Public Knowledge criticized the Department of...
Public Knowledge criticized the Department of Commerce report on copyright for its failure to consider the problems of consolidation among corporate music licensing rightsholders, PK said in a Friday blog post (http://bit.ly/13Bon6i). It praised the report, which was released Wednesday…
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(CD Aug 1 p12), for recognizing issues with music licensing and for noting that the best defense is a good offense. But the paper leaves out the “elephant in the room” that is the impact of consolidation among rightsholders, it said. “At some points the [paper] even seems to imply industry consolidation is a good thing,” it said. “A marketplace with a small number of ‘must have’ licensors may be less complex but actually makes life more difficult for new services and independent artists. When the top three record labels control so much of the market they're considered indispensable to a new service, they have an effective veto power and can use their leverage to impose a tax on innovation in the marketplace."