Music Publishing - It's back to the singles market

Reading an interview except with a music publisher was enlightening. http://music3point0.blogspot.com/2010/06/interview-with-publisher-richard.html

Licensing Fees

There are 3 main types of income in the music industry - Mechanical royalties, Performance income & Synchronization licences.

Mechanical royalties are derived from direct sales of a "physical" copy of music. Eg. sheet music, vinyls, cds, mp3s.

Performance income are derived from playback the music. Eg. live renditions, radio, tv.

Synchronization licences are derived from using music commercially with moving pictures. Eg. soundtracks for movies & tv shows.

Apparently mechanical royalties have been on the dive ($13billion in 1998 vs $8billion in 2008) while synchronization licences have been on the rise. This is due to the increase in tv/cable networks over the years which results in more broadcasts and more shows produced, thus more music used.

It's Back To The Singles Market

Gone are the golden days of buying an album just to get the piece of music that you like. Even if you ignore the fact that most music can be downloaded for free via torrents, digital distribution of music as a business model isn't doing too well as each music stream/download pays too little. The opportunities in the cloud are great but also presents great challenges in monetization. It'll be interesting to see how things evolve in the months/years to come. Needs a google-adsense like tipping point.