music publishing blog by MIDiA Research

Blog: music publishing

Read our latest daily deep-dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the digital entertainment world. Check out your favourite analyst, or search by coverage – games, video, music, audio, media & marketing, or critical developments for all.

What ‘Barbie’, ‘The Idol’, and more say about the future of artists in film

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

8 Jun 2023

music industry

record labels

music publishing

2023 is already shaping up to be another big year for music artists in Hollywood. Late last month, Jack Harlow made his acting debut in a Hulu remake of 1992 basketball comedy White Men Can’t Jump ....

UMG, Endel, and the case for labels in the AI space

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

1 Jun 2023

Universal Music Group

Warner Music Group

record labels

The flood of new music created using artificial intelligence (AI) will further erode major label market share, and some label executives’ recent comments about the value of human-made music seem to put...

Should streaming take a cue from TikTok’s revamped creator program?

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

23 Feb 2023

Music Streaming

Spotify

music industry

A year ago, VidCon co-founder and vlogger Hank Green posted a viral YouTube video lambasting TikTok’s $1 billion Creator Fund, claiming it delivered chump change to videos with millions of views. The...

With its Australia experiment, TikTok gives the music industry the ultimate test

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

9 Feb 2023

TikTok

social media

independent music

Licensing negotiations between platforms and the music industry come down to one question: which side needs the other more? The more that TikTok needs hit music to attract users, the more leverage the...

The record labels’ TikTok opportunity cost

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

22 Nov 2022

Music Streaming

TikTok

YouTube

With their short-term music licensing agreements soon to expire, record labels are reportedly pressuring TikTok to sign an ad revenue share agreement, which would see TikTok pay a share of advertising...

Looking forward and back: Why song interpolations reflect a new music industry outlook

Blog post by Tatiana Cirisano

2 Dec 2021

catalogue

music publishing

Music

If many popular songs from the past year sound familiar, it might be because they are. Song interpolations – when artists copy another song’s underlying melody, often with modified lyrics – are increasingly...

Can music rights expand to drive the new music creator economy?

Blog post by Kriss Thakrar

11 Nov 2021

rights acquisition

music publishing

music catalogue M+A

The investment that is pouring into music rights has exploded in recent years, hitting $10 billion at the time of writing and set to increase much further. Many rights acquisitions deals have been based...

T-Series to IPRS: Signs of a maturing market?

Blog post by Srishti Das

9 Apr 2021

Music Streaming

music publishing

IPRS

The Indian Performance Rights Society (IPRS) finally controls the majority of publishing market share in India, after the mammoth music label and film production company T-Series registered itself as a...

How Music Publishers Are Driving a Full Stack Revolution

Blog post by Mark Mulligan

14 Oct 2019

anthem

avl

AWAL

Music publishing catalogues are gaining momentum fast as an asset class for institutional investments, with transactions ranging from large catalogue mergers and acquisitions (M&A) through to investment...

Songwriters Aren’t Getting Paid Enough and Here’s Why

Blog post by Mark Mulligan

10 Sep 2019

cmos

Drake

google

Music Business Worldwide recently ran a story on how Apple has proposed a standard streaming rate for songwriters, with Google and Spotify apparently resistant. Of course, Apple can afford to run Apple...

Music Publishing and the Catalogue Question

Blog post by Zach Fuller

29 Jul 2019

music catalogue

music publishing

recorded music

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." Somewhere in a field back in the summer of 2008, Rage Against the Machine used this line as the bridge in their...

Music Publishing as an Asset Class – Update

Blog post by Zach Fuller

19 Jul 2019

Amuse

hipgnosis song fund

music publishing

Back in February, MIDiA released a report detailing the financial innovation taking place in the recorded music industry and how this was effectively securitising the concept of music publishing rights....

Yesterday: The Beatles and the Economics of Music Catalogue

Blog post by Zach Fuller

5 Jul 2019

danny boyle

music catalogue

music publishing

The release of Yesterday this week, a film about an aspiring musician who one day discovers he is the only person in the world who remembers The Beatles is an interest test-case for catalogue in the streaming...