4.1 Terms and Definitions

Acquiring Music Publisher

A Music Publisher that has acquired Right Shares of Musical Works, typically collated into a Catalogue, from another Music Publisher (the Relinquishing Music Publisher).

Administrator

A Party administrating Rights on behalf of one or more Rights Controllers (in the context of this standard a Collecting Publisher).

Batch

A grouping of one or more DDEX messages to be processed by the recipient together.

Catalogue

A well-defined collection of items such as rights in Musical Works, Right Shares and/or Releases.

The XML tags in the messages defined in this standard use the spelling “catalog” instead of catalogue.

Collecting Publisher

A Rights Controller who is, at the time of assertion, controlling the right to collect royalties for a specific rights type in a specific territory for a specific Musical Work. Collecting Publishers may ask Administrators to administer some of their rights. A Musical Work may have zero, one or many Collecting Publishers.

Collection Share

A Right Share as calculated for the collection of money for Right Shares. It specifies the ratio (percentage) of a composition that a rights holder is contractually entitled to collect from a Licensee, by rights type, territory, and period.

In the context of this US Letters of Direction Choreography, Collection Shares are the Right Shares that are being transferred from a Relinquishing Publisher to an Acquiring Publisher.

Hub

A service that acts as a broker for information exchange, typically using DDEX messages. In the context of the Musical Work Right Share Notification Choreography, the US Musical Works Licensing Choreography and this US Letter of Direction Choreography defined by DDEX, a Hub acts as an intermediary for information exchange to facilitate sharing of Right Share information. Hubs may also play a role in facilitating licensing processes between (prospective) Licensors and (prospective) Licensees. Hubs may also act as routers and/or provide data caching functionality.

Letter of Direction

A communication from a Rights Controller who has acquired a Catalogue of rights to Licensees of the Musical Works contained in that Catalogue. An Administrator may carry out the communication on behalf of a Rights Controller.

Licensee

A Party that is granted a Licence in respect of rights in one or more Creations, by a Licensor. The Licensee may be a human being or other legal person or corporate entity. The Licensee may or may not be the message sender or message recipient of a message in a specific information exchange defined by a DDEX standard.

Licensor

A Party that grants a Licence in respect of rights in one or more Creations to one or more Licensees in accordance with the authorities it has been granted to do so by one or more Rights Controller(s), Rights Administrator(s) (where applicable), Licensing Agent(s) (where applicable) or Rights Holder(s). The Licensor may be a human being or other legal person or corporate entity. The Licensor may or may not also be the Rights Controller, the Rights Administrator, the Licensing Agent or the Rights Holder in the Creation(s) that are the subject of the Licence granting the rights. The Licensor may or may not be the message sender or message recipient of a message in a specific information exchange defined by a DDEX standard.

Manuscript Share

The  proportion of a Musical Work written by a Writer, as agreed between the Writers, typically represented as a percentage or a fraction. Manuscript Shares may occasionally vary by territory and/or rights type.

Musical Work

A Work intended to be perceivable as a combination of sounds, with or without accompanying text.

Any words that are intended to be expressed with a Musical Work (often termed Lyrics) form part of that Musical Work. Not all Musical Works contain Lyrics. A Musical Work may be expressed and fixed to become part of a Sound Recording or a Video Recording, or may be used to create notated music (sheet music, scores, instrumental parts) or sound generation codes (such as MIDI files).

In some cases, the Musical Work comes into existence simultaneously with its expression. This is common in extemporised forms such as jazz music.

Original Publisher

A Rights Controller who is assigned rights directly by the Writer (as opposed to, by another Publisher). A writer may have zero, one or many Original Publishers.

Original Publisher Share

The proportion of the overall Musical Work that a writer has assigned to an Original Publisher. Each Writer can have zero, one or many Original Publishers, and hence zero, one or many Original Publisher Shares. In contrast to Collection Shares, an Original Publisher Share does not define a share for the collection of money.

Release

A Release is an abstract entity representing a bundle of one or more Resources compiled by an Issuer. The Resources in Releases are normally primarily sound recordings or music audio-visual recordings, but this is not invariably the case. The Release is not itself the item of trade (or “Product”). Products have more extensive attributes than Releases. One Release may be disseminated in many different Products.

Relinquishing Music Publisher 

A Music Publisher that has relinquished Right Shares of Musical Works, typically collated into a Catalogue, to another Music Publisher (the Acquiring Music Publisher).

Right Share

A percentage or fraction of a right for a Musical Work for a particular time and place in which a party claims a controlling interest. Controlling interest includes ownership and/or administration.

Rights Controller

A Party that controls rights in one or more Creations in respect of some or all rights for specific territories, time periods, Rights Types, Usage Types and Commercial Model Types (which may be anything up to and including all rights for the world, in perpetuity, for all types of Usage and for all types of Commercial Models). Creations include Musical Works, Sound Recordings and other Resources as well as Releases.

A Rights Controller is in many cases also the Licensor.

A Rights Controller may be a human being or other legal person or corporate entity.

A Rights Controller may or may not also be the Rights Administrator, the Licensing Agent or the Rights Holder.

A Rights Controller may or may not be the message sender or message recipient of a message in a specific information exchange defined by a DDEX standard.

Sound Recording

An audible persistent manifestation of a subject (often but not necessarily of a performance).

Web Service

A modern set of web technologies that allow small pieces of information, typically in the form of XML files, to be exchanged. Augmented with SFTP (or other file exchange mechanisms) they can be used to communicate information about Releases along the music value chain.

Web Service Call

The sending of an XML document to a port/address on a web server, using HTTP or HTTPS.

Web Service Response

The sending of an XML document in direct response to a Web Service Call, using HTTP or HTTPS.

For the avoidance of doubt, the appropriate response is always the message indicated in the appropriate choreography.

Writer

A creative creator of the musical or lyrical elements of a Musical Work. Writers include Adapters, Arrangers, Authors, Composers. ComposerLyricists, Librettists, Lyricists, NonLyricAuthors and Translators.

Writer Share

See Manuscript Share.