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  1. 2 Music Industry Supply Chain and Work Registration Standards

2 Music Industry Supply Chain and Work Registration Standards

DDEX, formed in 2006 as the Digital Data Exchange, is a consortium of media-related companies developing digital supply chain standards for use among music industry stakeholders.576 In 2008, DDEX developed and released its digital supply chain standard, a standardized eXtensible Markup Language (XML) format for transmitting information between parties (generally business-to-business).577 DDEX’s supply chain standard has been adopted all across the music industry ( digital retailers, digital distributors and aggregators, record companies, music rights societies and various technical service providers ), with more than 3,500 implementation licences [] issued. 578 DDEX’s supply chain standards generic enough so that it can be adapted to other digital supply chains.579 DDEX offers an implementation license that allows the implementation of the DDEX supply chain standards via an application programming interface (API). 580 DDEX implements its standards similar to W3C, such that anyone may become a contributor to the standards by joining as a member, but differs from W3C in that its standards are not publicly available.581

The Common Works Registration (CWR) standard is a supply chain standard developed by performance rights organizations and music publishers, and maintained by the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC).582 The CWR is a standard format, that provides the necessary data required for registering and revising works with performance rights organizations or mechanical rights organizations.583 Additionally, the standard allows for tracking and facilitating the transfer of musical works between publishers and societies. 584 CISAC also maintains the International Standard Work Code (ISWC) for musical works in ISO 15707.585 ISWC is the international standard for identifying a musical work.586 The minimum descriptive metadata required for a ISWC is:

  • “the title of the work,

  • all composers, authors and arrangers of the work identified by their IPI numbers and role codes,

  • the work classification code (from the CIS standards list), [and]

  • in the case of ‘versions’, for example arrangements, identification of the work from which the version was made.”587

The International Standard Recording Code (ISRC) is an international standard for identifying sound and music video recordings.588 The ISRC is comprised of the following elements, in the following order:

576Michael Petychakis. DDEX: AN API for the Music Industry. en-US. June 2018. url: https://apilama.com/2018/06/25/ddexapi-music-industry-technology/ (visited on 12/18/2019); About DDEX. en-US. url: https://ddex.net/about-ddex/ (visited on 12/18/2019).

577Petychakis, DDEX; About DDEX.

578Petychakis, DDEX; About DDEX; . Frequently Asked Questions. en-US. url: https://ddex.net/implementation/frequently-asked-questions/ (visited on 12/18/2019).

579About DDEX.

580Petychakis, DDEX.

581Petychakis, DDEX; About DDEX.

582MusicMark. url: https://www.musicmark.com/ (visited on 12/18/2019).

583MusicMark; Common Works Registration User Manual. User Manual CWR11-1494. Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC), Sept. 2011, pp. 1”54. url: https://musicmark.com/documents/cwr11-1494_cwr_user_manual_2011-09-23_e_2011-09-23_en.pdf.

584Common Works Registration User Manual.

585Fraçois Nuttall. PRIVATE COPYRIGHT DOCUMENTATION SYSTEMS AND PRACTICES: COLLECTIVE MANAGEMENT ORGANIZATIONS’ DATABASES (PRELIMINARY VERSION). tech. rep. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Sept. 2011, pp. 1”34. url: https://www.wipo.int/export/sites/www/meetings/en/2011/wipo_cr_doc_ge_11/pdf/collective.pdf.

586Frequently Asked Questions. publisher: International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers. url: http://www.iswc.org/en/faq.html (visited on 10/12/2019).

587Frequently Asked Questions.

588ISRC - International Standard Recording Code. publisher: International Standard Recording Code. url: https://www.usisrc.org/ (visited on 12/18/2019).

  • “Country Code”,

  • “Registrant Code”,

  • “Year of Reference”, and

  • “Designation Code.”589

” The Country Code identifies the country of residence of the registrant.” 590 The Registrant Code identifies the entity assigning the Designation Code in an ISRC. 591 The Year of Reference Element identifies the year in which the ISRC is allocated to the recording. 592 The Designation Code consists of five digits assigned by the Registrant. 593

The International Standard Name Identifier (ISNI) is an international standard for public identification of contributors to creative works.594 A creative seeking an ISNI will have to contact an ISNI Registration Agency to obtain an ISNI from the ISNI International Agency.595

589International Standard Recording Code (ISRC) Handbook. 3rd. International ISRC Agency (IFPI Secretariat), 2009. url: https://www.ifpi.org/content/library/isrc_handbook.pdf.

590Ibid.

591Ibid.

592Ibid.

593Ibid.

594About the ISNI International Agency. url: http://www.isni.org/about (visited on 12/18/2019).

595ISNI | ISNI Registration Agencies. url: http://www.isni.org/content/isni-registration-agencies (visited on 12/18/2019).

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