Oh, I just had to be first :-)

[Pete Surdoval]

ASCAP... Oh, I just had to be first for old time's sake. I'll shut up now. I promise! :-)

[Chris Alpiar]

Ah we need Les here to stir the pot ;)

[John Doryk]

I think the Association of Senile Catatonic Ardvark Poachers is just great.....unless you're an advark. Of course I wouldn't expect them to track my music performances or ever get a dime from them.

[Chris Merritt]

Hey Richard! Under ASCAP rules (as posted on their site) the "writer's share" can not be given or sold. The writers share must go to the actual composer:

"Distributions for Works Made For Hire. As a condition of ASCAP
Membership, all ASCAP Writer and Publisher Members agree that ASCAP shall
pay Writer royalties to Writer Members for “works made for hire,” as that term is
defined in 17 U.S.C. § 101 of the U.S. Copyright Act."

And also:

"As a condition of ASCAP membership, all writer and publisher members agree that, even in work-for-hire situations, the writer and not the employer will be paid the writer's share of ASCAP performing rights royalties. In addition, ASCAP's Articles of Association provide that, with only very limited exceptions unrelated to work-for-hire situations, writer's royalties "shall not be sold or otherwise disposed of." Hence, subject only to those very limited exceptions, ASCAP will not honor an irrevocable assignment of writer's royalties but will, notwithstanding such an assignment, pay writer's royalties only and directly to the writer member-in-interest."

So how is it possible for companies to take the writer share?

[Mark Northam]

Sadly, ASCAP looks the other way when it comes to composers being forced to give away their writers shares as a condition of employment. Note that the rules talks about an "assignment" of royalties... that means after the royalties already have been created (via the cue sheet). If a writer is told he must put some executive down as a phony writer, that's not an assignment, it's simply adding an additional writer. And of course, ASCAP says they have no way to tell if writers are "real" or not. Very convenient way to duck any responsibility for the extortion of what likely are millions of dollars of composer royalties every year.

And of course, they say it's a "composer issue" even when these practices are well-known, well-documented, and operated on an industrial scale. So when ASCAP allows this blatant disregard for the spirit of their rules, of course some bottom-line oriented companies are going to take advantage. After all, if it's OK with ASCAP, that sends a loud, loud message to the industry. The fact that the ASCAP board voted a few years ago NOT to approve a proposal by Doug Wood that would have taken a stand (in words only) against this practice also sends a loud message, as does the fact that a particular animation company, after being jettisoned by SESAC because of their business practices (forcing composers to sign over 30%-50% of the writers share to an alias for the company's President) was welcomed with open arms by ASCAP once again sends a loud message: Forcing writers to give up writers share as a condition of being employed is FINE with ASCAP. And frankly, until ASCAP takes a stand against this blatant disregard for the spirit of their own rules (they write the checks and make the rules here, after all), there's little hope in an oversupplied composer market that individual composers have enough leverage to put a stop to this practice.

I'll be very interested in Richard's response to this, especially what he thinks the ASCAP Board should do to rectify things. He's now one of the 12 writers in our industry who is in a position to, and has the responsibility to take action on critical business issues like this one. I'm hopeful that he will come down on the side of composers and take a decisive, public stand on this issue when it comes to making things happen on the ASCAP Board. As I said earlier, ASCAP writes the checks and makes the rules here. Only ASCAP is in a position to rectify this situation when it comes to ASCAP writers being forced to give up writers shares as a condition of employment.

[John Doryk]

Richard,
Seriously, you may be right, my catalog may not be that large and that may be the reason why. On the other hand, I have music on a number of music library publisher titles, have had my music broadcast on PBS, Discovery, History, FOX Network, etc and pretty much the only communication I've ever gotten back from ASCAP has been a quarterly statement saying "I'm sorry, no titles in our survey group" or something to that effect. When I've asked if I was not following proper procedure or asked for assisstance on checking on listing/cue sheets ect. registered of my music with ASCAP, I've not been able to get a returned email or phonecall. It may be that I don't have enough of the right kind of music in the right venues. I've managed to make a decent living at this, regardless, simply by working out my licensing and residual arrangements directly with the client, and as you reccommended, I pretty much always retain all my writers share in these arrangements.

[Bob Safir]

First, I'd like to invite everyone to read "Royalties, ASCAP, and the Sea," which I posted under the Business Professionals discussion here on the forum a couple of days ago. I was hoping that if these topics came up on the forum that we could take a calm, professional approach to the discussion. Having said that, I can point out that my issues with ASCAP also have to do with non-payment of royalties for cues that are part of a music library, which is making me wonder if something is broken somewhere related to these types of payments (music libraries). But even beyond that, I share a concern with John that I could never get anyone at ASCAP to return a call or e-mail over a period of a year regarding this problem. This is a customer service issue, pure and simple. We should not have to be matching Stevie Wonder's revenue stream in order to get the couretesy of a reply. I do know that my issues were escalated to the very top of Member Services...yet, still, there has been no response. Any organization, ASCAP, BMI, or The Association of Senile Catatonic Ardvark Poachers, has to do better than that.

[Bob Safir]

Pete, Richard: My particular situation goes deeper than that. Most of my cues in the scenario I'm referring to were wrongly attributed to me as a BMI composer. So I had to straighten all that out by contacting the library and by getting all the cue sheets and sending them to ASCAP. Additionally, some of the cues WERE in my ASCAP database, but I was getting paid for NONE of them. Between the corrected cue sheets and the ones in the ASCAP database, I was not only receiving no royalties, but also not getting phone calls and e-mails returned. That's simply unacceptable. But my point here is not to focus on my particular situation, but on the nature or source of the problem(s). ASCAP members, no matter who they are, should not have to go through this. Maybe some members are bringing in smaller royalty checks today, but they could be earning larger ones later and still deserve to be treated now as if they already are.

[Mark Northam]

"Now, as to "a very convenient way to duck any responsibility" and "Forcing writers to give up writers share as a condition of being employed is FINE with ASCAP" - this is tabloid rhetoric.
One must only ask WHY? Why would ASCAP do this? To gain what?"

Very simple, Richard. While ASCAP obviously cannot identify every phony writer that shows up on a cue sheet, there are more than a few very well-known examples of entire companies forcing this practice on composers - you even pointed one out yourself, SABAN. So in these well-known cases, identifying, or as you say "parenting", is not the issue. It is about the lack of will on the part of ASCAP to enforce these rules without requiring a composer to sacrifice his career by making a public claim and instantly be labeled a "troublemaker" in the industry.

What does ASCAP have to gain? Why is it fine with ASCAP to leave this as a matter for composers to deal with in an oversupplied and mercenary marketplace? Easy. Avoidance of financial liability. If ASCAP were actually to start enforcing its own rules in this matter - especially in the case of the well known animation companies that practice this, it might actually be held to some fiduciary responsibility for what are likely millions of dollars of checks it writes out to cue sheet thieves (phony writers on cue sheets) every year. It's very, very convenient for ASCAP, despite the fact it makes the rules and writes the checks, to to bury its head in the sand and pretend it doesn't know ANYTHING about industrialized cue sheet theft and leave it to the hapless composer to raise their hand and watch it get slapped down by some corporate lawyer.

I urge you as an ASCAP Board Member to look into the practices of industrialized cue sheet theft and do something about it! Don't know where to start? Call me and I'll give you the name of a large animation company (not SABAN) that is an ASCAP Member and for years has extorted a large portion of cue sheet writers share from hundreds of writers as a condition of employment. Or call Doug W - he knows who they are too, the practice has been going on for over 10 years and is very well known in the industry.

While we're at it, what are your feelings on the 1000+ signatures now required for independent candidates to get on the Board election ballots at ASCAP and the fact that a minute of score music only receives 20% of what a minute of song gets? As the new full time working score composer on the ASCAP board, I'm interested in your positions on these critical issues to composers.

[Mark Northam]

Hi RIchard -

If legal fees are what's stopping ASCAP from going after (instead of paying millions of dollars of royalties to) the cue sheet thieves, it's odd to say the least that ASCAP certainly had no issues spending what must have been at least $100,000 in legal fees to defeat well-respected composer Peter Myers who simply wanted his music, which contained a live vocalist singing prominently, classified as a "background vocal", yet till now hasn't spent a penny to stop the blatant, well-known cue sheet fraud perpetrated by a growing number of companies, and in fact was so afraid of this issue that the Board refused to even take a stand against it in writing. ASCAP has no moral ground at all on this issue in my mind until it starts enforcing its own rules. It operates the system. It writes the checks. It makes the rules. How much more simple can it be?

2. It's well known that those who complain publicly about the royalty system or how it's operated can quickly be labeled "troublemakers" and quickly earn the wrath of the PROs. Nobody needs that in their careers, hence why composers continually accept discriminatory and prejudicial royalty rates for their instrumental music from the PROs. It's a sad, sad, state of affairs, and the songwriters are laughing all the way to the bank. Do you honestly think that if the question was asked "Do you think 20 cents on the dollar for a one minute cue of your music compared to a one minute song on TV is fair?" that the majority of composers would answer, "YES"? Only fear is preventing these composers from standing up for their rights and the value of score music - it's the only answer that makes any sense.

How do YOU feel about the ASCAP weighting formulas, which pays a minute of score music only 20% of what a minute of song is paid, even songs marked as "background"?

3. Sadly, ASCAP has established its own standard and practice of allowing companies to extort writers shares as a condition of employment and paying huge sums of money to known cue sheet thieves. BMI too for that matter. How? By allowing this over many years and not preventing it, despite the fact it is directly against the spirit of their rules. They aren't even willing to go after the companies doing this right out in the open - I'm not talking about individual co-writers that would be hard to identify, I'm talking about multi-million-dollar companies doing this in full view of EVERYONE. I find these actions by the PROs to be reprehensible, and am surprised you don't. Blaming individual composers in an overcrowded market isn't the answer due to lack of leverage. The responsibility clearly rests with the organizations who operate the royalty system, make the rules and write the checks.

Also, regarding SCL and SABAN - as I recall, the SCL ceased actions immediately on this issue as soon as it received a letter from SABAN's lawyer Daniel Petrocelli after publishing the excellent piece "The Integrity of Authorship" by Ray Colcord in the SCL newsletter. Clearly, and for good reason, the SCL and the composers involved were unwilling to risk a legal confrontation with SABAN.

In this market, the power of a single composer unless they're a household name to change the policy of a company who has decided to demand writers share is negligible. Everybody knows they're bad deals, but individuals have no power to stop them. That falls to organizations like ASCAP who make the rules and write the checks. And yes, BMI has a similar prohibition on their books, and they look the other way too. It's a disgusting practice by any measure. But then again, so is wiping out any chance of independent candidates to get a spot on the ASCAP Board election ballot. It smacks of arrogance, contempt, and an organization that is so full of itself and the superiority of "the song" over score music that it will say and do anything to maintain that, including spending six figures burying a member in legal fees (Myers) trying to say a "vocal" isn't a "vocal" while refusing to act on the blatant extortion of cue sheet royalties from composers for decades.

[Mark Northam]

OK, Richard, I won't ask any more of you. I wasn't looking for resolution, only your thoughts on several critical issues for composers. Thanks for the clarification on the SCL's response to SABAN - you were there, I wasn't.

I guess with your longtime, personal relationship with ASCAP's staff and leaders that it probably isn't fair to ask you to objectively discuss these controversial ASCAP composer policies. Sorry if I put you on the spot.

Maybe one day we'll have leaders who are ready to publicly discuss controversial ASCAP composer issues like the weightings, the elections, no digital watermarking, etc. Then again, those are exactly the people ASCAP apparently doesn't want on the Board ballot, much less elected (or selected). And by the looks of it, ASCAP has been 100% successful in achieving that.

[Bob Safir]

Richard - my case has been escalated up to Seth Saltzman, who is the head of Member Services. I'm waiting to hear back from him before I try anything else. Thanks for the suggestion regarding Shawn... I'll wait a bit before contacting him, if it becomes necessary at all. -Bob

[Bob Safir]

Hi Richard - yes, you are correct in all of these statements. The thing about my situation, however, is that ALL of the cue sheets -- yes, ALL of them -- have been provided to ASCAP. Now, because it's cable (Discovery Channel, Biography Ch, BET, etc.), I don't expect to see huge sums of money. But I still should get paid, I still should get return calls, etc. And I was told that the library received foreign royalties on these same shows long ago...while I was still waiting for the domestic. Note: I don't want you to solve this for me, I can certainly continue to drive it. But awareness of this, and of simiilar/other issues amongst ASCAP membership, is worthwhile to all of us. As you can see from other responses, many members experience the same phenomenon. Thanks for responding to these posts...it is appreciated. -Bob