At present, the Register of Copyrights is appointed by the Librarian of Congress and answers to that office. H.R. 6028 would break that link. The bill would remove the US Copyright Office from the Library of Congress‘s supervisory authority. The Register would instead be nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate, serving a term of 10 years with the option of reappointment.
Source: A bill moving through Congress could change who controls the US Copyright Office
The CMA hopes this will give publishers greater leverage in content deals with Google, by forcing the company to seek permission to use their intellectual property. The CMA will wait to see how its first wave of interventions pan out before it decides whether to act further. This announcement at least signals a direction of travel.
Source: What do UK watchdog’s new rules on Google AI results mean for publishers?
The US Register of Copyrights has continued the designation of The Mechanical Licensing Collective (The MLC) as the statutory collective responsible for administering the blanket compulsory mechanical license for eligible streaming and download services in the United States. The decision follows the Register‘s first periodic review of The MLC‘s designation, as required by the Music Modernization Act (MMA).
Source: Copyright Office reups The MLC’s designation as the statutory Mechanical Licensing Collective
SoundExchange and IFPI have introduced a new capability that automatically assigns International Standard Recording Codes (ISRCs) to individual recordings. The functionality allows an ISRC to be assigned to a recording via an immediate online registration. It is designed to reduce administrative steps for small labels and self-releasing artists that do not own and manage large catalogs.
Source: SoundExchange and IFPI introduce automatic ISRC assignment for individual recordings
AI news licensing standards coalition SPUR has added almost 20 publisher members in a major international expansion of its work. SPUR said on Wednesday it has already made “significant progress” on its work towards the technical infrastructure that will allow publishers to see how AI systems are using their content and therefore better negotiate. This will be launched soon, the group said.
Country music star Garth Brooks is considering a sale of his catalog, eyeing roughly $2 billion for the rights to his songs and recordings, according to people familiar with the matter. Brooks, an album sales and touring juggernaut, is seeking a price that would be among the largest deals for an individual artist or group’s catalog. He would sell both his publishing, or songwriting, and recorded music rights.
Source: Garth Brooks Considers Sale of Music Catalog, Seeking Roughly $2 Billion
Suno CEO and co-founder Mikey Shulman wrote in a blog post on Wednesday (June 3) that, “as with our previous funding rounds,” the Series D saw “participation from some of the best artists, producers, songwriters, and people from across the music industry.” He didn’t name any of them. The funding more than doubles Suno‘s valuation from the $2.45 billion it achieved after closing a $250 million Series C round seven months ago in November.
Source: Suno raises over $400 million, pushing valuation to $5.4 billion
The company behind ChatGPT has no plans to share advertising revenue with publishers, OpenAI’s vice president of media partnerships has confirmed. Varun Shetty was asked at the WAN-IFRA World News Media Congress in Marseille on Tuesday whether they are considering a revenue share model on publisher content being surfaced next to adverts, which are being trialed on ChatGPT. Shetty responded: “Not at this point.”
Source: OpenAI not planning to share advertising revenue with publishers
Google has processed billions of DMCA takedown requests during the first months of the year. Reporting agency Link-Busters remains the top sender. While its dominance remains, the company appears to have hit a takedown ceiling of roughly 70 million URLs per week. Google won’t confirm whether there’s a limit on the notices it processes and says that trusted parties “can submit the quantity they need.”
Source: Google’s Top DMCA Sender Plateaus at 70 Million Takedowns Per Week
Google must allow news sites to opt out of having their online content scraped to feed AI overviews and other artificial intelligence services and features for British users, regulators said Wednesday. The Competition and Markets Authority said it was ordering Google to give online publishers the option, in what it called a “world first.”
Source: UK Orders Google to Allow Publishers to Opt Out of AI Scraping for Search Summaries