The argument about whether the mechanical copyright (the copyright covering the actual sound recording) should be extended in the UK was always going to be resolved from a European Perspective, and the EU has now taken the lead and voted on the way forward. The European Parliament has voted on an extension to the current life of the copyright. 

However, the EU will still differ from the USA on a number of very important points. The most obvious is that the term is 70 years in the EU and not 95 as in the USA. Additionally, there are greater revenue sharing mechanisms in play revolving around a scheme where Labels pay 20% of the additional income gained (from the extra years) into a benevolent fund designed to support performers and sessions musicians. Similar to the USA there is also a clause which makes it mandatory that after 50 years the acts can renegotiate their record deals.

Although, this is clearly a step in the right direction, and does give more power back to the artists I still can’t see why they couldn’t have let the right to copy be handed over to the market place. There is still an argument that if a label can’t make good money from a copyright over 50 years, then the extra 25 won’t help, and if they DID make good money in the first 50, then why should they make more over another 25? And why 70 years and not 95? Why 70 and not 75, or 70 years after death as with publishing? These seem to be arbitrary numbers based on what people ‘feel’ is right. 

Im still a fan for it expiring after 50 years and then the music being sold in a competitive environment. Labels would pay good money to have their copies remastered, perhaps adding extra content so that way their version stood out from the artist’s own version who would be free to sell their copies. I see no downside to this and its more in line with where the industry is heading anyhow which is one defined by open access, low level ‘direct to artist income streams’ with less and less ‘labels’ involvement in the production. 

Are artists in the Long tail who produced their own music, did all the performing and singing going to have to pay 20% of any income derived to the benevolent fund after year 50 of the copyright, even if no one else was involved in the production or performances on the recordings? One wonders if this law is a last ditch effort of acts and labels, who are part of the ‘old industry’, to hold back the tide of change?

The EMI story continues to entertain and distress in equal measure. It would seem that the friction in EMI has now spilled over to Guy Hand’s own private equity company TerraFirma as can be read here.

This news that Mr Hands has bought out (for a nominal sum) some of his co-investors isn’t so shocking taking into account that many investors have no more money to invest. However, the timing is as EMI is due a health check with the banks around March time. Perhaps Mr Hands is expecting to have to literally cough up more money from his own pockets (EMI’s losses have been reduced, but they are still losing and not making money) and he doesn’t want any dead wood as part of the fund holding him back.

Guy Hands might know exactly what he is doing, and indeed he might have a great master plan. On the other hand he might just happen to be the Moby Dick of the Music Industry and EMI is one huge whale.

Clearly in the year where UK acts have been doing so well, its a shame that the UK’s main record label is still so weak and is lacking a true strategy to carry it forward. Once the Beatle’s recordings become shared ownership with the Beatles (which under US law they will) then it might be a case of game over.

For sometime we have been used to music and advertising working together. In many ways, its never been subtle, from the famous Pepsi style ads, to HIp Hop acts wearing branded goods such as Nike and Reebok.

However, its never become a point of standard practise. Mainly because not all acts or all songs reach a large enough or relevant enough audience. Additionally, what with the economy being so tough at present, advertisers demand stats and feedback to deomstrate the bang they get for their buck.

A few years back, Sting’s video for Desert Rose was doubled up as the advert for a Jaguar. It was still subtle enough (in contrast to a pepsi ad) to fit around the narrative of the video but had enough shots of the car so that it could be used in a shortened form for tv and cinema adverts.

With everyone, reaching out and grasping new income models will the idea of advertiser driven content raise its head? We are already seeing how much of the tv industry is supplementing its income due to a market that has gone through huge amounts of fragmentation, and due to advert slots themselves being less effective partially attributed to the tivo style technologies that now exist. 

Shows are either being commissioned by sponsors or prexisting shows are being touted to possible sponsors who may like the concept and see a fit with their product or message.

Why not the same with music? I’m not only suggesting this for individual tracks or artists. Why not apply this approach to the great untapped ‘brand’ of the label itself? Labels have never understood brand. Even though they take great pride in their LABEL, apart from the DefJams or specialist jazz labels of this world, the ‘label’ has rarely stood for anything in the minds of the consumer. Consumers, for the large part, did not buy this or that album because it was on Universal or EMI. They followed the act.

However, if the labels can actually come up with identities (you could call them labels!) which have a very strong focus, and start to sell them as ‘channels’ being targeted at specific target groups- why then they might find that they have a platform which advertisers will want to embrace. This would help create targeted income on Utube Channels, physical product, tv slots. One can even see opportunities with regard to how their music is ‘presented’ on platforms such as Itunes, Amazon or the new mobile ‘unlimited’ music services.

Of course this could have a cynical affect on the music. However, it shouldn’t. After all, record labels have always pushed music that was appealing to an audience. Without doing that, it would not sell and hence not be supported by the label. All we are doing here is doing it in a more coordinated way and making sure the record company’s own label really means something.

We have already seen how music shows on tv are being snapped up by sponsors and ad agencies the world over. Now is the time to take that trend and make it apply to music in general and not just American idol and its copycat shows.

EMI has been struggling for a while now. In fact struggling is probably an understatement. Bought by Guy Hands a few years back now for around £3 billion, in today’s climate (and based on EMI’s continued slide into financial armageddon) surely the banks will soon call in their debt?

EMI claimed at the end of December, that its last 6 months had been positive resulting in cash being generated. Perhaps the slide into financial doom is over? March will be the important month in 2009 as thats when its banker checks the state of the finances, making sure they are in line with the risk and expectations required for the finance to continue and not be called in. 

However, as a huge part of EMI’s sales are in the UK, and as the UK music industry had an awful xmas (due to music sales switching to games, and the lack of coverage on the high street due to the Woolworths situation) one wonders if EMI will find that their position is not quite as positive as they had hoped?

Its rumoured that they are shutting down the world famous Olympic Studios. Recording studios in London (and the developed world) have been finding it tough going for some time, especially the large studios. EMI will concentrate on Abbey Roads, a studio which in recent years has diversified. Abbey Roads has become a specialist venue, and tv studio (home to Live at Abbey Roads - a Channel 4 TV series). Meanwhile its name and facility mix allows it to continue to be used for large budget games/films and top recording artists from around the world. However, the next 12 months will be crucial for Abbey Roads too as its fate is wrapped up in EMI’s. 

EMI needs to work out what it does and how. It doesn’t really have the time to be ‘experimenting’ in the market place and should either streamline down in a particular direction or raise the finance to move aggressively into a new market or distribution platform. It seems, though, that they either lack the direction, don’t know what the future holds (and hence are hedging their bets) or lack the finance to move aggressively to where they want due to the amount of debt they are burdened with. CNET reports that EMI are to launch their own download store, quoting a spokeswoman saying it is where they can ”experiment with new digital platforms.” Well surely the whole download store idea is not exactly something which needs much experimentation? We have Itunes, Amazon, Nokia, Napster, Emusic and many many more? What is EMI bringing to the party?

Ultimately those with a financial stake in the company will at some point ask - how best can our investment maintain or increase its value? Even if ‘turning the company around’ is slowly working, would we be better served by selling it whole, or in parts, to other companies with the direction, resources and finances to make best of the great assets locked into EMI and its heritage.

Its been rumoured on a number of sites now that Itunes will be dropping DRM. Well hurrah if they do. Lets quickly go through the pros, and cons of this decision. 

Cons -

From Apple’s perspective they loose a reason to buy an IPOD or to keep buying an IPOD. Traditionally music bought was tied into that piece of hardware. It would not play on anything else

Music which is exclusive to the Apple’s, Itunes Store can be copied and shared with as much ease as any other material.

Pros - 

For the last two years, people have been able to buy music, legally, without DRM from a number of players in the market. That music would work on an IPOD. So Apple’s business model had actually become a barrier to them growing the Ipod market, as consumers would soon become use to the idea of music download interoperability (remember in the early years, Apple were not the only company with closed DRM).

It should also be noted that the Ipod has now grown beyond its original functionality. Its now a phone, a games machine and slowly becoming a business smart phone which is competing with Blackberry. Hence, there are lots of different ways Apple can make sure it still has content exclusively tied to its hardware by having the best business applications and games to play (adapted uniquely to its hardware). 

Apple still has the Itunes store, and for many that is of value in itself. The Apple hardware, with a dedicated ’streamlined’ (some people think that the Itunes Software needs a MAJOR makeover) software application for purchasing and managing content is a major plus. There are still very few competitors with a fully joined up experience such as Apple’s (Sony are slooooooowly getting there with their PS3 and PSP platforms).

All we need is the record labels to allow Apple to lift DRM across its entire catalogue. Does this mean Apple was always telling the truth when they said it was the Record Companies that forced DRM on them? Well I suspect, that yes, in their continual fear of anything which is not some form of physical distribution system they did insist on DRM. However, I reckon that Apple then saw how they could make it proprietary and use it as a way of making sure no one could ride their success in developing the Ipod platform. 

That market reality has now gone, and now we look forward to a world where, music at least, has no locks on it. The question remains will the Movie Industry follow suite and also allow Apple to unlock the films and tv shows? That would be superb boost to the world of legal digital content, and would result in many more people embracing it.

After all EMI recently stated that since they had lifted DRM via a number of download sites they had not seen an increase in illegal sharing. Those that want to break the law always will, and for the rest of us, if the price is right, if we feel we own the content and can use it across all our hardware without being punished - well we always buy it.

After all we can STILL buy it on CD/DVD and rip it with ease. If companies were THAT concerned with stopping Piracy they would have stopped making CDs and DVDs by now!