Due Date for Q3 2010 Data (July 1 - September 30): Friday, October 8, 2010


Archive for November, 2009

Q4 Data Submission Deadline: January 15, 2010

Monday, November 16th, 2009

A big thanks to all you stations who submitted data for Q3 SoundExchange reports! It was a huge effort all the away around. We’re happy to say that we were ale to report on 175 stations, covering 230 separate content streams, which was a big jump from the Q2 reports (67 stations, 94 streams). We were happy, the CPB was happy and – most importantly – SoundExchange was happy by this upward trend. So, thank you all again.

As good as the Q3 turnout was, there is still much more to be done.

Stations that did not submit data for Q3 must start reporting; SoundExchange knows who you are and, while they have been understanding about everybody getting on board under the terms of the CPB-SoundExchange agreement, they expect every station streaming music to comply fully with the reporting requirements. I went to Washington, DC last week to meet with the folks at SoundExchange to update them on our progress and they made it clear that, in the not too distant future, they will begin knocking on doors of stations that are not in compliance. Please, please, please don’t be one of those stations.

OK, enough of that. You get the picture.

That brings us to the next order of business: Q4 reports!

In order to guarantee that we can generate and submit reports to SoundExchange on behalf of your station, you must submit your Q4 data to Public Interactive – in the required format (more on that below) – no later than Friday, January 15, 2010.

Here are the relevant points to keep in mind:

1. Unless I have already told you otherwise, choose two 7-day consecutive periods within the quarter (October 1 – December 31, 2009) to report on. To repeat, your reporting data must must must be completely contained within Q4 or we cannot include it!

2. For each song streamed, the following information is required (yes, it is all required): song title, featured artist(s), album title, marketing label, start date and time, and EITHER end date and time OR duration of play.

3. Stations that are not Public Interactive Composer clients must submit a playlist log that matches our playlist file formatting requirements. Playlists files that do not match this format cannot be processed by us and will be rejected.

4. Stations that do not have their streams hosted by Public Interactive must submit streaming access logs that cover the chosen reporting period. Playlist logs alone are not sufficient; without streaming access logs (not aggregate usage statistics) we cannot generate reports on your station’s behalf.

5. Depending on when your data is ready for submission, you will submit it to us either via FTP or Composer Basic. The latter is still not ready for general consumption, though we are working hard to make it available for Q4 data submissions. Either way, contact me when you are ready to submit your data and I will tell you how to do it.

Once more, just for the record, the deadline to get us your SoundExchange reporting data for Q4 (October 1 – December 31, 2009) is Friday, January 15, 2010. Learn it. Know it. Live it.

Of course, we are happy to accept your Q4 data well before January 15, if you have it available. Remember: if the data is not formatted properly we will ask you to reformat it and resubmit it to us. In order to ensure that we have your properly formatted data by January 15 it is best to get it to us as soon as you can.

WSPR 2009 Session Recap

Monday, November 9th, 2009

Last week I was in in beautiful Portland, Oregon for the Western States Public Radio (WSPR) Fall Conference 2009. On Wednesday I took part in a session on everybody’s favorite topic, SoundExchange reporting.

The session panelists also included Washington, DC attorney Melodie Virtue and Ginny Berson of the National Federation of Community Broadcasters. Melodie went over the legalities of the DMCA and such and I covered the basics of reporting to SoundExchange through Public Interactive then we fielded questions. I thought it was an excellent session and hopefully those in attendance did also.

For those who couldn’t make it, here’s an action shot from the session:

WSPR 2009 SoundExchange Session

WSPR 2009 SoundExchange Session

You can almost feel the excitement in the air, can’t you?

Big thanks for Paul Stankavich of KPLU for inviting us to hold this session and for putting the whole conference together. Thanks Paul!

You can download the various slides and handouts from the session using the links below.

Melodie’s slides on music licensing

My slides on SX reporting through PI

My SX Reporting Quick Start Tips handout