  There’s a tendency to think of 1970s stagflation as a downside boundary.  It’s not.  It just happens to be the worst sustained economic times in living memory as the Depression-era Greatest Generation settles into the silence of old age.  However, there’s nothing magical about the 1970s. 

As it stands today, over 40 countries already have an inflation rate in the double digits, America is a debtor nation, Wall Street has sold a huge number of jobs off shore, productivity growth is lower than the 1970s and we’ve gone along with the central banks’ zero interest rate policies in the years since the 2008 crash.  The piper must be paid for the Lehman Bros. of this world leading us all over the cliff in the great recession, even though the central banks’ easy money policy has delayed that payback.  All of these are reasons why there must be a cost of living adjustment in any government imposed statutory rate that takes away bargaining rights. But wait, there’s more.

When Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell changed the Fed’s inflation targeting (remember “transitory inflation”?), he blew an opportunity to start fixing the real problem.  But no more.  The chickens are coming home to roost with increases in interest rates and yet-to-materialize promise of quantitative tightening. Now that Mr. Powell was reconfirmed for another term.

If there’s even a chance—any chance—that 1970s style stagflation and depression-level demand destruction may be the best we can hope for, anyone setting a wage control like the statutory mechanical royalty rate simply cannot order that rate for five years and fail to take into account the potential for a coming inflation spike even if the smart people sign a suicide pact.  Yet this is exactly what just happened with the settlement of the streaming mechanical rates for Phonorecords IV at the Copyright Royalty Board.

Admittedly, the Copyright Royalty Judges are boxed in given the preference for voluntary settlements baked into the Copyright Act.  That gives the smart people far too much credit and fails miserably to allow the Judges to do what judges do—bring contemplative thought to the problem.  This is what judges do, it is not what lobbyists and their lawyers do.  But unless the public raises the failure to include a cost of living adjustment in comments, so far there’s little basis for the Judges to correct the defective settlement.

It is essential that the Judges are allowed to do their job outside the hurley burley of the commercial relationship with the biggest corporations in history whose lawyers are hell-bent on conducting a scorched earth litigation campaign to crush songwriters.  This is especially true of Google, Amazon and Spotify who have demonstrated truly vile behavior during the entire proceeding, a bully-fest beyond category.

George Johnson hit upon a potential solution in his recent comment. If one applies the COLA to the royalty pool after the mind-numbing “greater than/lesser of formula” created by those seeking full employment for lobbyists, lawyers and accountants, that’s actually a pretty elegant solution. I would quibble a little bit with the idea and apply the COLA as an uplift to the actual royalty statement so that the royalty recipients could see how that uplift was arrived at (which in theory would make them less likely to audit the MLC). That “show your work” approach would allow the payee to see how the MLC got there and make it easier to audit upstream for obvious mistakes.

It will also make it easier for the Judges to add the COLA because the building blocks of the calculation won’t change from the voluntary settlement (TCC, revenue share, etc.).

If songwriters are forced to stay in the confines of the statutory license trap, at least a COLA keeps the cheese from melting before their eyes. Plus they’re not required to guess today what the cost of food at home, shelter and gasoline will be five or six years from now.

The Judges would also have the opportunity to bring the services into a new era of fairness and wipe out the bullying of process as punishment that we all had to endure through two different proceedings.

Remember, as you have probably read or realized yourselves, all the US needs is one more good exogenous roundhouse shock to the economy (such as the world abandoning petrodollars for a basket of currency such as the ruble, the renminbi and the real to pick a few out of thin air), and we are in serious economic straights with hyperinflation as the real bugaboo.

Remember also that the US bonds pay interest at less than the inflation rate.

The decline of the dollar as the premier world reserve currency will put a stop to that interest/inflation spread practically overnight. The US government will not be able to borrow from a seemingly bottomless pit of lenders paying US dollars for US bonds at any price for the stability and transferability. What happens then? Probably interest rates will increase–a lot–to make it worth the lender’s money. Which means the debt service will take up an even bigger chunk of the US budget which will give us less to spend on the “Cross of Iron” weaponry that got us into the petrodollar business in the first place. And so it goes.

Songwriters may not be able to do anything tangible to stop cataclysmic economic events, but they can demand at least a bare minimum of downside protection through a COLA.

You may say, why so cynical? I’m not altogether cynical, I hope that I’m just cynical enough. The numbers don’t lie. If you know anyone who was a child during the Great Depression, or is the child of that person, ask them what it was like.

The overarching point is why would you want to take a chance and bet it all on the smart people?

The cheese or the trap. Which will you have?

by Trichordist Editor

Keeping the Songwriter Survey Open!!

Thanks for the HUGE response to the songwriter survey on what you think the new unfrozen mechanical rate should be!! The response has been so strong we’re going to keep the survey open so more of you can participate.

This Survey Monkey questionnaire is anonymous and easy to take–3 minutes to complete–and you could really help a lot by giving your opinions on what you think the rate should be! We will post the results so everyone can see.

You can start the survey at this link. Thank you!

by Trichordist

The Effect of Unfrozen Mechanicals on Controlled Compositions

[A “controlled compositions clause” explainer for artists and songwriters by Chris Castle on MusicTech.Solutions]

Nice post by Ed Christman in Billboard explaining the continuing crisis on frozen mechanicals. Ed comes up with a rough justice quantification of the impact on songwriter and music publisher revenues in light of controlled compositions clauses in recording contracts that apply to (a) songs written and recorded by artists, or (b) songs by “outside writers” if and only if the artist can get the outside writer to accept the controlled compositions terms and rates.

For those reading along at home, one theory (aside from sheer leverage) that gets used in this context is that the artist/writer can agree on behalf of all co-writers to accept the terms of the license granted by the artist to the label in the controlled compositions clause because they are co-owners of an undivided interest in the song copyright and can grant nonexclusive licenses in the whole subject to a duty to account provided the license is not economic waste or self-dealing. Let’s just leave all that where it lays for now, but that story has never really been properly challenged–particularly the economic waste part given the rate fixing date issue and even the frozen mechanicals crisis itself. We’ll come back to that bit some other time.

The rate fixing date is a key part of the discussion for understanding the impact of unfreezing mechanicals. So what is that rate fixing provision? 

Remember, the controlled compositions clause starts with reducing the minimum statutory mechanical rate in the US (and in theory in Canada subject to MLA) in effect at a point in time. That point in time is either commencement of recording (booo!), delivery, release or sale of a unit embodying the song at issue. Remember that the labels only pay mechanical royalties on physical and downloads (the rates at issue in the frozen mechanicals crisis)–streaming services pay for the interactive streaming mechanicals (and there is no mechanical for webcasting, a whole other beef).

You say, wait–isn’t the mechanical rate 9.1¢? Why does it matter when the record was recorded, delivered, released or sold? Won’t the rates all be the same? And you’d be right if you were asking about a record recorded and released in 2006 or after, or a record recorded and released between 1909 and 1978, like, say some titles by Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Otis Redding or Miles Davis. 

But–it wasn’t always this way. The mechanical royalty rate was set at 2¢ by Congress with the first statutory license, i.e., compulsory license, in 1909 and did not change until the 1976 revision of the US Copyright Act effective 1978. The rate then began to incrementally increase over the years until it reached 9.1¢ in 2006, a phased increase that was to compensate for Congress failing to increase the rate for 70 years, aka “the Ice Age”. The Congress really screwed up songwriters’ lives by freezing the rate at 2¢ during the Ice Age and songwriters and their heirs have been paying for it ever since, right up to the 2006-2022 period, aka “the Second Ice Age” or the Return of the Neanderthals. 

In an effort to help songwriters shovel out from the Ice Age, The Congress also authorized indexing the minimum rate to inflation from 1988 to 1995. Indexing is again on the mind of the Copyright Royalty Board right now–bearing in mind that an increase in rates due to inflation has nothing to do with the intrinsic value of the song copyrights so there’s no confusion. Indexing simply applies any increase in the consumer price index to the statutory rate and preserves buying power. In a way, it is the opposite of a case about value. Indexing assumes that the value issue was already decided (in this case in 2006) and simply preserves buying power so that the “nominal” rate of 9.1¢ in 2006 can still buy the same amount of goods or services in 2022 (or 2023 in the case of the CRB rate period). Otherwise the “real” rate, i.e., the inflation adjusted rate, is not 9.1¢ it is about 6¢.

Remember–the proposed rate increase to 12¢ by the CRB is not about value, it’s about buying power because it’s solely focused on inflation.

So back to controlled compositions. It is no coincidence that at the same time as the 1978 increases were phased in, the labels established controlled compositions clauses that knocked songwriters back down. They would probably not have gotten away with freezing by contract at 2¢ so they let the rate float up but much more slowly and with several caps. The first cap is the maximum number of songs, usually 10 or 11. The next cap is the infamous 3/4 rate, where the label pays based on 75% of the minimum statutory rate. But the third cap is the rate fixing date and that’s the one we want to focus on in the unfrozen mechanicals context.

In simple form, it looks something like this contract language:

If the copyright law of the United States provides for a minimum compulsory rate: The rate equal to seventy-five percent (75%) of the minimum compulsory license rate applicable to the use of musical compositions on audio Records under the United States copyright law (hereinafter referred to as the “U.S. Minimum Statutory Rate”) at the time of the commencement of the recording of the Master concerned but in no event later than the last date for timely Delivery of such Master (the applicable date is hereinafter referred to as the “Copyright Fixing Date”). (The U.S. Minimum Statutory Rate is $.091 per Composition as of January 1, 2006); 

The way that the statutory rate increases come into the controlled compositions clause is because from 1978-2006 the statutory rates increased across albums delivered across album cycles. If you consider that the rates used to increase about every two years and that an album cycle can be two years, it’s likely that LP 1 would have a lower rate than LP2, LP 2 than LP3 and so on right up to 2006.

Also remember that the increases in rates are prospective, meaning that the controlled compositions rate on recordings delivered in the future will, of course, get the higher rate, even if the past rates don’t change which they don’t, at least not yet. Also consider that permanent downloads often are excluded from controlled comp treatment and are paid at full rate, probably on the rate fixing date in the artist’s agreement. Sometimes the download rates “float” or increase in line with increases in the statutory rate, but that’s part of individual negotiations.

If there is an outside songwriter who does not agree to accept the artist’s controlled composition rate (and there are plenty of these) what happens? Typically the label will account to the outside writer at their full minimum statutory rate but will deduct that payment from the maximum aggregate mechanical royalty payable to the artist (i.e., the 10 song cap). There’s some twists and turns to this involving rates on different units “made and distributed”, but for our purposes there is one clear thing to understand:

Because of the rate fixing date which is frozen by contract (the Mini Ice Age) the artist/songwriter will be paying a higher mechanical to the outside writer from a frozen royalty “pool”. 

This is why you should always, always demand “protection” for at least one outside song in your contract and then review each album to determine if that needs to be increased. This is particularly true for records made in places like Nashville where the record company will demand you work with “A” list songwriters (assume none of whom will take 3/4 rate) and then try to deduct the difference between the uncontrolled rate and the controlled rate from you (and if it gets big enough, cross it to your record royalties). (Not only will A list writers not take the 3/4 rate, they’re pissed because they can’t charge you double stat like they do double scale for sessions.)

Example: You have a 10 x 3/4 rate cap on mechanicals, the “cap rate”. That’s the 68.25¢ album rate you hear about (10 x .75 x 9.1¢). Say you have 10 songs on your album and you wrote all of them. You get the entire 68.25¢. If you had two outside songs whose writers get 9.1¢ under current rates, you deduct 18.2¢ from the cap rate, and that leaves 50.05¢ as the “controlled pool” or the total mechanical royalty payable to the artist/songwriter (actually all controlled writers, but leave aside that wrinkle).

So you can see, that’s no longer a 75% rate, it’s actually more like a 55% rate.

Now let’s assume that the new rate is 12¢. Same calculation, two outside songs now get 24¢, but the cap rate stays the same because of the rate fixing date. During the Mini Ice Age, i.e., while that cap rate is fixed at 9.1¢ x 10 x .75, the controlled pool now is expressed as 68.25¢ – 24¢ = 44.25¢, or about 48% (44.25 ÷ 91). The artist’s publisher is not going to be wild about that; the outside writer’s publishers will be thrilled.

This will start to true up on the next LP that takes a rate fixing date after the 12¢ rates go into effect. In that situation you’d be increasing both sides of the equation, so the cap rate would increase to 90¢ (10 x .12 x .75). The outside writers still get 12¢ each for two songs (or 24¢) which is deducted from the cap rate to get a controlled pool of 66¢. The true controlled comp rate is then back to about 55%.

These effects will be less pronounced if you have protection for one or more songs (or fractions of songs) or you have a higher cap, say 11 or 12 instead of 10 (with corresponding increases on other configurations). But you see the trend line.

I think this leads to the conclusion that increasing the statutory rate is a huge step forward and we should all be grateful to the Judges. The rate fixing dates for catalog titles (really the entire rate fixing date concept) must also be considered and any new effort to tweak the controlled compositions clause to effectively nullify the Judges’ rate increase will no doubt cause further conflict.

One day Congress will again act to reduce the effects of the controlled compositions clause and especially the rate fixing date, but in the meantime the Judges may well visit the issue to the extent they are able before we see the Return of the Neanderthals.

by thetrichordist

Unfrozen: What will the new physical mechanical rates do to or do for valuations? — Music Tech Solutions

There are some decades in which nothing happens and some weeks in which decades happen. This was one of those weeks. You no doubt have seen that the Copyright Royalty Judges offered a breath of fresh air in the contentious and labyrinthine Phonorecords III and IV proceedings by refusing to accept the insider “settlement”…but if mechanical royalties have been understated, what does it mean for catalog valuations in the past and in the future? Looking at you, Bob Dylan!

Unfrozen: What will the new physical mechanical rates do to or do for valuations? — Music Tech Solutions
by Trichordist Editor

Major Labels Pounce on Copyright Royalty Judges in Effort to Cram Down Frozen Rates

By Chris Castle

[This post first appeared on MusicTechPolicy]

“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread.” 

Anatole France

It’s hard to believe, but the major labels have filed an “emergency motion” at the Copyright Royalty Board asking the Judges to “clarify” their historic rejection of the insider deal to extend the freeze on physical mechanical royalties for songwriters that many have criticized as being flat out corrupt (and the Judges certainly hinted at it, smoke and fire being what they are). I don’t know about that, but what they seem to really mean is for the Judges to limit the rejection to George Johnson because he’s the only songwriter in the Phonorecords IV proceeding–like that will help them–but screw every other songwriter in the world, and indie label, too, for that matter.

Look, everyone is entitled to a hail mary, but the labels are essentially asking the Judges to say “just kidding” about their rejection of the insider deal. I must say that it’s kind of hard to follow the pretzel logic in places, but one point was very, very clear and it is this:

Nor would there be any basis for the Judges to reject the Settlement as to non-participants [that would be every songwriter except George]. Non-participants take a calculated risk when they choose to sit out a proceeding. Specifically, they decide that to save the expense and burden of participating in a proceeding, they will live with the outcome of the proceeding whatever it is. In particular, just as a dissatisfied non-participant [that would be you and me] cannot seek appellate review of the outcome of a rate proceeding, non-participants may not object to any settlement reached by those who are prepared to undertake the expense and burden of participation. [Well judging by the uniformly negative public comments lots of people including me did not get that memo.] Thus, while Congress has authorized the Judges to decline to adopt a settlement as to an objecting participant, it expressly did not authorize the Judges to decline a settlement as to non-participants who, by definition, have chosen to allow the participants to reach an agreement on their behalf. In so doing, Congress reasonably chose to promote participation in proceedings while also giving settlements broad effect.

Guys, guys, guys…there are a lot of ways you could have said this, but why on Earth you chose this one is beyond me. By definition, non-participants have chosen to allow the participants to reach an agreement on their behalf? Really? Really? By whose definition? I’m sorry, but that just does not pass the laugh test.

And are they really saying that the preferred outcome–promoted by Congress, no less–is to have every songwriter and independent label in the world crammed into the Copyright Royalty Board’s hearing room? Do they really want a line out the door and around several blocks? Because if that’s really what they want, maybe that could be arranged in Phonorecords V. But we also may see real scorched earth litigation ensue here if the Judges refuse to reverse themselves instead of making lemonade out of lemons.

Actually, Congress did not charge the well-heeled major label and publisher participants to look out for the interests of nonparticipants. (Almost sounds like…gasp…a fiduciary duty, don’t it?) You know who Congress does charge with that obligation as true blue fiduciaries?

The Judges. That’s their job. And the Judges showed up for work, rejected the insider deal, and did their job just as they are supposed to in order to preserve equal justice under law.

[If you want to tell the Copyright Royalty Board what you think, try crb@loc.gov]

by Trichordist Editor

All Economic Indicators Are Flashing Red at the Copyright Royalty Board on Frozen Mechanicals–MusicTech.Solutions

by Chris Castle

All of the economic indicators are telling us that inflation is going to be around for a while–so songwriters should expect some cost of living adjustment based on the Consumer Price Index when the Copyright Royalty Board sets mechanical royalty rates, especially for the frozen mechanical rate on physical phonorecords. Why do I say that?

The U.S. Consumer Price Index closed 2021 at 7%. That is the highest inflation level since 1982–and remember in 1982 the U.S. had already had a solid two to three years of Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volker’s anti-inflationary surge after the malaise of the 1970s.

The Producer Price Index for 2021 was measured at 9.7% by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the largest calendar year increase since 2010. The PPI is a leading indicator of inflation as measured by the CPI because it measures a large basket of raw inputs and future price increases that will affect the CPI in weeks or months.

The University of Michigan survey of consumer sentiment fell to 68.8%, its second lowest level in a decade (the lowest being in November 2021). The survey also measured “confidence in government economic policies is at its lowest level since 2014.” The consumer sentiment survey indicates that consumers expect bad times ahead, or at least expensive times. This can have a pronounced effect on consumer inflation expectations.

Consumer inflation expectations remained unchanged after rising strongly over the last year, particularly the one-year outlook. Inflation expectations can be a self-fulfilling driver of inflation for a number of reasons such as FOMO pricing on homes and cars as well as wages–if you expect inflation to rise x% in the next 12 months, today you will seek wage increases of at least x% (if not more).

All of this tells us that the entire idea of extending the freeze on statutory mechanical royalties gets more absurd by the day. It’s entirely reasonable to “index” statutory mechanical royalties during the current rate setting period of 2023-2027 as we’ll all be very lucky to get through that period without suffering crippling inflation that will further erode the 2006 rates the CRB has used for the past 15 years.

[Why this wasn’t fixed in Music Modernization Act is anyone’s guess. This post first appeared on MusicTech.Solutions]

by thetrichordist

Frozen Mechanicals Crisis: @NorthMusicGroup Comment to Copyright Royalty Board

July 26, 2021

Via Electronic Delivery

Copyright Royalty Board 37 CFR Part 385

[Docket No. 21–CRB–0001–PR (2023–2027)]

Determination of Rates and Terms for Making and Distributing Phonorecords (Phonorecords IV)

Copyright Royalty Judge David R. Strickler
Chief Copyright Royalty Judge Jesse M. Feder
Copyright Royalty Judge Steven Ruwe
US Copyright Royalty Board
101 Independence Ave SE
Washington, DC 20024

To Your Honors:

My name is Abby North. I am a music publishing administrator based in Los Angeles. My views expressed in this letter are solely my own.

With my husband, I am a copyright owner of the classic song “Unchained Melody,” among other copyrights.  I also administer musical works on behalf of songwriters, their families and heirs. My clients depend on royalties to pay for life’s essentials.

It is imperative that the Judges understand that despite what some parties may argue, Subpart B royalties absolutely are meaningful to songwriters.

There is no dispute over the fact that streaming is the most prominent form of music distribution, as reported in the popular press.  But mounting evidence shows a significant and consistent growth in vinyl production.  CDs remain popular among some listeners. Other listeners prefer to have permanently available digital copies, i.e., downloads.

Vinyl, once written off for dead, has enjoyed almost 15 years of consecutive growth, with more than 19 million vinyl records sold in the US so far this year.  Per Digital Music News, this is an increase of 108% over the previous year. The Judges need only look to this year’s Record Store Day on July 17 for confirmation of the vinyl resurgence.  

Amazon Music now offers a “Vinyl of the Month” club, curated by “the experts at Amazon Music.”

Vinyl pressing plants are overwhelmed by the volume of orders they are fulfilling, and it is commonly understood in the industry that vinyl sales would be far higher if production could keep up with demand.

Vinyl is now treated as a merchandise item by many labels and artists, and as such it is a significant contributor to the overall earnings of many artists, from the smallest independent to Taylor Swift.

An artist/songwriter of Taylor Swift’s stature may not rely on earnings from vinyl, but other songwriters most certainly do. This is particularly true of artist/songwriters who have seen their high margin vinyl sales cannibalized by streaming (as was noted in the recent report by the UK Parliament’s Digital Culture Media & Sport Committee on the Economics of Music Streaming).  And ALL songwriters rely on any source of revenue available for exploitation of their songs.

As a rightsholder and administrator of legacy and current copyrights, I can testify that mechanicals from physical and download media are a substantial share of overall royalties.

In reviewing my clients’ 2Q21 statements, one legacy songwriter received 57% of his period royalties from physical mechanicals and 9% from download mechanicals. Another writer had uniquely high grand rights and sync royalties for the period, but still saw 17% of overall royalties from physical and download mechanicals. If we remove the grand rights and sync amounts, the overall total from physical and download mechanicals is 35%.

It is clear that streaming rates, even at 15.1%, are not sustainable for most songwriters. It is obvious that without a more equitable streaming revenue distribution model, we will continue to see songwriters leave the business entirely, or at least be forced to pick up side gigs to increase their income.

These facts provide the undeniable case against freezing the Subpart B rate at $.091 per unit.  Arguments I have heard from insiders defending their decision to freeze the rates are that downloads will decline if Apple stops supporting iTunes, and that physical sales are so negligible that they just do not matter. Walk into any record store or follow fans to the merch stands at a concert and you will see and hear the real story. Also, Apple is not the only distributor of digital downloads.

It appears that significant and impactful decisions are allowed to be made by a tiny group of participants that is in the room primarily because this group has tens of millions of dollars to fund legal expenses. This very small group with undeniably substantial resources and very deep pockets decided that it is in support of a rate freeze.

This very small group is now asking the Judges to apply its private deal to each and every songwriter in the world.  And yet, almost none of these songwriters were included in that decision to freeze the rate.

The ability for just two trade organizations to have such an oppressive global impact is staggering. What about the rest of the songwriters and independent publishers and their due process rights?

Respectfully, I implore the Judges to keep in mind that the NMPA does not represent all music publishers, and the NMPA itself owns no copyrights.   At best, the NMPA Board of Directors could speak solely for the music publishers that employ them.

NSAI is one of many United States songwriter organizations, and like the NMPA, owns no copyrights. It most certainly does not represent all songwriters from all US songwriter organizations, and it certainly does not represent songwriters around the world who are not affiliated with songwriter organizations. 

As an illustration of global songwriter opposition, both the UK’s Ivors Academy and the European Composer and Songwriter Alliance have each come out against frozen mechanicals.

I ask the Judges to recognize that NSAI and the NMPA do not have such broad authority to reasonably put forth decisions that affect all the world’s songwriters and publishers.

In the recent Web V decision, the Judges acknowledged the need for an inflation-indexed increase in the statutory rate for sound recordings.  Due to the inevitable decline in buying power created by inflation, the physical and download mechanical rate must correspondingly increase.

I have no objection to a settlement related to mechanicals. I do have an objection to a freeze proposed without authority that does not both increase the old $.091 rate and also include an adjustment for inflation at a bare minimum.

To freeze the rate for 20 years ignores the debilitating impact of inflation, ignores the needs of songwriters and truly independent music publishers like me who are not represented before the CRB, and frankly, displays a willingness to undervalue music.

It is imperative that in the future, publishers and songwriters at large, domestically, and globally be given a mechanism to participate in the rate-setting process, whether or not they have millions of dollars to spend on lawyers.

Music is crucial to human well-being. The American Songbook and its many creators are a treasured element of United States, and in fact, world culture.

How can something so important, so meaningful and so rare not be deserving of a rate increase that at least mitigates the effect of inflation?

Sincerely,

Abby North

North Music Group LLC

by Trichordist Editor