DSPS FORK OVER $424M IN UNMATCHED ROYALTIES

Royalty payments from DSPs totaling $424m are waiting to go to their rightful owners thanks to the initial efforts of the Mechanical Licensing Collective.

The nonprofit that grew from the Music Modernization Act, the MLC has accrued $163m from Apple Music, $152m from Spotify, $43m from Amazon and $33m from Google Play/YouTube since launching in 2019.

The unmatched royalties are referred to as "black box" money—funds that were never distributed because composition owners could not be determined. Data from the DSPs on the unmatched royalties accompanied the lump sums of cash.

“This significant amount proves just how broken the system was, how much the MMA was needed and how much songwriters have to benefit from the protections it has put in place," said National Music Publishers Association President and CEO David Israelite. "At long last, that money can make its way to its rightful owners. This is a massive win for music creators and the streaming services themselves.

“The Mechanical Licensing Collective's obtaining this historically unmatched money, doing the research to find its owners and giving copyright owners a transparent process to claim what is theirs is exciting progress that paves the way for the future growth of streaming, which will benefit the entire industry.”

Designated by the U.S. Register of Copyrights in 2019 following the historic Music Modernization Act of 2018, the MLC is responsible for administering the new blanket compulsory license for the use of musical works by digital music services.

Read the MLC's full statement here.