Prism Sound Orpheus - Audio Media

of the new deals that you see, like McCartney’s deal, are just newways to market and that’s more of an issue of marketing andplacement and your ability to strike a relationship with Starbucks,McDonalds, or whoever,” Caldas insists. “The interesting issue thatthe McCartney/Starbucks deal brings up is how the path to marketis developing. As the path becomes more global and the physicalworld continues to shrink, people look to new ways to get there.”One thing Merlin certainly won’t be attempting to do is duplicateservices which are already doing a reasonable job of helping labelsand artists distribute their music. At present, companies such asIODA, AWAL, CD Baby, and Rightsrouter, provide a range of waysthat more or less anyone can deliver their musical product to thelikes of iTunes, and Merlin has no reason to replicate them.the magic of merlinJoining MerlinMerlin’s actions will be based on the mandate it receives from itsmembers, subject to approval by its board of industry veterans, soit is necessary to join to have a say in their activities. Joining Merlinwill be a matter of signing a membership agreement and any labelas an independent MP3 initiative without major label repertoire so it wasn’t an issue of equality as such.They haven’t actually rolled the service out around the world yet, but they were always clear that it was anAmerican initiative and they would globalize it as and when it made business sense for them. Ultimatelydoing that depends on whether the US business model is successful.”in the world will be eligible to become a member Side By Side AM 26|02|2008 14:45 Side 1as long as they qualify as truly independent – thedefinition of independent being that the label hasto control more than 50-percent of its own equityand not more than five percent of the market.Although Merlin will be brokering deals onbehalf of its members, it intends to leave themechanics of distributing Royalties to the wellestablishedsound engineeringRM8 TUBE MODULESterritorial collection agencies andto use the local trade associations (such as AIMand BPI in the UK), as the main avenues forcommunicating their news to those concerned.“We will outsource pretty much all those raw SIDE-BY-SIDEcollection and distribution functions,” say Charles.“There will be a process of tender to see who iswilling to do it on a regional basis. Those bodieswill allow labels to opt into the actions we’ll beundertaking. They will also be very importantconduits for the transfer of information inboth directions.”Despite the involvement of associations suchas AIM, it won’t be necessary to be a member ofany industry organisation to join Merlin or optinto a Merlin deal. As Charles puts it, “you’ll signup to the deal, and somebody will collect theroyalties for you.“We are really just getting started, so are in themiddle of appointing our legal team to representus in our YouTube negotiations. They are theperfect example because no independents arelarge enough to deal with a service that big and FRONT TO BACKpowerful. OK, maybe some of the very biggestindependents can get in the door but the averagesmall label and artist trying to run a career willfind dealing with a company like Google difficultand expensive. The shape of the YouTube deal willdepend on a whole range of factors but the bestwe can do is to make sure your music is paid forand you are not giving it away.”Merlin certainly promises to be a great aidto independent music, representing the sectorglobally, and enabling smaller businesses tograb a share of anything that’s going. Once it isestablished it should be able to react quickly toany new media developments of the YouTubeor MySpace variety, and if the last few years areanything to go by, there will certainly be more - CM1A, EM1A, PM1A & RM8 now shipping...of their ilk to come. “We need an open and fairmarketplace to maintain a healthy and vibrantindependent music system,” concludes Charles,“and at the moment it is not open and I don’tthink it’s fair.” ∫LYDKRAFTwww.tube-tech.comSNOCAPOne of the first things Merlin did after it was set up was notify the public about the SNOCAP media rights deal withMyspace, which allowed artists and bands to sell their music via their MySpace band pages and receive payment.So far SNOCAP’s digital registry is only set up to deal with sound recording copyright owners who are UnitedStates residents, but report that they are working hard to do the same for the rest of the world.When asked about Merlin’s role in the deal, Charles reveals that it was more or less set up without theirinvolvement and they merely acted a messaging platform to make sure that the world’s independents wereaware of the service. “That is not really the essence of what Merlin will do in the future,” admits Charles.“Of more interest to us right now are things like YouTube, because the Myspace Music Store was very openabout licensing the independents from day one and YouTube has not been so forthcoming. SNOCAP startedaudio media may 2008 49