You're correct. I understand the geek nature of the idea, and how any out-of-field implementation looks great. The problem is that music notation is badly understood even by those programming it, and even more badly programmed because programming begets programming -- in other words, just as there are many who think MP3s sound better than full-range high-resolution version, there are many who think amateur music notation looks just fine. They've gotten used to it, and don't actually look at fine metal plate engraving when designing the software. Were the same lack of understanding and poor implementation (even as a demo) brought to an accounting program or photo editor or even a book on Linux, it would be committed to the great hells of derision and disdain.
Dennis
As a music copyist for 40+ years, I'd say this may be a cool concept but has dreadful results. There have been hundreds of programs that produced amateur results like this since the early 1980s, and most of them couldn't (and still can't) do basic contemporary notation. That's why ABC notation is also pretty useless. If it can come close to doing this with good character balance and incorporation of graphical elements -- most of which Finale could do 15 years ago and Score could do long before that -- then it's a start.
I love new implementations, but as any professional in any field knows, ultimately it's what you implement that matters.
Dennis
Please back my project! at Kickstarter.
They have "Avant-Garde Electroacoustic Chamber Music Music Hero" out yet? That'd be me.
Dennis
I'm not saying that Discovery in particular wouldn't pay -- the show (called "Deadly Women" in the U.S.) just wasn't caught in the random cable survey, and I can't retrospectively change the ASCAP registration and approach them myself. The show runs in several world markets, four or more times a year, usually around Halloween in the U.S. There was a 15-minute segment with me, part of which included my music.
Dennis
You're right and I should have been clearer. We used to have to pay membership dues as well as the percentage -- the dues were dropped several years ago. So even if the performances or broadcasts drop below cost, unlike an agent, we don't pay any kind of retainer. But you're correct, they still get (and always got) a percentage of the royalties.
Yes, I have to relinquish trying to get my own royalties. It is, as they say, complicated. I can choose not to register specific pieces with ASCAP, and then try to collect royalties myself. But I can't do it in retrospect, nor can I choose to get live performance royalties but not broadcast royalties and vice-versa, and there's the problem of how to arrange this with the publisher (my own company, in this case, so it would be easier). I emphasize "try to collect" because it's really difficult and rarely successful unless you're an artist with fame or influence or already enough money to sue when you get ignored. Which takes us recursively back to why ASCAP and BMI exist in the first place.
Indeed, with computer technology finally infiltrating broadcasting/cable/web, I'd really love them to end the random surveys and go for 100% reporting.
Dennis
ASCAP doesn't have much 'muscle', it only has the law on its side.
As for the line, "ASCAP does not automatically pay royalties for general live performances," that is correct. Performances have to be reported even for U.S. composers to receive royalties. Similarly, I have to apply to receive my royalties from Belgium or Portugal or Italy or Australia to be funneled to me through ASCAP. On the same site you referenced, you can find ARPA's actual reporting info for overseas performances.
The application you referenced is for the ASCAP Awards, which provide additional funds for composers receive small levels of royalties. It is available to U.S. composers as well.
Dennis
AC, you clearly don't know me (or maybe even my previous
ASCAP often gets lumped in with the RIAA (and now Mussolini? why not do a Godwin on it?), and I was trying to provide a little background on ASCAP's "good side," which has helped me stay afloat as an artist in ways I couldn't do before in our relatively arts-hostile society and economy. ASCAP hardly does everything right, but they are an organization with a relatively small budget (last year's $115 million working budget doesn't finance one medium-size Hollywood movie these days) and a history that stretches back to vaudeville and acoustic shellacs. They can be very slow to change -- especially as changes must go through the 1941 consent decree (somebody correct me if this has changed).
No, I don't get the compensation I deserve because U.S. society doesn't put the same value on the creation of nonpop art/music as do other Western societies. There's no equipment tax that goes to composers, no large publicly supported agency that builds concert halls or provides public salaries to artists. But of the license fee "loaves" charged to venues and broadcasters, ASCAP lets me keep about 11 of my dozen loaves earned rather than your characterization of one in 12 (ever check out how much an agent charges?). They also give songwriting and film composition workshops, legal seminars, and dozens of other regional programs in support of artists' work. They had committees drawn from composer members dicussing Internet music options before there were MP3s to play. Their concert division head Fran Richard is absolutely fierce when it comes to defending composers.
You clearly want me to tell you why ASCAP is screwed up or at least how they could improve. Oh, yeah, they certainly could. They could get their head out of the protectionist sand and be less confrontational about stupid little issues. They could move faster to encourage venues and broadcast/cable outlets to modernize their reporting (and make it more accurate) so the random surveying could be dumped. They're finally getting their online licensing in some sort of decent shape, reducing the paperwork all around. Heck, I'd like to see them raise the licensing fees!
On the other hand, what seem like small issues (arcades, ringtones, bars, Girl Scouts...) are actually a process of defining what constitutes a public performance. The issue of piano rolls was once very important, and licensing those led to jukeboxes, radio, etc. So now virtual-world performances come into play, too. All of these stupid-sounding behaviors are defenses of the artists' rights put into motion -- and yes, some are really stupid. But ultimately ASCAP and BMI are not working for corporate interests (as the RIAA is) but rather artists' interests. That's why we join (and go through a process of evaluation to be accepted).
So, AC, am I an artist? I've always supposed so, and worked hard as an arts advocate. I've fought against copyright extension, against the WIPO regulations, against tethered software, against hardware locks and DRM (even being one of the originators of "key escrow"). As an composer, I've written nearly 1,000 pieces. But you can find all that on my website.
Dennis
The aggregate figures are published in their annual report. The "composers, authors and publishers" in ASCAP's name receive about 88.5% of what they collect. There have been years we've both made money and others in which 11.5% of my royalties wouldn't buy a decent weekend near their offices on New York's Lincoln Plaza.
Dennis
Okay, without getting too personal (this is Slashdot, after all), I'll say that I'm both a composer and a publisher member of ASCAP (my one-person company publishes the works of four composers). It is all tied together so that without ASCAP, there is no network of resources to provide income (I'm not an academic). Those royalties, my paper score and recording sales, an annual award, commissions for new compositions, music engraving (computer typesetting) and recording/restoration make up my income. Some years performances are good, but last year performances (mine and the other three composers) were few because the economy kicked our butts, and I know already royalties this quarter won't be the majority of my income.
The IRS considers my income from composition.
Dennis
No. There is ASCAP as well as BMI and SESAC, and as Artemis mentioned below, CCLI. There are also specialty licensing agencies here, and international agencies (which U.S. artists can be members of) like GEMA, BUMA, etc., etc.
Dennis
Artists can set the rates. There is no requirement to join a licensing agency. The point of the agency is to act as a nationwide intermediary/clearinghouse for the individual artist and publisher, alleviating them of the process of chasing down performances after the fact, negotiating each pre-performance contract, etc.
By the way, individual negotiation is still done for so called "grand rights". Look that one up!
Dennis
The broadcast distribution was (is) a bookkeeping nightmare. I expect a change in the random survey as more logs are computerized, but I appreciate the scope of the problem, and recognize that ASCAP has been improving their technological toolset.
Unlike the rest of the world where each piece is counted because of the relatively small number of broadcast outlets, consider that there are roughly 16,000 radio stations, 2,000 television stations, and 4,000 low-power stations in the U.S. generating 400,000+ hours of programming or some four million plays per day -- including songs, jingles, background music, etc. There is a massive amount of bookkeeping to acquire the composer and publisher information and appropriately divide and distribute the resulting pennies. You can imagine that doing this by hand, as has been the case for 85 years, would have made song-by-song crediting impossible.
Also, note that ASCAP operated for most of its existence under a 1941 consent decree, and the court must approve any changes in collection and distribution systems.
I know there's a developing standard number for recordings, but don't know if that also includes the title codes for the music.
Considering the complexities of finding not only broadcast and cable performances but also live performances, last year ASCAP collected $930+ million in licensing fees and turned over $815+ million of that in royalties. That's a pretty low $115 million (11%) operating-expense ratio for an organization that needs enormous hands-on work and representatives in every state. Composers send in printed programs, lists of performances, etc., which are resolved for duplications, titles hunted down and matched. Tons of manual labor.
Frankly, I would love it if it were possible to get to that automated crediting before I die. That unsurveyed Discovery Channel music alone is worth a good chunk, along with thousands of plays I've had worldwide.
Dennis
Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. -- Albert Einstein
