MCPS podcast licence

john eden

male pale and stale
http://www.mcps.co.uk/productionMusicLicence/ [do a search for "podcast"]

What do people think of this?

My interest in it is that I would like for there to be some way of cheap/free podcasts generating some money for the performers on them. (This especially concerns me in relation to performers who don't have a lot of money rather than, say, Phil Collins etc)

I'm not sure if this is the way though - partly cos I don't understand how it works.

It seems that people are able to pay 200 quid a year for a licence* but I don't understand how that money gets to the artists - or indeed if it would be swallowed up by MCPS admin etc. Now maybe 200 quid a year is a lot, but perhaps people could club together for a licence...

There are also some restrictions about not having a list of timings for tunes, or trackmarkers and not having the intros and outros of tunes on casts. Oh and having no more than 80% of your cast as music... which is restrictive but not insurmountable.

Can someone who knows about this stuff have a look and let me know what they think?

*200 quid plus vat assuming less than 13500 downloads per annum.
 

D84

Well-known member
To be honest I'm not sure I get the deal 100% either myself: basically it seems that their minimum licence fee for podcasts/podcasting(?) that generates less than 13,500 songs to be downloaded in a quarter is pro-rated(?) to £50. I have no idea what kind of hits your podcasts get but I'm guessing that this isn't much: eg. if a podcast with 15 tracks is downloaded 1000 times that's 15,000 downloaded tracks and you're into the next higher £100/quater bracket.

It looks like they'll be hitting iTunes and other corporate services mostly as they'll be making the most money to be charged from it.

If they hit the little guys too hard that would be very cheeky: eg. setting an unfair barrier to competition; the people with the money, or capital, are welcome and can climb over the barrier easily - a bit like broadcast licensing.

On the other hand artists and esp. publishers would like to get paid. What do artists here think?

Mind you they'll probably won't be putting too much money/staff in the Limited Licences section of the office...
(see paragraph 2)
 

Martin Dust

Techno Zen Master
http://www.mcps.co.uk/productionMusicLicence/ [do a search for "podcast"]
There are also some restrictions about not having a list of timings for tunes, or trackmarkers and not having the intros and outros of tunes on casts. Oh and having no more than 80% of your cast as music... which is restrictive but not insurmountable.

Can someone who knows about this stuff have a look and let me know what they think?


The % thing is nuts, I did a dvd project for a company that included loads of pop videos and the dvd couldn't be over 20% content of pop vids, it was a big problem for them until I made the Menu system 31mins long, thus pop vids = 20%.

I'm a member of the PRS and MCPS and they really need to get their heads around things cos loads of people are losing money because of how they run things at present.
 
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john eden

male pale and stale
The % thing is nuts, I did a dvd project for a company that included loads of pop videos and the dvd couldn't be over 20% content of pop vids, it was a big problem for them until I made the Menu system 31mins long, thus pop vids = 20%.

I'm a member of the PRS and MCPS and they really need to get their heads around things cos loads of people are losing money because of how they run things at present.

Yeah I agree - I mean you could put 20 minutes of yourself muttering under your breath at the end of a mix you did and that would be ok for MCPS.

From what I read on the site it looks like this is a first attempt and they are looking for comments.

Personally I think me and Paul Meme would consider getting a licence if it would mean that some of the reggae artists we like were going to get some (much needed) money - as long as the pricing was reasonable and the set up wasn't too restrictive in terms of what we want to do.
 

Martin Dust

Techno Zen Master
I agree, some money is better than none but they don't see things that way, had the same problem with audio clips for a project, £500 for ten seconds!!!! They see "music as music" and as such they are really out of date with how things are being used these days.
 

Magz Hall

Active member
podcast isues

I think it will be far more difficult for those doing a tiny niche music podcast with no budget at all - to pay such a fee. I also think it will squeeze out diversity and force podcasting to just serve just the mainstream interests-and won't be so good for independent music.
To get round such costs and huge admin we have just started airing the show via a listener on demand internet station totallyradio which allows us to play new tracks on the internet - but we still plan to carry on with our special podcasts all who have taken part signed full consent forms, obviously this is new ground, but I do think it sounds really costly.


264091295_26678cbb79.jpg


hey you can listen to our latest show music show on this link

http://www.totallyradio.com/show_pages/shows.php?show=110

the latest music show is now updated for you to listen on demand every 2 weeks for two weeks via totallyradio.com

You Are Hear latest show track list-


1. Matmos - Steam and Sequins for Larry Levan (Matador)
2. Junior Boys - In the morning (Domino)
3. Juana Molina - Malherido (Domino)
4. Gay Against You - Tripple Shipol (ADAADAT
5. Serena Maneesh - Sapphire Eyes (Play Louder Recordings)
6. Joanna Newsom - Cosmia (Drag city)
7. Tom Dissevelt and Kid Baltan - Song of the Second Moon (Limelight)
8. weird Pierre Henry cut-up c/o
9. Ramases - Molecular Delussions (Vertigo)
10. Lard Free - Tatkooz a' Roulette (Spalax)
11. Route Hohmann and Erbe Chor - Das Licht (Cinesoundz)
12. Felix Kubin and Coolhaven - Waschzwangmama (Korm Plastics)
13. Sparks - Metaphor (Little Beethoven)
14. Beriut - Gulag Orkestar (4AD)
15. Nalle - Midwinter's Dream (Pickled Egg Records)
16. Dudley Simpson - The Tommorrow People theme (Trunk Records)


www.youarehear.co.uk

http://myspace.com/youarehear


Also our youarehear Podcast is always being updated -

check the latest - Bob Moog interviews from the archive

http://feeds.feedburner.com/youarehear



cheers magz
 
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john eden

male pale and stale
Hello Magz - good to bump into you the other day.

I'll have a look at the on-demand thing. Did you get a release form off Sparks, then? :confused: (and isn't the album "Hello Young Lovers", rather than "Beethoven"?)
 

Magz Hall

Active member
hi john-

re sparks track - it is the names of the artists and track played and label- not the LPs for any of the tracks on the list for our totallyradio show, who as it happens sorts outs prs/mcps etc for that-which keeps the cost of our backs to to do it.

However I did ask sparks for permission to podcast their live set at big chill and they were the only artist to refuse us ever, interestingly enough- which was a real shame as they were amazing.

magz
 
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