{"id":24912,"date":"2018-06-18T23:32:31","date_gmt":"2018-06-19T03:32:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=24912"},"modified":"2018-06-25T16:17:21","modified_gmt":"2018-06-25T20:17:21","slug":"cfif-strongly-opposes-senator-ron-wydens-access-to-sound-recordings-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/24912\/cfif-strongly-opposes-senator-ron-wydens-access-to-sound-recordings-act\/","title":{"rendered":"CFIF Strongly Opposes Senator Ron Wyden’s “ACCESS to Sound Recordings” Act"},"content":{"rendered":"

CFIF has long championed<\/a> greater fairness for recording artists and protection of intellectual property (IP) rights in the music industry.\u00a0 \u00a0Among other problems, current law generally protects recording artists’ rights for post-1972 songs, but not pre-1972 classics:<\/p>\n

Under byzantine laws, artists receive just compensation whenever their post-1972 recordings are played, but in many cases not for their pre-1972 recordings.\u00a0 That’s an indefensible and arbitrary artifact that has persisted far too long.\u00a0 Why should Neil Diamond receive payment whenever ‘America’ is played, but not classics like ‘Solitary Man?’<\/p>\n

Fortunately, the opportunity to correct that unfairness has arrived.\u00a0 Even better, legislation to correct the existing flawed system arrives alongside other music legislation that galvanizes the coalition to finally correct the situation.\u00a0 As a result, a broad coalition of music organizations representing everyone from songwriters, composers, performers, publishers and labels supports three new pieces of legislation…”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Accordingly, CFIF strongly supports<\/a> the Music Modernization Act, which passed the House of Representatives unanimously<\/em> earlier this year:<\/p>\n

Introduced by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R – Virginia) and Ranking Member Jerrold Nadler (D – New York), the Music Modernization Act combines music licensing reforms outlined in the CLASSICS Act, Songwriters Equity Act of 2015, the rate standard parity provisions of the Fair Play Fair Pay Act, and AMP Act into a single, consensus piece of legislation.\u00a0 The MMA addresses specific music legacy issues such as establishing federal copyright protection for artists who recorded before 1972, creating a single licensing entity to administer music publishing rights for all digital music and ensuring producers and engineers receive royalties for their contributions to the music they help create.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Unfortunately, Senator Ron Wyden (D – Oregon) has counterproductively introduced the so-called “ACCESS to Sound Recordings” Act.<\/p>\n

Just as the Music Modernization Act claims nearly unanimous support among all stakeholders in the music industry, Sen. Wyden’s proposed legislation rightfully garners similarly consensus opposition:<\/p>\n

Seven leading unions, membership organizations, and advocacy groups representing recording artists, performers, vocalists, musicians, producers, and songwriters today sent a letter to the U.S. Senate detailing the flaws in Sen. Ron Wyden’s so-called ‘ACCESS to Sound Recordings Act.’\u00a0 The groups, which include American Federation of Musicians, Content Creators Coalition, Future of Music Coalition, The Living Legends Foundation, the Recording Academy (GRAMMYs Organization), The Rhythm & Blues Foundation, and SAG-AFTRA detailed how Wyden’s bill would undermine the retirement security of elderly artists before reiterating their support for the CLASSICS Act.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The group’s letter, which is worth reading in its entirety<\/a> of detail, highlights the flaws of Sen. Wyden’s proposal:<\/p>\n

We are disappointed that the introduction of the ‘ACCESS Act’ was done without consulting any artist group, organization, or union who would have made it clear that the bill’s eleventh-hour introduction is not a viable solution.\u00a0 The ‘ACCESS Act’ would undercut the goals of the MMA by cutting compensation for the older artists that it is expressly designed to benefit.\u00a0 It would unfairly shorten the period in which pre-1972 recordings produce royalties for the artists and copyright owners, effectively shutting down a lifeline of payments to artists who need it most.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There is simply no justification for Sen. Wyden’s proposed legislation.\u00a0 The MMA received unanimous House support, which is incredible in this hyperpartisan era, and the Senate should pass it for President Trump’s signature at long last.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CFIF has long championed greater fairness for recording artists and protection of intellectual property (IP) rights in the music industry.\u00a0 \u00a0Among other problems, current law generally protects recording artists’ rights for post-1972 songs, but not pre-1972 classics: Under byzantine laws, artists receive just compensation whenever their post-1972 recordings are played, but in many cases not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[5025,4999,3983,2871,5024],"class_list":["post-24912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-access-to-sound-recordings-act","tag-classics-act","tag-copyright","tag-intellectual-property","tag-music-modernization-act"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24912"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24924,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24912\/revisions\/24924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}