[Fmpro] SOCAN Questions

[Mark Northam]

Hi Sean -

Welcome to the Film Music Professionals discussion list, it's great to have
you here. I know your information will be highly valued by the composers
here.

A couple of questions for you about SOCAN policies:

* You mentioend that writers cannot "legally" belong to more than one PRO at
a time, but publishers can. Do you have any thoughts/ideas why this might be
true? It would seem that writers would benefit just as much as publishers do
from the benefits of being able to maintain multiple PRO membership. Also,
as I'm sure you're aware, SOCAN members have more rights at ASCAP and BMI
than US writers do in one critical area: SOCAN members, like all non-US
members, have the right to divide up their catalog any way they please
between ASCAP, BMI and SESAC for US collections. US writers can only be a
member of one of the US societies at a time, severly limiting their ability
to place different portions of their catalog with the PRO that is the most
competitive.

* Can you provide a brief rundown on what constitutes a "feature
performance" on television in Canada and supply any basic information on the
different usage weightings that may be used there? Specifically, does Canada
have anything like the rules at the US PROs where all songs indicated as
"background vocals" are automatically paid as features, even if the song
plays a very minor role on the actual scene?

* If a US writer sent SOCAN an assignemnt letter that said, in effect,
"Please pay all of my writers royalties that you may collect on my behalf
to my Canadian representative, Mr. Joe Smith, 123 Main Street, Vancouver,BC
ABC123" would SOCAN honor this kind of assignment request? 

Thanks again for your willingness to help educate and inform composers in
our forum, and again, welcome!

Best,

Mark Northam


> -----Original Message-----
> From: fmpro-bounces+markn=gmocorp.com at nxport.com [mailto:fmpro-
> bounces+markn=gmocorp.com at nxport.com] On Behalf Of Sean Goble
> Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2008 11:00 PM
> To: fmpro at nxport.com
> Subject: Re: [Fmpro] FMPRO Digest, Vol 39, Issue 3
> 
> 
>  I can't speak on behalf of every PRO out there, but I know that SOCAN is
> designed as a member focussed organization and if you ever have any
> questions, need advice or think that you may not be getting paid for a
> performance, we do all we can to track down that performance or give you
> an answer.  We keep a toll-free line for any inquiries by any of our
> members.
> 
> I hope this helps.  If you have any questions, go ahead and post them and
> I'll try to answer as much as I can.
> 
> Cheers,
> -Sean Goble
> Membership, SOCAN
> 
>