Here you can read CEO of TONO, Cato Strøms, comment on the TONO year 2015, in connection with the fact that TONO's annual report has now been published.
/ 27/05/2016 / codexWritten by: Cato Strøm
We keep hearing that the music industry is going through a period of major change. It's old news. TONO has been in this process of change for twenty years now, right from TONO's inception with licensing digital music distribution online, and TONO's members putting their own music online for distribution to their fans and supporters. As a curiosity: First out was deLillos.
The structural changes are not felt equally in all territories. Here in the Nordics we tend to get them first. We live in a far from fully digitalized society, at least compared to many other countries in the world.
The rapid technological development in our area, combined with social and cultural inequalities, is the main reason why the biggest changes are first felt here in the north. If we look at the sales of recorded music on physical media, significant markets such as Germany and other large countries on the continent are still far ahead. We can see the same in other parts of the world where the technological revolution has not progressed as far as in northern Europe.
The technological revolution has run away from the protective function of copyright. We have not experienced that since we received a modern intellectual property law in the 1960s. Legal developments in our area have not been impressive in the last fifteen years. The EU's many directives and the Recommendation from 2005 have not provided a solution to the challenges of copyright in the last fifteen years.
Here at home, the Ministry of Culture has just submitted a draft of a new copyright law, and it is claimed that this law will strengthen the position of copyright holders and restore the legal balance between the interests of copyright holders and the interests of major players.
It is clear that this draft law does not address the relationship of the largest players to copyright, I am thinking, for example, of Facebook and YouTube. As of today, these players can hide behind directive provisions (the e-commerce directive) and provisions in national legislation (the e-commerce act), which place them in a position of exemption from liability in relation to the exclusive rights provisions of copyright. The national legislator would probably say that changes to the legal regimes in this area lie at the EU directive level. Making services such as YouTube and Facebook, among others, liable must take place in Brussels and possibly in the USA through changes to the directive or changes in the interpretations of the directive.
Our impression is that politicians in Brussels and elsewhere have become aware that the gigantic economic growth that these services represent must be shared with those who deliver the content. We are talking primarily about music, but also films and other copyrighted content. The Ministry of Culture's draft of a new copyright law means the presentation of a completely new law. The very big changes in our area are not easy to spot. We note that the term "author" is proposed to be replaced with the more neutral term "author". This will naturally be discussed in the Storting.
Furthermore, the Ministry will introduce provisions to prohibit streaming from an illegal source when this has been made openly available to the public on the Internet, when this is likely to significantly harm the economic interests of the author. Here, the Ministry is clearly targeting illegal film services.
TONO is disappointed that the Ministry has not found room to introduce a dispute resolution regime that could have saved both copyright holders, music providers and the legal system unnecessary time and money. Today, copyright holders are forced to go to the ordinary courts to have remuneration issues resolved. This is time-consuming, financially burdensome and the court will only judge retrospectively. This could easily have been resolved through a dispute resolution body as we know it from other countries' copyright laws.
The best news has been saved for last, and it is very pleasant to be able to report that 2015 was a record year for TONO as we had a turnover of almost 600 million kroner, an increase of almost 20 percent compared to 2014.
A significant reason is a settlement in the media area, and we still see an increase of more than 9 percent in the online area. The concert area also shows strong growth. Revenue from abroad increased by 25 percent, which has several explanations. The combination of many big Norwegian hits abroad, better work documentation in other territories, and a low krone exchange rate. We believe that 2016 can be at least as good a year for Norwegian music abroad as 2015 was.
The text above is taken from TONO's annual report, which you can read at to click here.