Heartland

Commission opens proceedings into collective licensing of music copyrights for online use

The European Commission has warned sixteen organisations that collect royalties on behalf of music authors¹ that their so-called Santiago agreement is potentially in breach of European Union competition rules. This is because the cross-licensing arrangements that the collecting societies have between themselves lead to an effective lock up of national territories, transposing into the Internet the national monopolies the societies have traditionally held in the offline world. The Commission believes that there should be competition between collecting societies to the benefit of companies that offer music on the Internet and to consumers that listen to it. This position reflects only a preliminary position of the Commission at this stage and the collecting societies have the right to defend their views in writing and at an oral hearing.

Obviousman wrote:Came across this while searching on another forum...

clicky

Commission opens proceedings into collective licensing of music copyrights for online use

The European Commission has warned sixteen organisations that collect royalties on behalf of music authors¹ that their so-called Santiago agreement is potentially in breach of European Union competition rules. This is because the cross-licensing arrangements that the collecting societies have between themselves lead to an effective lock up of national territories, transposing into the Internet the national monopolies the societies have traditionally held in the offline world. The Commission believes that there should be competition between collecting societies to the benefit of companies that offer music on the Internet and to consumers that listen to it. This position reflects only a preliminary position of the Commission at this stage and the collecting societies have the right to defend their views in writing and at an oral hearing.