“Advancing the Creative Economy” was the theme of the Copyright Clearance Center’s OnCopyright 2012 conference on March 30, and an important first order of business seemed to be defining what, exactly, a creative economy is. For many, it became a matter of semantics: “piracy” and “stealing” vs. “infringement,” “individual” vs. “commercial,” “intellectual property” vs. “creative greater good,” and “copyright” vs. “licensing.” The philosophical implications of these words clearly depended on what roles panelists played in the creative economy, as did the preference as to whether copyright ambiguities be better defined, or remain vague and fungible… read more

There’s a fascinating report from the Future of Music Coalition called Artist Revenue Streams (ARS), which they describe as “a multi-stage research project to assess whether and how musicians’ revenue streams are changing in this new music landscape.” They recently released an installment which focuses on an orchestra musician’s income/expense structure during the period 2000-2011 and the results are intriguing.[…]

The Future of Music Coalition has been working on a long-term project that goes beyond personal anecdote and uses tax returns and other information to better understand where money in the music business goes, including how much goes to musicians.

The Artist Revenue Streams project examines how musicians’ revenue streams are changing, and why…

If you are a current investor, it may hurt you to hear this, but Pandora ceases to exist without access to artists’ music, and in no way can it (or should it) be the other way around. Ask yourself this: Will the music royalty checks decrease or stop rolling in if Pandora goes away? No. Will you stop listening, buying, streaming, borrowing, renting or stealing music if Pandora goes away? Now I feel you may be trusted to answer that question in any which way you wish — but try to be honest. read more