S-2625 : Still Just a Bill

Allocation for Music Producers Act or the AMP Act

This bill authorizes royalties for producers, mixers, and sound engineers who made a creative contribution to a sound recording. A nonprofit collective designated by the Copyright Royalty Board shall adopt procedures for such royalty payments for various digital transmissions of the recording.

The procedures shall allow the owner of the exclusive right to publicly perform the sound recording or the featured artist to instruct the collective to calculate and distribute the payments to the producers, mixers, and sound engineers. The instruction is called a "letter of direction."

For sound recordings fixed before November 1, 1995, the nonprofit collective shall adopt policies for collecting and distributing such royalties, even without a letter of direction. The collective and those seeking royalties shall attempt to contact the featured artist to get a letter of direction; however, if the artist does not object within a specified time frame, the collective may distribute the royalties.