business
Buma/Stemra, APRA AMCOS Forge Pan-Asian Licensing Deal
The pan-Asian hub was announced in 2013 following a “groundbreaking deal with foundation member Universal Music Publishing. It exists to offer full-service digital licensing, processing and distribution for copyright holders across the Asian region, including India. “The online market is growing rapidly in Asia,” comments Bernard Kobes, CEO of Buma/Stemra. “We’re thrilled that our members from now on will benefit from that growth. We really look forward to working closely together with the excellent APRA AMCOS team in order to maximize the revenue stream for our members.” Adds Dean Ormston, CEO of APRA AMCOS: “We are excited to welcome our trusted society partner Buma/Stemra into our industry-leading Pan Asian Multi-Territory Licensing Hub. We look forward to working closely with the...
NCC to ensure enforcement of copyright laws from 2021 – chief
File Photo The Director General, Nigeria Copyright Commission (NCC), Mr John Asien, says the commission would focus more on the enforcement of copyright laws as from 2021. Asien told newsmen on the sidelines of the just concluded 39th International Convention of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) in Ilorin, that it would no longer be business as usual for pirates, as different strategies would be used, both online and in physical space, to ensure that pirates stopped selling pirated books. ”For us at the commission, we are more than committed, by next year we will be focusing more on enforcement and we are going to do that in all nooks and cranny of Nigeria. ”We are going to use different strategies and working on different platforms, both online and the physical space. This is beca...
Universal Music Publishing Buys Bob Dylan’s Song Catalog
Another factor, industry sources say, is that the generation of singer-songwriters who came of age in the sixties and seventies is at a point where they’re thinking about their legacies, as well as estate planning. On December 4, Primary Wave Music Publishing announced that it had acquired a majority stake in the catalog of singer-songwriter Stevie Nicks, in a deal that The Wall Street Journal reported valued her compositions at $100 million. That deal and Dylan’s could trigger more big catalog transactions. This is a unique prize, however. Among the songwriters of the rock era, only the Beatles are as influential as Dylan, the only songwriter to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. The catalog includes more than 600 compositions, written over the course of six decades, including “Blo...
India’s Serum Institute seeks approval for COVID-19 vaccine
The Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine producer by volume, has sought government approval for emergency-use authorisation of the coronavirus vaccine that it has developed in partnership with the University of Oxford and British drugmaker AstraZeneca. “As promised, before the end of 2020, @SerumInstIndia has applied for emergency use authorisation for the first made-in-India vaccine, COVISHIELD,” the company CEO Adar Poonawalla tweeted on Monday. The experimental vaccine can be stored at two to eight degrees Celsius and can be distributed more easily in India, which has the world’s second-highest number of infections at 9.6 million. The company has applied to the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI), with Poonawalla saying the vaccine will “save countless lives” witho...
Ariana Grande Edges Mariah Carey on U.K. Singles Chart
With three more weeks until Christmas, there’s plenty of time for Carey to snag the title. There’s Christmas cheer up and down the chart, as Wham’s “Last Christmas” (RCA) flies 20-3, The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl’s “Fairytale of New York” (Warner Bros) zooms 26-8, and 18 more holiday hits impact the Top 40, the Official Charts Company reports. The highest new entry on the chart this week belongs to Liam Gallagher, with his charity fundraising singer “All You’re Dreaming Of” (Warner Records) opening at No. 35. It’s the former Oasis frontman’s fourth solo Top 40 single. Proceeds of the single will benefit Action For Children, a charity that protects and supports vulnerable children and young people across the U.K. Over on the Official U.K. Albums Chart, Barlow’s...
AC/DC Holds Off Powderfinger For Australian Chart Title
Meanwhile, Miley Cyrus bags her sixth Top 10 title as Plastic Hearts enters at No. 3 on the ARIA chart. It’s Cyrus’ first studio album since Younger Now, which peaked at No. 2 in October 2017, though the U.S. pop singer did drop an EP last year, She Is Coming, which reached No. 10 on the survey. Closing out the Top 5 are BTS’ BE (down 2-4) and Taylor Swift’s former leader folklore (up 6-5), respectively, while Andrea Bocelli’s Believe climbs into the Top 10 for the first time. In its third week on the chart, Believe lifts 24-10, and becomes the Italian tenor’s eighth Top Ten title in the land Down Under. Over on the ARIA Singles Chart, 24kGoldn’s “Mood” featuring Iann Dior is the champion for the eighth week. The San Francisco rapper’s first leader in Australia has now logged the seco...
Mariah Carey and Wham’s ‘Christmas’ Hits Battle For U.K. No. 1
It could be a very special Christmas indeed for Mariah Carey, whose “All I Want For Christmas Is You” is on pace to hit No. 1 in the U.K. for the very first time. Carey’s festive classic is in pole position after the weekend, with a lead of 1,300 combined sales over Wham’s “Last Christmas,” another holiday standard which has never reached the top of the chart tree. Carey’s “Christmas” was released in 1994 and has a U.K. peak position of No. 2. You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagined what a dating should be. It begins with giving you back power. Get to meet Beautiful people, chat and make money in the process. Earn rewards by chatting, sharing photos, blogging and help give users back their ...
Egyptian rights group head hopes release will help other prisoners
The head of a leading Egyptian human rights group who was held for two weeks on terrorism charges said Saturday he hoped the campaign to secure his release would help others still jailed on similar Allegations. Activists saw the detention last month of Gasser Abdel Razek, executive director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), and two of the group’s other staff, as the latest escalation of a broad crackdown on political dissent under President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi. Egypt’s foreign ministry had said EIPR was operating illegally, an accusation the group denies. There has been no official statement from public prosecutors since Abdel Razek’s release, and officials could not be reached for comment. The arrests, which came after EIPR hosted a briefing on human rights for 13 s...
Sorry, ‘SNL’: Variety Talk & Sketch Series Will Now Compete in One Emmys Category
“Saturday Night Live” has won outstanding variety sketch series the last four years running, but now it will be up against talk shows too, like five-time winner “Last Week Tonight With John Oliver.” The Television Academy announced its rule changes for the upcoming 73rd Emmy Awards competition on Friday (Dec. 4) — and fans of NBC’s Saturday Night Live may not like the first one. Separate awards for variety talk and variety sketch series have been recombined into one category: outstanding variety series. Saturday Night Live has won outstanding variety sketch series the last four years running. It was nominated the two years before that, but lost, in turn, to Inside Amy Schumer and Key & Peele. By contrast, between 1976 and 2014, when SNL had to compete with...
AU welcomes Nigeria ahead of AfCFTA kick-off
The African Union Commissioner for Trade and Industry, Albert Muchanga, said in Addis Ababa on Friday that instruments signifying Nigeria’s entry into the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will be received at the commission’s headquarters shortly ahead of next year’s kick-off of trading. Speaking during the AfCFTA Business Forum 2020 to discuss the status of preparations to launch the continental trading, Muchanga said the launch of trading will facilitate the growth of African enterprise and enhance the capacity of industries producing goods to a wider population. Nigeria, which signed the AfCFTA agreement in 2019, officially ratified the agreement on 12 November. The instruments of ratification are expected to be received at the AU on Saturday, 5 December, the deadline for the...
David Swartz Launches Singular Arts Group Artist Management Company in Berlin With Matt Lambert
Mykki Blanco, Patrick Wolf, Finn Ronsdorf & FaltyDL are the first four artists on the Germany-based company’s roster. David Swartz launched a Berlin-based full-service artist management company Friday (Dec. 4) called Singular Arts Group in partnership with Matt Lambert. Swartz spent the early part of his 20-year career in the business in the live music sector, from concert promoter to booking agent, before moving into artist management. He started Kosher Management in Los Angeles in 2009 and managed American and European acts mainly across the rock and electronic genres until 2016 when he moved to Germany. Lambert, who will serve as Singular Arts Group’s creative director, has more than 15 years of industry experience working as a filmmaker, photographer, artist and cr...
PRS for Music Proposed Livestreams Rate Scheme Draws Managers’ Ire
“For the sake of all artists, songwriters and the wider industry, it is crucial that this new format is allowed to grow and thrive,” the artists and managers say in their letter. “Charging artists up to four times the live rate strangles rather than nurtures this innovation.” Signing onto the letter were managers for such artists as Dua Lipa, Biffy Clyro, Liam Gallagher, Bicep, Fontaines D.C., Gorillaz, Yungblud, and Arlo Parks, as well as a group of songwriters. In a statement sent to Billboard, PRS for Music did not detail the proposed scheme for its Online Live Concert license, which it said was “still evolving.” The organization says the new scheme will allow the necessary rights to be licensed and says it welcomes “the many initiatives to move live concerts online.” The manager and ar...
