Unlike the U.S., where copyright conundrums abound, China has a chance to create a music industry with a completely fresh approach to copyright consumption. I was recently invited to join the American delegation attending the International Creative Industries Summit in Shanghai, China.  The intensive two-day summit, which occurred April 21-22, 2009, was   poised to be a historic event to witness.  For me, it was rife with irony and provided a fascinating contrast to the "established" western music industry.  

New York - For the past year, Jim Griffin has advised Warner Music Group on digital distribution and licensing models with the goal of bringing an end to the litigation that has put a wedge between the major labels and their customers and replacing it with a regular flow of income for right holders. The project known as Choruss, which is being incubated at Warner and is planned to be rolled out as a non-profit with Griffin at the helm, proposes to build a small music-royalty fee into university tuition payments received from students, and, if successful, could be expanded to make ISPs the collector of the fees. For those of you who were not able to attend DMW's Digital Music Forum East this past week, here is a complete transcript of his interesting keynote presentation:

New York - Fascinating keynote at the Digital Music Forum East this morning from Jim Griffin, an advisor to Warner Music Group and head of the Choruss initiative. I'm getting a text of his speech and will post. But suffice to say he delivered a smackdown to Rick Carnes and Chris Castle over their criticisms of Choruss which ran in op-ed that appeared in Content Agenda and other publications.

San Francisco - Three of the four major record labels have signed on to back Choruss, an independent nonprofit organization that would collect and distribute monies paid by universities and Internet service providers for blanket digital music licenses, Wired.com reported, citing an industry source.

Los Angeles - Several universities have been approached by record labels to discuss a "voluntary blanket licensing" of music to college students, TechDirt reported.

New York - Major label Warner Music Group (NYSE: WMG) this week hired Jim Griffin, former head of digital at Geffen and a vocal industry critic, to oversee a plan that would have consumers pay a monthly fee through their Internet service providers for unlimited access to music, Portfolio.com reported. "We're still clinging to the vine of music as a product," Griffin told Portfolio.com, dubbing the state of affairs "Tarzan" economics. "But we're swinging toward the vine of music as a service. We need to get ready to let go and grab the next vine, which is a pool of money and a fair way to split it up, rather than controlling the quantity and destiny of sound recordings."

[Notes from the 2006 Digital Media Conference]

Aydin Caginalp: The Industry Perspective - The sale of music downloads (online/mobile) has doubled in the last year and has helped to offset the 7% drop in physical CD sales. Most iPods contain files which are 66% ripped from CD’s and most are only half-filled. The empowerment of the internet is the empowerment of the artist.