Some artists are not being paid for their music
The Canadian Recording Industry is being sued for over $6 billion from music artists. The suit has grown with new infringements found recently and now numbers of 300,000 songs used without prior permission or payment from music artists.
According to Jared on Zeropaid, the CMI is facing a suit that is seeking damages for unapproved song usage on compilation albums. The astronomical $6 billion suit seems almost unbelievable but apparently close to 300,000 song infringements have been documented so far. Each song infringement can bring up to $20,000 in damages. There has also been reports of documentation issues with song usage by CMI.
Michael Geist wrote that many of the infringements are document back to the 1980s and includes many artists. According to Geist, the suit began in October 2008 with artists seeking damages from unapproved music usage. He also writes that Canadian law changed back in the late 1980s when recording companies needed to seek approval for each instance of using a song or album. Apparently many companies did not do so and the suit is the final result of years of unpaid song usage.
The irony is of course that different recording industry groups have been suing people for downloading songs without payment for several years. The defendant companies involved in the suit include Sony BMG Music Canada, EMI Music Canada, Universal Music Canda, and Warner Music Canada. The evidence appears to be rather strong against the defendants and they have already reportedly admitted to owing at least $50 million in damages. While the suit is ongoing, there is no victor nor a complete accounting of all of the infringments found yet.
So what does this really mean? Here is how I see the suit.
Basically in Canadian law, music artists are supposed to be able to approve the use of all of their songs by other parties. Apparently the companies in question either failed to seek permission on every song used or did so incompletely. This doesn't mean that the companies refused to pay artists for their work nor does it mean they ignored Canadian law. At least not until proven so in court. At this point, it appears that artists have not been paid or sought out for approval due to errors and poor bookkeeping. However, more proof may bring more evidence that changes this and more damages may result.
For artists, there is a reportedly large list of song infringments that continues to grow in size. They are seeking past payments for songs used and profited from by the recording companies. It appears that at least some damages will probably be administered when the suit is finished. Whether this means it will reach billions of dollars remains to be seen.
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