Copyright

Today we had a lesson on copyright in the audio industry.

A representative of APRA AMCOS, Kellie Lloyd, was a guest speaker for the lesson and gave us a rundown on APRA AMCOS, and what the company is about.

But before we get too far into the world of copyright, what is it? And what's the situation in Australia?

According to smartcopying.edu.au:

“A simple definition of copyright is that it is a bunch of rights in certain creative works such as text, artistic works, music, computer programs, sound recordings and films. The rights are granted exclusively to the copyright owner to reproduce the material, and for some material, the right to perform or show the work to the public. Copyright owners can prevent others from reproducing or communicating their work without their permission or may sell these rights to someone else.”

If we pull this apart and summarise, it’s basically saying that copyright is essentially the protection of work, it has laws around it which protects other people or companies from using or recreating this work without the permission of the owner. ("1.1 What is copyright?", n.d.)

In Australia, we’re currently under the COPYRIGHT ACT 1968, Some of the things in this act that can be applied to myself as an audio practitioner are things such as:

-textual material (“literary works”) such as journal articles, novels, screenplays, poems, song lyrics and reports;

-artistic works such as paintings, drawings, cartoons, sculpture, craft work, architectural plans, buildings, photographs, maps and plans;

-dramatic works such as choreography, screenplays, plays and mime pieces;

-musical works: that is, the music itself, separately from any lyrics or recording;

-cinematograph films: the visual images and sounds in a film, video or DVD are protected separately from any copyright in works recorded on the film or video, such as scripts and music;

-sound recordings: the particular recording itself is protected by copyright, in addition to, for example, the music or story that is recorded;

("Week 3: Copyright & Contracts – Self-Directed Practitioners – Medium", 2015)

APRA stands for the Australasian Performing Right Association and was was established in 1926 to manage the performance and communication rights of its members. AMCOS, the Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society Limited (AMCOS) was established in 1979 to manage “mechanical royalties”, that is, the reproduction or copying and storage of music in different formats.

The two companies formed as one in 1997 so that members could go through the one company rather than both. ("What we do", n.d.)

APRA and AMCOS is a Performance Rights Organisation, an organisation which essentially recognises when your work is being used or performed. We are all entitled by law to copyright royalties, which essentially means whenever your song is publicly played or purchased, you receive money for the use of your work. APRA AMCOS Manages this, and the money is paid to APRA AMCOS, which is then distributed to you.

This is something that is very important being a music producer. For example, current song I’m creating features myself and an artist, we’d have to work out how to divide the royalties as we have both collaborated on a piece of work. The artist however not only owns the vocal melody, but the lyrical content as well which is covered as two types of work, musically and textually.

This is something that we could work out with APRA AMCOS, which will then pay us for the work whenever the song is used.

Let’s say this song were to be released on iTunes or Spotify, we could do this independently, however most of the time this is done through an online distributor. Some common distribution companies you may have heard of are those such as CD Baby and Tunecore. These distributors however need to also make an income, so they charge you to distribute your music.

The distribution company which seems to be the most appealing to me is Gyrostream, a brisbane based distribution service which has been recommended to me by my peers. Gyrostream has a chart on their website which compares the amount of money that various distribution companies take per album streams in comparison to theirs.

What also interests me in Gyrostream is the amount of services that you are covered under, such as youtube monetisation. This is likely the distribution company that I would go with when releasing the track, however I will also consider all alternatives.

Learning what I have about copyright has been an important lesson for me this trimester, as previously I’ve never really had a clear understanding of what I need to do to release my music.

Thanks for Reading!

References:

Retrieved from https://www.gyrostream.com/

1.1 What is copyright?. Retrieved from http://www.smartcopying.edu.au/copyright-guidelines/copyright---a-general-overview/1-1-what-is-copyright-

Week 3: Copyright & Contracts – Self-Directed Practitioners – Medium. (2015). Retrieved from https://medium.com/self-directed-practitioners/week-11-copyright-contracts-de8b049cd8f4

What we do. Retrieved from http://apraamcos.com.au/about-us/what-we-do