Downtown Music the independent rights-management and music-services companies has left the copyright business.

Downtown sold a library of owned copyrights of hit songs recorded by artists including Adele, Aretha Franklin, and Lady Gaga for $400 million. The company is redirecting their efforts to artist services (distributing, marketing, licensing, royalty collection)

Independent artists make up the fastest growing sector of the music biz. Why? Because the digital streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple made signing with a major label nearly obsolete. While the major label system still rolls out the occasional radio hit, the artists who distribute music without any major music label has morphed into a billion-dollar market.

Artists want nearly full control of their music and rarely want to give up their rights. That’s problematic for the major labels that generally demand artists sell their rights in return for distribution and promotion.

“The motivation to sell your rights at the onset of your career is falling out of fashion,” said Downtown founder and Chief Executive Justin Kalifowitz. “While it is true the top of the pyramid, the top 1% of creators, are selling their copyrights, the general theme of the music business today is ‘how do I own and control my music?'”

To survive in the changing climate, Sony says it is ‘actively pursuing’ music acquisitions. Like Pac-Man eating everything in its path, they even bought a Mexican music catalog.

Sony Group Corp Govt Vice President and CFO Totoki Hiroki said:

“We’re always enhancing our potential to find and nurture artists and regularly create successes, and we goal to proceed to extend our profitability sooner or later,” Hiroki stated of Sony’s music operation, whereas noting that the AWAL settlement and the Som Livre buyout had been accredited however not but accredited by regulation”

Sony bought AWAL and Kobalt, Brazilian label – Som Livre, and Paul Simon’s song catalog.

Lana Del Rey announced that a new album called Blue Banisters will arrive on July 4th. She always comes up with cool album names. In March, the day after she released Chemtrails Over the Country Club, she said a new album called Rock Candy Sweet will arrive on June 1st. That never happened. Regardless, Lana keeps things moving and interesting, always finding herself in a discussion.

Apple releases the iPhone update. This recent update is Facebook’s worse nightmare. It gives users transparency and control over apps that want to track them for advertising. The main source of Facebook’s income is ‘tracking’ users and selling data to companies that target iPhone users.

Now, you’ll see a pop-up when you open an app that wants to access your device ID for advertisers. That pop-up will ask if you want to be tracked. Now have the option to opt out.

This will have an effect on online advertising reducing the effect of targeted ads and profitability.

The battle lines are drawn between Apple’s Tim Cook and FB’s Mark Zuckerberg. The love affair has dwindled and they ready to fight. I’m not sure how Facebook will fight back common sense privacy rules, but fear causes rational people to lose their mind.

While Hollywood is still reeling in shock over the Oscars historic ratings crash, it’s time to acknowledge that it’s the end of the era. If video killed the radio star, then social media killed the movie star, while TV and streaming killed the movie theatre.

And the award ceremonies? Forget about it.

Brooks Barnes, a Hollywood reporter for The New York Times, said: “The Oscars forgot about its primary job — to sell Hollywood to the world, to be a big, fat commercial for the dream factory, the kind that makes financiers open their wallets and wannabe actresses get pinwheels in their eyes about the day they might be able to stand on that stage and give their acceptance speech.”

How will movies survive?

“It is a tough market, even for us coming off of ‘Avengers: Endgame,’ to make a darker, character-driven movie says Joe Russo”

It may not be entirely decimated, but it’s a wake up call.