A right royal mess

The local publishing body – meant to accurately pursue royalties on behalf of its members – has completely misreported its royalty collection results for local members, publishing the erroneous information in a press release to media.
In responses to Business Daily enquiries yesterday, the group reiterated the incorrect information, stating that MOP200,000 (US$25,000) had been collected ‘from different affiliated societies […] and will be distributed to its members’.
The group also commented that it was an increase on the previous year, despite the fact that it did not have the relevant data on hand to provide.
The amount in question relates to the activities for 2015, despite the press release stating it related to ‘the operating situation of the past year’.
The press release states that the MOP200,000 ‘will be distributed to its members’ but the group does not mention the 30 per cent management fee it places on the royalties collected which, if subtracted from the total, amounts to MOP140,000 and is still higher than the actual amount the group collected during the year: a total of MOP120,071.
In fact, the amounts collected – relating to three years of operations and provided to Business Daily (2013, 2014 and 2015) – collectively do not equal the amount announced in the group’s press release.
The total collected ‘from different affiliated societies’ amounted to MOP12,240 in 2013 and MOP30,793 in 2014, according to the group’s emailed response. The total for the three years’ collections amounts to MOP163,104, only 81.5 per cent of the reported total of MOP200,000 (for 2015).
Despite the ‘mistake on the data provided in the press release’ – for which the group told Business Daily ‘we apologise’ – the group had not issued an official correction by the time this story went to print.
Within the response to Business Daily’s enquiries, the group defends its existence by saying: ‘It is necessary for us to protect the material interests of music creators and publishers. MACA is established to defend the public performance rights of the musical works’.