Page 44 - Mar_Apr23

The Business of Composing, Part 2 - Licensing

through a third party administrator. Without Content subgenres of “Spiritual.” (This information isn’t
ID tracking your music, no performance royalties or ad often discussed publicly, possibly to dissuade cli-
revenue is paid out to the publishers or labels/distribu- ents from incorrectly labeling their works.) Unfor-
tors. Instead, the performance royalties go unreported/ tunately, the majority of choral compositions fall
unclaimed and the ad revenue is simply paid to the per- into these ineligible genres. Furthermore, genre
son who posted the video (if they’ve monetized their and subgenre are determined not only by what the
channel). album owner selects, but also (according to CD
An additional challenge for sheet music publishers Baby) by analysts at the DSPs who scan and audit
is that all tracking is based on commercially-released music to be sure it fits criteria for monetization.
recordings from a label or a distributor like CD Baby. Incorrectly labeled music risks being rejected or
There is no way to register content through sheet music removed. However, we have seen albums labeled
or non-commercially released audio. Music publishers “Classical” which were accepted by the DSPs for
continue to lobby YouTube for access to collecting all monetization, so this area seems somewhat un-
these types of revenue, and we hope it will improve in clear and inconsistent in our experience. We sim-
the future. ply offer this information so readers can be aware
In the meantime, there are indirect routes to access- of the possible issues that may arise.
ing Content ID (although they have limitations and
drawbacks). If you use a distributor/aggregator (e.g. Although this may seem discouraging, remember that
CD Baby or others like it) to distribute recordings of these criteria are only for Youtube and Facebook monetization
your work, you can choose whether to opt in to You- of others’ videos containing your music; even if ineligible for
Tube Monetization for your recording. Hypothetically, Content ID, your audio can still be distributed on all
this could be a beneficial “back door” into Content ID; the DSPs; it just can’t be monetized in these additional
CD Baby would collect ad revenue as your “record la- ways.
bel” for any videos (your uploads, or others) that Con- If you do have a musical work that is accepted for
tent ID matches to your recording, only if your work monetization, CD Baby will use Content ID to collect
meets the following criteria: ad revenue owed to the recording owner and report
plays to PROs for any videos that use this music—not
• The musical work the recording is based on is entirely just others’ videos, but also your own (whether perfor-
original. Any track containing public domain con- mance videos, lyric videos, etc.); they will take a 30%
tent is not eligible for monetization on YouTube cut and send you the other 70%. (For your own video
or Facebook, due to the risk of mismatches and of your own performance of your own work, you can
false claims; so choral arrangements of public do- use YouTube’s Claim Dispute mechanism to dispute
main folk songs, hymns, etc, are unfortunately not CD Baby’s claim on your video and collect that video’s
eligible. ad revenue directly from YouTube.) This entry into
Content ID will also allow your PRO to match You-
• You own the work’s copyright (only the copyright tube plays to your copyrighted music, generating some
holder of the original musical work can monetize performance royalties for publisher and writer(s).
that work through Content ID). CD Baby also offers Pro Publishing: this add-on lets
CD Baby collect additional revenue for you as your
• The work is in an eligible genre. According to CD “publisher” (collecting/sharing the YouTube revenue
Baby, certain genres are ineligible for monetiza- owed to the publisher/copyright owner.) However,
tion at YouTube (and Facebook). These ineligible most of us have either a publisher (traditional or self)
genres include not only obvious categories like administering and claiming other rights and royalties
Karaoke or Spoken Word tracks, but also “Clas- for the work, so registering with CD Baby Pro Publish-
sical” music (even contemporary Classical) as well ing could create conflicts of ownership and claims, and
as the Hymns, Spirituals, or Traditional Gospel is therefore not a viable option.

42 CHORAL JOURNAL March/April 2023 Volume 63 Number 7