# Music Publisher



## zamyen (Jun 13, 2019)

Hi Vi,
I have had an interesting response from one of the big Distributor/Publisher.

Their business is mainly Distribution, but they also offer Publishing Administration.

What is interesting is they said that any compositions registered by them, cannot be uploaded to Royalty Free libraries (for example Audio Jungle, Pond5 etc.)

This seems strange to me since the RF libraries may license the music but don’t collect performance royalties.

It seems I would have to step out of any publishing administration with them, but this begs the question, are there any Publishing Administrators that usually allow working with RF libraries?

Nb. The original compositions are registered with a performing rights society as well, in case this makes a difference.


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## Jaap (Jun 13, 2019)

It's a wrong conception that music sold on RF sites like Pond 5 and Audiojungle can't collect performance royalties

Copy pasting what I posted in this topic: https://vi-control.net/community/threads/back-end-royalties.82559/#post-4394655

As confusing as it is, royalty free does not mean there is no backend. It means that the company/person who buys it only pays a one time fee for the usage and will not have to pay afterwards.
So lets say Company X makes a small documentary about a local town with the intention to only display it at a company for a select group of people, he/she grabs a piece of music from Pond 5 and pays a one time fee for using the music.
But if lets say the network ABC sees that it is a great documentary and decides to broadcast it on its network, then ABC will have to pay the royalties for the music, hence the reason your music should always be registered with a PRO.

And then it does not matter if it is music from a RF or exclusive library. The royalties are paid by the broadcasting network and not by the company who bought license to use the music.
I hope this example clears it up a bit


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## zamyen (Jun 13, 2019)

Jaap said:


> It's a wrong conception that music sold on RF sites like Pond 5 and Audiojungle can't collect performance royalties



Oh I absolutely agree, I would think it is in the Publishing Administrators interest that it gets licensed from those sites (they would make their % cut from collecting this revenue).

So I don’t quite understand why they don’t allow it to be added to RF libraries.


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## Jaap (Jun 13, 2019)

Ah wait, I read your post and interperteted it complete the wrong way 

This is completely on the subject of exclusivity vs non exclusivity. A lot of big publishers want to offer the tracks they have in the catalogue exclusively to their clients, to ensure them a certain "freshness" and also to make it for their clients more appealing to license music from them. Also they then can keep a better value up for their licenses.

It is very common practise in the world of library music that the big (and also a lot of smaller ones) are now going the exclusive road.


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## zamyen (Jun 14, 2019)

Jaap said:


> Ah wait, I read your post and interperteted it complete the wrong way
> 
> This is completely on the subject of exclusivity vs non exclusivity. A lot of big publishers want to offer the tracks they have in the catalogue exclusively to their clients, to ensure them a certain "freshness" and also to make it for their clients more appealing to license music from them. Also they then can keep a better value up for their licenses.
> 
> It is very common practise in the world of library music that the big (and also a lot of smaller ones) are now going the exclusive road.



Thanks, that is a really interesting insight. It looks like I will have to remove myself from the publishing agreement first (giving the required notice) to start using RF sites.

Hopefully I can revert the compositions with the Performing Rights organisation (PRS in the UK) back to being self published.

Finally I will need to figure out if there is a publishing administrator that can work with sites like Pond5 and Audio Jungle, or whether self publishing is the only/best option.

One useful thing the Publishing Administrator was doing was collecting Youtube and other international royalties, for example.


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## Jaap (Jun 14, 2019)

zamyen said:


> Thanks, that is a really interesting insight. It looks like I will have to remove myself from the publishing agreement first (giving the required notice) to start using RF sites.
> 
> Hopefully I can revert the compositions with the Performing Rights organisation (PRS in the UK) back to being self published.
> 
> ...



What a common strategy is to work on both fields. Have tracks that are exclusively bound to an exclusive publisher and make other tracks that you don't register with those libraries and publishers but distribute amongst non exclusive and royalty free libraries. (some of the RF sites are also exclusive btw like Premium Beat).
I assume you are not bound to register every track to that administration publisher?


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## zamyen (Jun 18, 2019)

Thanks Jaap,
Your replies are awesome to these threads.

Here is what they told me on that point “Please also note that you should not be physically registering your compositions with PRS because we do that for you.”

I do think an exclusive music distribution+publishing deal is too constricting if it’s worded like this, so I think going a self publishing route and claiming works directly (where permissible) is the best way.

So I think as I understand:

Royalty Free libraries -> means composer can Register Only with PRS

Other compositions such as those Distributed oneself can be registered with PRS, in addition can be registered for streaming and mechanical royalties. (In the UK these would be PPL and MCPS). Also these can be registered with Adrev/monetised on Youtube.

For royalty free one can’t register the ‘additional’ agencies as this could result in a licensee getting a copyright claim hence why one shouldn’t claim them as the owner in the case of RF library.

In other words, self publish everything and claim PRO oneself. Then for anything not going for licensing make sure to additionally register mechanical, streaming and Youtube with the appropriate agency.

I hope this is accurate, and makes sense overall.


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## Daryl (Jun 18, 2019)

zamyen said:


> Thanks, that is a really interesting insight. It looks like I will have to remove myself from the publishing agreement first (giving the required notice) to start using RF sites.



You have a reversion clause in your contract? I've never seen that with one of the big Publishers.


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## Daryl (Jun 18, 2019)

zamyen said:


> Other compositions such as those Distributed oneself can be registered with PRS, in addition can be registered for streaming and mechanical royalties. (In the UK these would be PPL and MCPS). Also these can be registered with Adrev/monetised on Youtube.



In the UK library music cannot be registered with PPL, as the Neighbouring Rights portion (for the performers) is collected by MCPS, and the Publisher is supposed to pass it on. They never do...!


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## GtrString (Jun 18, 2019)

Yeah, if you sign publishing admin with these companies, you basically cannot sign with any libraries (RF or not). Not even non-exclusive libraries can work with that.


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## Jeremy Spencer (Jun 20, 2019)

zamyen said:


> Here is what they told me on that point “Please also note that you should not be physically registering your compositions with PRS because we do that for you.”



For an exclusive library agreement, this is normal.


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## zamyen (Jun 20, 2019)

Daryl said:


> In the UK library music cannot be registered with PPL, as the Neighbouring Rights portion (for the performers) is collected by MCPS, and the Publisher is supposed to pass it on. They never do...!



The Uk perspective is really useful. Is it permissible to register (RF) library music with MCPS?


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## Daryl (Jun 20, 2019)

zamyen said:


> The Uk perspective is really useful. Is it permissible to register (RF) library music with MCPS?


Any music registered with MCPS will be dealt with via MCPS, and the licence fees are dictated by MCPS, so I'm not sure where RF comes into it. What Royalties are you hoing to avoid claiming?


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## tsk (Jun 20, 2019)

Daryl said:


> Any music registered with MCPS will be dealt with via MCPS, and the licence fees are dictated by MCPS, so I'm not sure where RF comes into it. What Royalties are you hoing to avoid claiming?



There are some strange things out there...

Shutterstock sells "royalty free" music, and yet they are registered with MCPS in the UK and have collected MCPS royalties, apparently. I have no idea how this works.


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