International market becoming key for music publishers: panel

OTTAWA — Markets outside of Canada are increasingly important for music publishers, a breakfast panel hosted by the Pearson Centre on Tuesday morning heard as participants discussed issues like copyright, tariffs and the new digital reality from an international perspective. According to the executive director of the Canadian Music Publishers Association (CMPA), Margaret McGuffin, a recent review in June indicated two thirds of revenue from companies under the CMPA came from foreign sources last year. That’s up from 25 per cent 12 years ago. “Export has become the key to growth for many of our small and medium companies,” said McGuffin. Coco Carmona, director general of the International Confederation of Music Publishers (ICMP), said that there needs to be ways of signing the mechanical (playing physical media) and performing (listening on the radio) rights simultaneously because of how the growth of music streaming has muddied the water regarding these definitions. “We have, in Europe, more than 40 million tracks online, and over 300 online services. It sounds complicated, but we’ve been able to develop it quite well,” said Carmona. “It’s in the publishers DNA to license.” In the U.S., music publishers have been tracking streaming music tariffs in Canada, set in August by the Copyright Board, because they are determining their rates for music streaming from 2018 to 2022, Erich Carey, vice-president and senior counsel at the National Music Publishers' Association (NMPA) said. He said that the U.S reaction to the Copyright Board’s August decision to lower the tariffs as much as 70 per cent was “in a word, dismay.” The U.S. was looking to Canada’s marketplace “for a benchmark,” Carey said. Nearing the end, the panel also briefly touched on the topic of international trade. While many of the specifics of how the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) negotiations would play out are still unknown, it’s not hard to guess what the U.S. priorities might be, according to former assistant deputy minister of Trade Policy and Negotiations, Don Stephenson. Stephenson pointed to stronger border rules, the currently vague educational copyright exceptions, and the copyright extension as likely issues that the U.S. would press Canada on during the negotiations. “In the , we already agreed with copyright extension. One would assume that we’re open to that discussion,” said Stephenson. — With reporting by Bryson Masse at bmasse@thewirereport.ca and editing by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca

International market becoming key for music publishers: panel

News | November 7, 2017

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International market becoming key for music publishers: panel

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