[FA Worldmusic] Posting to FA from SoundExchange

[Neeta Ragoowansi]

I would like to post the following below as a response to this posting
by Bernard Kleikamp on October 1, 2006.  Thanks!




[FA Worldmusic] FW: An Urgent Message to Recording Artists regarding
SoundExchange royalties


bernard kleikamp paradox at dataweb.nl
<mailto:fa-worldmusic%40folk.org?Subject=%5BFA%20Worldmusic%5D%20FW%3A%2
0An%20Urgent%20Message%20to%20Recording%20Artists%0A%09regarding%20Sound
Exchange%20royalties&In-Reply-To=26345386%242269320963%24549518165%40fol
kserv.net>
Sun Oct 1 16:32:12 EDT 2006

*	Previous message: [FA Worldmusic] FW: An Urgent Message to
Recording Artists regarding SoundExchange royalties
<http://www.folkserv.net/pipermail/fa-worldmusic/2006-October/000479.htm
l>

____________________________



Dear Mr. Kleikamp:



There were some serious mistakes in your posting of October 1, 2006,
regarding SoundExchange. Any artist or independent label who contacts us
and confirms a mailing address prior to the December 15th deadline will
be paid royalties earned as far back as February 1, 1996, when royalty
obligations for streaming first took effect in this country. The 90 day
processing for payments means simply that it may take up to 90 days for
your paperwork to be processed after it has been submitted- not that it
takes 90 days to register.



Please know that it is our highest priority to reach out to all the
artists and record labels on the list and have them come claim their
royalties. SoundExchange wishes that every deserving artist and label
receives their royalties and we have undertaken many initiatives to
ensure that result.  We have successfully increased the number of
payable artists from several hundred in 2003 (when direct payment to
artists became law) to over 20,000!  We did it by a variety of
activities, including, for example:



1.       Conducting matching exercises with the databases of CD Baby,
Disc Makers, AFM, AFTRA, the Blues Foundation, Folk Alliance (in
progress), the Recording Academy, among others. We match our unpaid list
against these organizations client lists. They then notify their clients
that SoundExchange has royalties and that they should register with
SoundExchange. CD Baby resulted in over 5500 matches; Disc Makers was
over 1200; AFTRA and AFM was over 4400. Matching exercises are currently
underway with ASCAP, BMI and SESAC.

2.       Working with the independent and major labels to obtain contact
information.

3.       Presentations to law firms, business management firms and
management companies, and matching their client lists against our unpaid
list to get them notified.

4.       Manual research and notification to individual artist and
independent record labels.

5.       An aggressive publicity campaign to get the word out to all
about the existence of these royalties.  Stories have been published in
over 50 major newspapers and industry publications to alert performers
and labels to come claim their royalties to date, as well as stories on
the CBS Evening News, NPR and other such media coverage.

6.       Participating and presenting at numerous music industry
conferences like SXSW, DIY, Billboard Hip Hop, Billboard Dance Summit,
CMJ, FMC, NXNE, NEMO, Atlantis and too many more to mention, to educate
the industry about this stream of revenue.

7.       Posting the current list of artists and labels who have failed
to come forward and claim their royalties.



Please also know that we have aggressively pursued repatriating U.S.
performers royalties earned overseas - which previously were not being
paid to U.S. performers and has now collected several million dollars -
which will grow in the coming years, and that we have conducted audits
of licensees indicating serious underpayments of royalties by those
licensees and has made recoveries on behalf of labels and artists.
Also, SoundExchange has been the only organization fighting for
marketplace rates on behalf of its performers and labels for the use of
music online.



SoundExchange currently represents over 2,000 independent labels, the 4
majors and over 20,000 performers.  We continue to work aggressively at
notifying artists and labels, and increasing these numbers on a daily
basis.



I hope this clears any misconception you may have had. Thanks in advance
for your assistance in this major task.  If you or anyone else out there
reading this ever has a question regarding SoundExchange, please feel
free to drop me an email and ask.  I'm always happy to be of assistance.



All the best,



Neeta Ragoowansi

Director of Artist-Label Relations

SoundExchange

1330 Connecticut Avenue, N.W. Suite 330

Washington, DC 20036

Email:  Neeta at soundexchange.com