As 2016 draws to a close, we can once again see that TONO has continued to grow its membership. We are gaining around 1500 new members a year, and now have a total of almost 30,000 members. We naturally find that very pleasing.
/ 23/12/2016 / codexAs 2016 draws to a close, we can once again see that TONO has continued its good growth in membership. We are gaining around 1500 new members a year, and now have a total of almost 30,000 members. We naturally find that very pleasing.
We can also be pleased that Norwegian music is making strong progress in many territories, indeed all over the world. This is most clearly evident in the fact that foreign sister societies are paying larger and larger amounts to TONO's rights holders. Last year, payments from abroad increased by 24%. We believe that this trend will continue.
2016 was the year when the proposal for a new copyright law saw the light of day. The government's stated goal has been for this law to strengthen the position of copyright holders after many years of what we believe is an unbalanced legal development that new technology and the new rights economy have led to. We can read from the consultation responses that the adoption of the law will be a struggle between different interests – on the one hand, the media houses and distributors, and on the other hand, the copyright holders.
The major distributors, Get, Canal Digital, Altibox, RiksTV and so on, play an increasingly important role in the dissemination of copyrighted content. TONO believes that distributors have an independent responsibility towards the rights holders when they distribute copyrighted content to their customers. This has led TONO to take legal action against RiksTV to clarify whether they are responsible towards the rights holders when distributing their programs. TONO won a clear victory in Oslo District Court in June this year. RiksTV has appealed the judgment, which will be heard in Borgarting Court of Appeal in November 2017.
This autumn, the European Commission has also presented proposals for changes to the copyright rules. As an EEA member, Norway will be bound by these when they are adopted. It is worth noting that the EU's "Copyright Package" contains proposals that could lead to large distributors such as YouTube, Facebook, Google and others being held responsible for the copyrighted material they distribute. This has been fought for by TONO and its sister societies, not only in the EU, but all over the world, for a number of years. Finally, we are seeing signs that bureaucrats and politicians in Brussels are seeing the challenges that the large platforms pose to the creative community. This should be seen against the background that it is the creative industries that are growing the most in Europe. This is where the economy and jobs for young people are created. We can therefore be pleased that the proposed rules will be able to hold the large platforms accountable so that copyright holders can receive remuneration for the extensive use of their music, films and other copyrighted material.
In our home market, we can look forward to high activity, especially in the concert area. This will lead to pleasant settlements for members in the future.
TONO takes this opportunity to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, and a happy, creative New Year in 2017!
