“Musicians And Their Online Personas” plus 1 more

Almost two years ago, I wrote an article for this website about how the internet has a tendency to hurt your musical career. I stand by this article, but I think it’s important to continually change and recognize your approach to the internet as an artist. Because as much as it has made things harder, it has probably made more things easier. That’s right folks — you have to take the good with the bad. Ultimately, your online persona is your first impression for most people who may become your listeners.

Younger me was pessimistic and unfortunately took pride in being so. Older, wiser, more prestigious me is a bit more thankful. Or maybe I’m just writing that to fill this paragraph. Oh well! Here is the lowdown on the importance of navigating your music career through the internet: what you need to do with it, where we’re going, and how to maintain a reputation.

Groundwork

It’s not brand awareness; it’s band awareness. Okay, sorry for the cheesy pun (well, not really), but look — the groundwork for what it takes to be an active musician is primarily built online nowadays. Emailing people about shows, creating social media accounts, engaging with publicists and press, uploading your music to streaming services — all of that is done online. Chances are, in this day and age, your touring groundwork will be laid online as well, and a lot of it will come through the connections you’ve made through the aforementioned channels.

Yes, flyering is good. Yes, calling people sometimes works. And word of mouth is wonderful when getting people out to your show. But generally, the internet is what’s going to get people who have yet to hear your music interested in what you’re doing. Your entire public profile will be founded on your web standing — don’t underestimate the power in that.

Reputation

A social media presence is important for any kind of professional reputation or public persona in this day and age. Even if you view music as more of a hobby than a job, you still have a reputation to build the second you start playing out of your garage. It’s important that you keep yourself active on social media, because it’s what will bring people out to the shows you’re booking and let people know when you have music out.

Now, you may say “I don’t care about bringing people out. I do this for me, not anyone else.” I get where that mindset comes from, but it’s a completely naive and selfish way of looking at things. Not because you should change your music or shill to anyone, but because playing out doesn’t only involve you. It also involves the promoters, labels, publicists, record store owners, other bands, and the like that take risks on your music and your shows. The least you can do for good people in the music industry is get other people to support them, because as we all know, they’re a rare breed. So staying active on social media and making sure people have ways of hearing your music online is really the least you can do for people who go out of their way to help you. Otherwise, you can stay in your garage.

The Future With VR

If you thought social media and video chat was intense, technology and the world wide web may have more in store for us yet. Urban Daddy (um, excuse the website name?) recently shared the news that the world’s first virtual reality (VR) music venue is here, on a platform called Melody VR. If VR concerts are now possible, why not VR interviews, press conferences and the like?

To be clear, VR is just one technological change, and we don’t know how it will affect the music world yet. I would bet it doesn’t replace real concerts for one reason: the physical experience of a concert. The volume of the music, being crammed into a crowd, dancing or moshing with others, and singing along in unison can’t be duplicated by VR in a way quite as meaningful as the real deal. However, the music industry has to be pro-active in producing and promoting content through all channels. Soon, VR may become important for label showcases, music videos, and press conferences. Would that be cool? I think it might be. But that kind of change may come in another form, not necessarily VR. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see how it all pans out.

 

Here’s to the next 10 years of technology! What’s your take? How do you navigate your online persona in regards to your music? What do you love and hate about it? Let me know all the things over on Twitter @Robolitious.

 

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The Music Modernization Act (“MMA”) has finally passed both the Senate and the House after the herculean efforts of some individuals and organizations who worked tirelessly to negotiate compromises to accommodate all sides. The MMA will finally move the recorded music industry forward in a way that should facilitate more artists and songwriters being able to make a fair living from making music. The MMA proposes to reform the music licensing landscape in several substantive ways to benefit artists and songwriters.

 The MMA is comprehensive and sweeping in its scope. The MMA revamps Section 115 and repeals Section 114(i) of the U.S. Copyright Act. It creates a public data base to facilitate and expedite payments to songwriters and it overhauls the rate Court system and changes the standard for setting rates to a free market standard. The MMA also incorporates several other major pieces of legislation including the CLASSICS Act (Compensating Legacy Artists for their Songs, Service, & Important Contributions to Society Act) which grants copyright protection to pre-1972 sound recordings so songwriters and artists can receive royalties on pre-1972 recordings and the AMP Act (or Allocation for Music Producers Act), which improves royalty payouts for producers and engineers from SoundExchange when their recordings are used on satellite and online radio. Notably, this is the first time producers have ever been mentioned in copyright law.

 Here are some highlights of the MMA’s benefits for recording artists and songwriters:

Section 115 Reform and the Public Database

 The MMA ends the bulk Notice of Intent (NOI) process through the Copyright Office, which can prevent songwriters from being compensated or compensated in a timely manner for uses of their works. Under the MMA, the digital services would fund a Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC), and, in turn, be granted blanket mechanical licenses for interactive streaming or digital downloads of musical works. The MLC would be governed by publishers and self-published songwriters. The MLC would address the challenges digital services face today when attempting to match songwriters and publishers with recordings. The MMA also creates business efficiencies for the digital services by providing a transparent and publicly accessible database housing song ownership information. Additionally, because the database would publicly identify songs that have not been matched to songwriters and/or publishers, publishers would also be able to claim the rights to songs and get paid for those songs. Songwriters and publishers would also be granted an audit right which is not currently available under Section 115 of the US Copyright Act.

Willing Buyer/Willing Seller Standard

The MMA upgrades the current standard to a free market standard. Section 115 of the Copyright Act has regulated musical compositions since 1909—before recorded music even existed. Section 115 allows anyone to seek a compulsory license to reproduce a song in exchange for paying a statutory rate. Current law directs the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB)—the government body responsible for setting the statutory rate—to apply a legal standard to determine rates that does not reflect market value. The MMA replaces the current flawed legal standard with a standard that requires the court to consider free-market conditions when determining rates.

Rate Court System Overhaul & Section 114 Repeal

 The MMA overhauls the rate court system. Currently, ASCAP and BMI are each assigned to a single, respective rate court judge. Every case must be adjudicated before each performance rights organization’s (PRO’s) respective designated consent decree judge. Under the MMA, a district judge in the Southern District of New York would be randomly assigned from the wheel of district judges for rate setting disputes. The “wheel” approach would enable BMI and ASCAP, as well as licensees, to go before any judge in the Southern District of New York on a rotating basis—rather than being assigned to a single judge—for the purpose of rate setting disputes. This approach ensures that the judge will find the facts afresh for each rate case based on the record in that particular case, without impressions derived from prior cases. The MMA would also repeal Section 114(i) of the U.S. Copyright Act which prevents rate courts from considering sound recording royalty rates as a relevant benchmark when setting performance royalty rates. As a result, the playing field has been uneven, at the expense of songwriters. The MMA moves the industry to a fairer system under which PROs and songwriters would have the opportunity to present evidence about the other facets of the music ecosystem to judges for their consideration. This repeal creates the opportunity for songwriters to obtain fairer rates for the public performances of their musical works.

Wallace Collins is an entertainment lawyer with 30+ years’ experience specializing in entertainment, copyright, trademark and internet law. He was a recording artist for Epic Records before attending Fordham Law School. T: (212)661-3656 / www.wallacecollins.com

 

 

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