LONDON - The Music Managers Forum has said that the royalties paid out to its solo artists and bands is a pittance compared to what iTunes earns. Music managers are meeting in Manchester today to sort out the issue.
Currently artists' receive 4.5 pence on every 79 pence track sold on Apple’s iTunes. This works out to less than 6 percent as royalties and the Forum is unhappy over the prevailing situation. If Apple sells a single for £2.99 single, the artist receives a paltry 35 pence or 12 percent as royalty.
“Sale prices and royalties have gradually been eroded to the point where an artist needs to sell in excess of 1.5 million units before they can show a profit, after paying for recording time and tour support,” said Jazz Summers, the chairman of the Music Managers Forum, which is hosting a Know More! Campaign to raise awareness among the artists' fraternity.
Warner Music Group chairman and chief executive Edgar Bronfman said that the unparalleled popularity of the iPod and the iTunes Music Store had affected the thinking at Apple, "The market should decide, not a single retailer," he said. "Some songs should be 79 pence, some songs should be more. We want and will insist upon having variable pricing," he stressed. He said that artists were being deprived of revenues from iPod and iTunes and they felt it was their right to claim them.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs responded by saying, "Record companies already make more profit selling a song via iTunes than on a CD because of manufacturing and marketing cost advantages. So if they want to raise prices it just means they're getting greedy." He added that if the price of songs were jacked up, piracy would increase meaning that everybody lost out in the end.
Posted
on : Tue, 04 Oct 2005 07:05 GMT | General News
By : Paula Jenkins
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