Newbie Question

[Inkstringer]

Rick,

That is an excellent reply and explains a lot. Several of the songs were already published to all music streaming apps / social media music through DistroKid who is my "Distributor" and several are already "scheduled" for release in March and April. All of the songs are publicly available on SoundCloud for anyone to listen to, forward, etc. The sync library never asked the "status" of the songs but eventually listened to them all through SoundCloud before asking for everything. It was a very strange "rush" to get all the songs by the end of the day and a contract signed.

[RPaul]

Several of the songs were already published to all music streaming apps / social media music through DistroKid who is my "Distributor" and several are already "scheduled" for release in March and April. All of the songs are publicly available on SoundCloud for anyone to listen to, forward, etc. The sync library never asked the "status" of the songs but eventually listened to them all through SoundCloud before asking for everything. It was a very strange "rush" to get all the songs by the end of the day and a contract signed.

I'm not sure (one way or the other) if just making a song available for streaming on Soundcloud would constitute first publication in the sense I was talking about with statutory mechanical licensing. But having it available through the paid download sites would. Here is what the US Copyright Office has to say about first publication:

What is publication?

Publication has a technical meaning in copyright law. According to the statute, “Publication is the distribution of copies or phonorecords of a work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending. The offering to distribute copies or phonorecords to a group of persons for purposes of further distribution, public performance, or public display constitutes publication. A public performance or display of a work does not of itself constitute publication.” Generally, publication occurs on the date on which copies of the work are first made available to the public. For further information see Circular 1, Copyright Basics, section “Publication.”

This is from:

https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq-definitions.html

It was easier to understand back in the physical media days, and also the permanent download side of things, which also transfers a recording to someone who purchases it. It's tougher (for me anyway -- and, as I said, I'm not a lawyer) to understand in the streaming world. For example, if you put a song on YouTube, maybe with a live performance, or make a song available for streaming only on Soundcloud, it is making it available to the public to hear, and it is certainly a public performance if they play it. But they don't get a permanent copy (at least legally -- they could always use some form of stream ripping capability), so is that actual "publication"? I tend to interpret it as not being that, but I'm old school.
 
As for the rush to get the songs signed, it's conceivable they may just have had a live opportunity for the sort of songs/recordings you have. (I had a quick listen to a few on your Spotify artist page last night, and I could definitely imagine the few I heard bits of working for country needs on both the songs and recordings front.)

[Inkstringer]

Thanks again Paul and thanks for checking out my songs. I had a new release today where the demo had over 1.5 million views on TikTok and it was part of the deal with the music library. It's off to a good start this morning on Spotify. I know it takes a while, but hopefully I will be reporting some placements over the next few months. In the meantime, I am writing and recording new songs.