The ongoing debate surrounding music royalties and online streaming services has kicked up more dust today as sources claim that electronic music streaming and retailing service Beatport paid “trapped” royalties to major labels last quarter, but not independent labels, leaving examples of the latter significantly out of pocket, as Resident Advisor reports.
Beatport announced that it would be freezing certain payments while its parent company SFX Entertainment underwent a process of going private. In a recent email that the company sent to its enlisted labels and which DJ The Black Madonna tweeted extensively about earlier this week, Beatport stated that it had “trapped certain earned label payments”, before going on to add that they expect the transition to be finished “within the next few weeks”, at which point they claim that all payments will be made.
However, Music Weekly reports that UK Independent trade body AIM has undertaken an investigation into the dealings and demanded that the unpaid members receive their royalties within the next 24 hours.
