[Fmpro] SOCAN, Sean Goble

[David Tkaczuk]

Thanks for your reply Sean.

Yes, some people are suggesting that you register/join as many PRO's
as possible, which is not possible with SOCAN.

On the subject of re-titling, Pump Audio is an example of a music library
that re-title's your works with their own title scheme. The person I talked
to said that they only will do this if your work is going to be used, but, I
am not sure about this. As a composer, you would like to be sure that
everything is as is should be and that nothing is slipping through the cracks.

Dave
D&D Music

Sean Goble wrote:

> Wow.  Okay, so here's answers where I have answers.  Please keep in mind
> this is strictly from a Canadian/SOCAN perspective.
>
> Dave:
> The reason you've had so many differing responses is because there is no
> complete answer to protecting your copyright.  Since you have to protect
> your copyright in civil court, you should cover as many bases as possible.
>  The way to look at it is you are creating a paper trail so that should
> your copyright ever come into question, you have documents to prove your
> claim.  The first thing I tell any of our members is if you cowrite, or
> someone has an interest in your song, GET THE SPLITS IN WRITING AND
> SIGNED.  Composing is an organic process, and this will quite often feel
> awkward but anything you can get down where the splits are decided is
> incredibly useful down the road.
> Copyright: There is the poor man's copyright, which is admittedly not fool
> proof, but it's a start.  This is the practice of sending a copy of your
> work by registered mail to yourself and not opening it.  This gives you a
> date that the work was completed but isn't strong enough to stand on its
> own.  Register your work with your PRO.  As far as the actual act of
> copyrighting your song, I normally recommend that people use the US
> Copyright system instead of the Canadian as the Canadian system only uses
> title and writers (so if I write a song called "I Love You" I get thrown
> in with all the other songs of the same name) whereas the US system takes
> a copy of your work.  US Copyrights can be submitted in Canadian court.
>
> Registering your work: Some people submit only the songs that see the
> light of day, some people submit every note they've ever written.  But I
> strongly suggest you use our webpage to submit your works (if you're a
> SOCAN member) as this cuts down on paper and there is no question whether
> it has been processed or not.  You can monitor it from the page.  SOCAN
> uses a 100% model so splits are 50% writer share and 50% publisher.
>
> Retitling: I think I need some clarification.  Do you mean a)changing the
> names of work b) giving/selling your work to someone else or c) within a
> publishing context such as labelling an entire acquired library?
>
> Mark:
>
> Publishers: I should have been clearer on this in my first post.  The way
> publishers register with multiple PROs internationally is by creating
> business entities in other countries.  For instance in N. America there
> could be Large Publisher Conglomerate in the US collected by BMI and then
> in Canada there would be LPC Canada that has a SOCAN account (normally
> that would be a SOCAN "B" account but I'll explain that a little more in a
> minute) that collects in Canada.  As we don't want to step on BMI's toes
> in this case, SOCAN normally requires some type of office up here in order
> for them to be a member of SOCAN.  In effect it's like having a
> subpublisher just under the same name.  Technically, these should be
> limited deals, but because of the nature of the beast, we accept that
> publishers, the larger ones at least, will have subpublishers/country
> specific versions of the company and we try to accommodate them, even if
> it doesn't technically fall into "membership" as it should be.
>
> Splitting your catalogue between US PROS:  When you become a SOCAN member
> you choose who you would like to collect on your behalf in the US.  These
> are SOCAN A, B and S accounts.  You, as a writer, can get split accounts
> where part of your account is an A and part is a B if necessary (say if
> you were published by one ASCAP publisher and one BMI publisher), but
> normally we encourage you to pick one to avoid money getting caught up as
> one PRO collects on your behalf for another PRO's song, it gets sent to us
> and then we have to send it back so that it can go through the right
> society.   You can however switch who is representing you by requesting it
> from SOCAN.
>
> Assignment Letter:  We have what is called an "Authorized Representative"
> form that allows our members to give partial or complete control of their
> account to a third party (while retaining their own control of course).
> However, you need to be a member of SOCAN in order to do this.  We do not
> pay out to non-members.  If you are an American writer, who is represented
> by an American PRO, all claims, requests and questions need to be directed
> through your PRO.  If you call SOCAN, we'll happily field your call but we
> can't do anything about cue sheets, missed broadcasts, works or finances.
> All directions have to come through your PRO.
>
> Les:
>
> IMRO: Good catch, I read that in a post after I had written my email and
> to be honest, I didn't know.
>
> Operating Costs: Our operating costs come from the "Radio Pool".  This
> pool, while primarily containing the license fees from our customers
> (public performance, broadcast), also contains money from various tariffs
> that we are unable to monitor.  We call it the "radio pool" because the
> performance data from radio is what is used to distribute the money in
> this pool.  But no foreign money goes into this pool, it is paid directly
> to our members.
>
> Watermarking: I'm really not privy to high level decisions such as reasons
> for watermarking or not watermarking.  Some of the technologies that were
> looked at came up a little short as they did not cross over when copied
> etc.  No doubt that has changed and we do keep on top of this stuff so it
> may happen yet, but right now we find fingerprinting to be a better
> approach on radio as we don't need to rely on the file itself for ID, we
> can do it from our end and I've heard rumoured that a similar technology
> is being looked at for TV/Internet.  Our company line however is that we
> are still looking at the technology and may utilize it in the future.
>
> Broadcaster Contract:  This isn't my end of the company, I am a member
> account executive which means I work with membership and all concerns of
> our members.  However, even if I were in licensing I don't think we'd be
> allowed to give out any details on our contracts.  Sorry.  :-(
>
> Multiple PROs: We may be dealing with an issue of semantics here.
> Membership, at least around here, is generally referring to worldwide and
> I assumed (probably erroneously) that's what you meant.   Part of the
> process of becoming a member is that we do a back check on an
> international database (IPI) to make sure you are not a member of another
> society.  If you are, we ask them to release you.  This is maintained
> universally (or is supposed to be) and is not unique to SOCAN.  However,
> as I did come in part way through this conversation (I've been on the
> board for a while but I don't always get the opportunity to read every
> digest), it occurs to me that you may be discussing limited territory
> deals which do happen.
>         A limited deal is where you assign a PRO for a specific territory.
>  I have seen this done with one or maybe at the most two territories.  So
> if you were a SOCAN member and a Canadian citizen living in Manhattan you
> could have SOCAN for worldwide ex. US and then have an American PRO
> collect in the States.
>         Here's the problems we've experienced when this starts to expand
> beyond one (I'm playing antagonist because it looks as if it has already
> been advocated if we're talking limited here).  Firstly, for each PRO you
> join, you need to qualify and you need to be released by your current PRO
> for that territory.  While some PROs have few membership qualifications
> and will happily sign a foreign based member, most PROs, unless it's a
> special case, restrict membership to people residing in their territory.
> This allows the smaller guys to exist and work with, instead of against,
> the big societies.   Second is taxes.  You're getting taxed in a multiple
> of different territories.  If your accounting is set-up for this, then it
> isn't a problem.  A third is you are gumming up the works a bit as limited
> territories are rare (and normally not recommended) and I'm sure you have
> experience with any large company trying to deal with something that it
> doesn't handle every day.  The last real issue is your catalogue.  If
> you're working with limited territories, you need to supply your entire
> catalogue to the societies working in limited territory deals.  Your
> society (whoever is representing you worldwide ex. limited territories) is
> not going to submit your catalogue to a limited territory country because
> it isn't claiming on your behalf in that territory.  And the limited
> territory PRO is not going to use a foreign PRO's list even if it were
> submitted.  So you will need to maintain your catalogue in multiple
> databases.
>         These issues are the biggies and if you don't see anything that's
> a deal breaker, then limited territories may be a good option for some
> people though we've found that the majority members who try it tend to
> come back to a worldwide.
>
> Commercials: You're right, SOCAN does not pay or collect  for commercials,
> 60 secs or less, aired in Canada. There's no real answer here. Commercials
> are simply something we don't pay, the same way that we don't pay for
> skating rink performances.  All PROs have different things they pay and
> don't pay, for instance we pay for all concerts while US PROs only pay the
> top 200.  It's a matter of policies and resources and while surely here,
> in a board full of A/V composers, commercials are a large focus, with
> other members it would be much preferred that we pay a different area as
> theoretically a composer of a work in a commercial has already been paid
> while a person having their song covered on stage has not.  It's a
> difficult line to walk and it does get revisited from time to time but
> that's the best I can give you at the moment.
>
> Geesh Les, throw me a softball or two next time would you?  :-)
>
> Okay, I think that's it.  Hope I didn't put everyone to sleep.
>
> Cheers,
> -Sean
>
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