What is a 'sync fee'?

[mqmurphy]

Very new to this (as you may have gathered...) but I registered with Taxi a month ago - I get the emails that refer to sync fees and I've searched the forums a bit but haven't found any posts that explain what these are. Can anyone direct me to a glossary or something that explains some of the terms that I'm encountering?
Thanks in advance.

MQM

[mazz]

http://www.amazon.com/Musicians-Guide-L ... +licensing

A sync fee is a fee paid for the permission to synchronize the composition to moving images. Sometimes there is a separate master sync fee if the master recording is owned by a different party (for instance a record label). For most of us who also control (own) our own masters, the sync fee is a combined master/sync fee.

Check out that book, it's a good one.

Hope this helps,

Mazz

[Kolstad]

What Mazz said + check out Taxi's own FAQ.
Most terms are there http://www.taxi.com/transmitter/0908/mu ... g-101.html

[Casey H]

Just to add to all the good info and resources... Sometimes the term sync fee is loosely used to reference all upfront licensing fees (master and sync) for a film/TV placement.

As mentioned, there really are 2 things: master and sync, but they often combined into one agreement and hence the sometimes loose use of the term "sync fee" to mean both.

Casey

[coachdebra]

And of course, there's Music, Money & Success by the Brabec brothers:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/082567 ... stsedge-20

Disclaimer - that's my affiliate link

[shanegrla]

Sync fee? Isn't that some mythical beast like the unicorn and satyr and Nessie? Surely just a product of overactive imaginations! They didn't actually ever exist, did they?

OK, sarc. off now. I actually did get one of those once. Here's hoping to bag another someday.