A non-profit monopoly still has the power of a monopoly!
Where is the Mormon Tabernacle Choir?
For years, it seemed as if SoundExchange, the nonprofit organization that handles royalty payments for musicians whose work is streamed over the Internet and broadcast on satellite radio networks, did not know.
The group insists that it tried hard to find the choir and about 9,000 other artists who still had not been paid.
Critics say SoundExchange has sat on its hands. Who, they ask, does not know that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir is in Utah? And how hard can it be to find the Olsen twins?
Fred Wilhelms, a lawyer who helps musicians with royalty payments, accused SoundExchange of moving slowly on purpose.
“What happens to the money they can’t pay because they can’t find the person to pay?” he asked. “They get to keep it themselves. Nothing succeeds like failure.”
For SoundExchange, the timing of the negative attention could not be worse. It is fighting before the Library of Congress to remain the sole distributor of the royalties.
The first thing that always comes to mind about “non-profits” like this is — how much money gets set aside for so-called operating expenses — and how large are the salaries for the self-important execs at the top?
There is an easy solution to this. Make the company pay interest for late payments.
I imagine that the royalties are in an interest bearing account. If the consortium is skimming off substantially more than its administrative costs – like the big fat paychecks some nonprofit execs pull down – this sounds like quite a swindle …
And who gets the interest accrued to the funds not paid? Wanna bet it’s the “non-profit”?
Don’t know if it’s changed; but, one of the reasons UPS used to take a minimum of 3 weeks to remit COD’s was the interest on the float.
Well, it’s the float that first made American Express wealthy. But I can’t figure out who I would pay if I owed money to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Really – who get’s the check?
As for SoundExchange – seems like a case of lack of accountabiity to me. One center of distribution of royalties only makes sense – it’s more efficient and everybody knows where to go for an accounting. Unless, like Republicans in Congress, there’s no way to hold them accountable. That’s when you get problems.
Oh! Well, no wonder the people who royalties couldn’t find them.
The first thing that always comes to mind about “non-profits” like this is — how much money gets set aside for so-called operating expenses — and how large are the salaries for the self-important execs at the top?
I knew there was a reason I always liked you, Ed. 🙂
Companies can be noble. Non-profits can be noble too. But there is nothing noble in having a particular tax status. When Americans understand this, their money will be better placed, and the flim-flam artists of all varieties will go broke. Yet how may times do we hear someone say that they support an organization because it is “non-profit.” If only they knew… If only they knew….