Pandora Lawsuit Could Overhaul Music Industry Royalty Scheme

A lawsuit between music streaming service Pandora and the two largest music publishing firms in the world could be the catalyst to reshaping how the music industry pays artists for their intellectual property. Artists and songwriters are calling on the music licensing firms, Ascap and BMI, to update agreements they’ve held with the Justice Department for decades to assert more reasonable royalty rates on internet radio sites like Pandora, which are rapidly expanding. Pandora currently pays just 1.85 percent of revenue as part of the 4 percent that it pays for all publishing rights. Five protesting songwriters have said that, though hits they penned for superstars like Beyonce and Christina Aguilera were played 33 million times on Pandora, they received just $587.39 in total royalties.