I joined BMI which is one of P.R.O. and tried to register my work. During the process, it asked me who the publisher is. My songs are registered on Amuse.io which is a music distributor and I am not sure if I input their name on it.

Does anybody have experience with P.R.O?

 

Most likely what you have with Amuse.io is a distibution agreement. There is a difference between a publisher and a distributor. As the writer of your song, you are automatically the owner of your composition copyright, which in essence makes you a publisher. If you're a BMI writer, your publishing share is given to you if you don't have or belong to a publishing company BMI considers payments to songwriters or composers and to publishers as a single unit equal to 200%. Where there is the usual division of performance royalties between songwriters or composers and publishers, the total writers’ shares will be 100% (half of the available 200%), and the total publishers’ shares will be the remaining 100%. How do I know? I have been with BMI for 39 years.

 

ASCAP makes sure you understand what you are doing. Once you register your songs you own all the different categories of rights. Once you put songs on soundcloud, they are automatically copyrighted, according to how I read their info. Still waiting to see a few pennies in my ASCAP account, someday.I reached a minimum of 1000 plays a month on soundcloud, so they are supposed to start distributing to paying platforms like Spotify, etc.

 

Last edited: May 23, 2019