The music industry needs to obtain more revenue from karaoke royalties and radio stations in China to offset losses to piracy, the head of an industry association said yesterday.
"The new business model is built on the diversification of revenue streams," International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) chief executive John Kennedy said at a music industry conference in Hong Kong.
Revenue from CD sales still represents a big chunk of the industry's overall earnings, but its share is decreasing, and record companies need to branch out into digital music, radio and karaoke royalties, especially in China, Kennedy said.
He said the industry was "enormously underpaid" by radio stations for the use of music and that in the US, excluding digital broadcasters, "a major league music station doesn't pay anything."
The lobbyist said if the industry can get royalties from radio play in the US it would gain "many" hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue -- and that it is seeking to do the same in China.
Kennedy said the industry has secured a deal that requires karaoke bars to pay royalties for the use of music videos. He said fees averaged US$1.30 per day per room, with an estimated 50,000 karaoke bars in China.
Digital music is also a promising field, with a predicted US$3.1 billion digital business this year from the Internet and mobile phones, a 45 percent surge from the previous year, Kennedy said.
However, he said record companies aren't cashing in on the boom enough, pointing out that China Mobile, the world's largest mobile carrier by subscribers, earns US$1 billion in revenue from music but that the music industry pockets less than 5 percent of that figure.
IFPI, which represents the recording industry worldwide, estimated that sales of pirated music products worldwide were worth US$4.5 billion in 2005 and that nearly 20 billion songs were illegally downloaded that year.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique