Lovett Speaks for Songwriters in Industry Struggle

May 14 -- Record companies face off against music publishers and songwriters like Lyle Lovett in Washington, D.C., this week in a growing dispute over royalty payments that threatens industry plans to sell music online.

The major recording labels and music publishers, which own music rights, are at odds over on-demand or interactive music streamed over the Internet, which allows consumers to listen to whatever song they want, when they want.

While the world's big music labels argued successfully that free song-swap service Napster infringed their copyrights, songwriters and music publishers now claim that at least one major label, Vivendi Universal's Universal Music Group, has violated their copyrights.

The House of Representatives Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual Property has called a hearing for May 17 as the major record companies gear up to launch online subscription services they hope will convert millions of Napster users into paying customers.

"Companies are trying to build legitimate online services to compete with Napster and the music publishers are the biggest stumbling block to that," said Jonathan Potter, executive director of the Digital Media Association, a trade group representing webcasters or online radio companies.

Publishers say they are merely defending songwriters' rights to be compensated.

"The reality is that songwriters have been ignored — or taken for granted — in the debate over distributing music on the Internet," said Carey Ramos, an attorney for music publishers.

Scheduled to speak at the hearing are country star Lovett, on behalf of songwriters; Edgar Bronfman Jr., executive vice chairman of entertainment giant Vivendi Universal; and officials from digital media company RealNetworks Inc., online music company MP3.com, and the National Music Publishers' Association.

The licensing conflict centers on streaming music, which enables users to listen but not copy songs online. For months, publishers, labels, and webcasters have been in negotiations over how much publishers should earn for streamed music.