The American Society for Composers, Authors and Publishers reached a proposed settlement Thursday with DOJ that ends the department’s investigation into whether the performing rights organization (PRO) was violating its 1941 consent decree by signing about 150 contracts with songwriters and music publishers that made ASCAP their exclusive licensor for performances. Justice’s consent decree prohibits ASCAP from interfering with its members’ ability to directly license their songs. The department began its investigation in 2013 while ASCAP was settling its rate-setting proceeding with Pandora in the U.S. District Court in New York. U.S. District Judge Denise Cote said then that Pandora had a right to perform all compositions in ASCAP’s repertory (see report in the March 17, 2014, issue). Justice is reviewing both the ASCAP consent decree and a separate consent decree with PRO Broadcast Music Inc. Justice filed the proposed settlement Thursday in the U.S. District Court in New York City in conjunction with a petition for the district court to hold ASCAP in civil contempt for violating its consent decree. ASCAP agreed to pay a $1.75 million fine but didn’t admit any wrongdoing related to DOJ’s allegations. ASCAP promised to not sign any further exclusive contracts with its members and will reform its licensing practices so they don’t allow music publishers to oversee ASCAP licensing. The proposed settlement also requires ASCAP to improve its consent decree compliance program to minimize the likelihood it will violate the consent decree in the future, Justice said. “By blocking members’ ability to license their songs themselves, ASCAP undermined a critical protection of competition contained in the consent decree,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Renata Hesse, head of DOJ’s Antitrust Division, in a news release. “The Supreme Court said that ASCAP’s consent decree is supposed to provide music users with a ‘real choice’ in how they can access the millions of songs in ASCAP’s repertory -- through ASCAP’s blanket license or through direct negotiations with individual songwriters and publishers. Today’s settlement restores that choice and thereby promotes competition among the songwriters, the publishers and ASCAP.” The settlement “was the right thing to do for our members," said ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews in a news release. "With these issues resolved, we continue our focus on leading the way towards a more efficient, effective and transparent music licensing system and advocating for key reforms to the laws that govern music creator compensation.”

Opponents of the Fair Play Fair Pay Act (HR-1733) “have chosen to stand by hometown radio stations against the giant recording labels,” NAB said Thursday in a statement responding to the Alliance for Community Media, National Federation of Community Broadcasters and other independent broadcaster stakeholders’ endorsement of the bill (see 1605110059). HR-1733 would require most terrestrial radio stations to begin paying performance royalties and would require digital broadcasters to begin paying royalties for pre-1972 sound recordings. The bill includes a carve-out that would cap performance royalty payouts at a maximum of $500 per year for commercial stations with less than $1 million in annual revenue and $100 per year for college and public broadcasting stations. “We value our relationship with musicians,” NAB said. “Hometown radio stations are sustaining legacy artists and launching the careers of new artists. By contrast, many artists are suing their recording labels for royalties that they are owed. We believe radio stations are the best friend of the artists.”

The Copyright Office’s planned May 18 and May 24 roundtables on how software-enabled products affect U.S. copyright law (see 1512150050) will include a focus on the fair use doctrine, the first sale doctrine and other exemptions to copyright protections, the CO said Monday in agendas for the two events. The May 18 roundtable in Washington, D.C., will be at the Library of Congress’ Madison Building. The May 24 roundtable in San Francisco will be at the University of California Hastings College of Law. Both roundtables also will examine the proper role of copyright law in protecting software-enabled consumer products and ownership issues associated with such products, the CO said.

The Copyright Office’s two upcoming roundtables on its study of Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 1201 will partially focus on how to improve the CO’s triennial review process for Section 1201 exemptions and on a proposal to allow presumptive renewal of previously granted exemptions, the CO said in agendas released Wednesday. One of the CO’s Section 1201 meetings will be May 19-20 at the Library of Congress’ James Madison Building in Washington. The other will be May 25 at University of California Hastings College of Law in San Francisco, the CO said. Both roundtable discussions also will examine how Section 1201 affects consumer issues and competition, along with the section’s anti-trafficking provisions.

The New York Court of Appeals said it will consider Flo & Eddie's lawsuit against Sirius XM on the issue of whether New York law recognizes a public performance right for pre-1972 sound recordings and the scope of the state's law. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals asked the New York court in April to review the Flo & Eddie lawsuit, pausing its own review of the case because the status of pre-1972 sound recordings under New York law constitutes a “significant and unresolved issue” of state law that “is determinative” in the 2nd Circuit's eventual decision on Sirius XM's appeal of the case (see 1604130063). The New York Court of Appeals said Tuesday it will consider the state law issue “after briefing and argument,” but didn't set a schedule for considering the case in a brief memo.

The Copyright Royalty Board finalized its 2016-2020 royalty rates for noninteractive webcasters, saying in a Monday notice in the Federal Register its 2016-2020 rates would remain at 0.17 cent per performance on nonsubscription services and 0.22 cent per performance on subscription services. The CRB originally released its 2016-2020 noninteractive webcaster rates in December (see 1512170063) and released its full determination in February (see 1602120058). Publication of the noninteractive webcaster rates in the Federal Register starts the 30-day clock for parties in the proceeding to file an appeal of the CRB’s decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

The American Society for Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) generated more than $1 billion in royalty revenue in 2015, up slightly from the $1 billion-plus in revenue the performing rights organization generated in 2014, ASCAP said Thursday. ASCAP’s domestic royalty revenue rose to $716.8 million in 2015, up $61 million from 2014. ASCAP said its domestic royalty distribution to performing artists and other music creators rose to $573.5 million, up 6.2 percent from 2014. It said it returned almost 88 cents of every dollar in collected royalties back to music creators and kept the remaining 12.3 cents per dollar for operating expenses. “We are doing the best job possible for our songwriter and composer members even as we advocate for changes to the outdated music licensing laws that disadvantage songwriters in the today’s digital world,” said President Paul Williams in a news release. “While the music industry is in the midst of tremendous change, ASCAP has stayed ahead of the curve with a strategic focus on revenue growth, operational efficiencies, technology and service innovations demonstrating that the collective licensing model delivers the best value proposition in the performing rights world,” said ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews.

MPEG LA updated the coverage of its DisplayPort patent pool to include the v1.4 specification approved in March, the company said in a Monday announcement. MPEG LA’s goal “is to provide worldwide access to as much DisplayPort essential intellectual property as possible for the benefit of licensees,” it said. Its pool of DisplayPort licensors includes Hitachi Maxell, Lattice Semiconductor, Philips, Rambus and Sony, it said.

Samsung Research America of Mountain View, California, seeks registration of “Marix” as a trademark for a class of “computer software for controlling, monitoring and restricting access to televisions, desktop computers, and portable and handheld electronic devices,” said its April 19 application (serial number 87006511) at the Patent and Trademark Office. The subsidiary also wants to use the trademark for computer software to “remotely manage” those conditional-access “settings,” as well as for parental control software, the application said. Samsung representatives didn’t comment Monday.

Pandora passed the $2 billion mark in royalties for artists and songwriters, nine months after hitting the $1.5 billion royalties mark, the company said Monday. Some 80 million users spend an average of more than 23 hours per month streaming music on Pandora, it said. Pandora CEO Tim Westergren called the “rapid acceleration” of Internet radio royalty payments "promising news" for the industry, creating a “massive” revenue stream that previously hasn’t existed from radio.