ABSTRACT
The music industry has prospered since a number of technological developments provided it with the potential to expand. Historically, music publishing was the bedrock of the industry with the major income generated through the sale of sheet music which was vigorously marketed by the publishers; ‘They hired “song pluggers” (such as the young Irving Berlin and George Gershwin) to play their numbers on pianos set up in music stores to encourage the purchase of printed music. The song pluggers also auditioned numbers for theatrical, vaudeville, and cabaret performers in the hope of achieving exposure for the catalogs of their employers’ (Biederman et al. 1992, p.384). At this stage, income could also be generated from the performances of the musical works, an area protected by copyright. Copyright occupies a central role for the music industry being the vehicle by which artistic creativity can be commercially exploited.2 The ownership of songs and the ability to assign the copyright, or parts of the copyright, in such songs is the raison d'etre of music publishers. Historically ‘pure’ songwriters would write a song that would, hopefully, be recorded by a famous star, become a hit and bring in money via mechanical royalties. Similarly record companies could exploit their ownership of the copyright in the sound recording brought into existence when the original composition was recorded. In order to collect the royalties payable, when such works are utilised in their numerous forms, licences or assignments are given to agencies that collect and distribute the royalties.3 A number of important changes have occurred within the music industry that have altered not only the relationship between songwriter and song, but have provided increased technological ability to enable new forms of music utilisation and creation.
