International ISMN Agency

The International Standard Music Number for Notated Music.
A System for Publishing, Distribution and Library Practices

News - Archive - 2014

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The Linked Content Coalition (LCC), the unique media project that recently published its innovative technical framework to improve the management and communication of and access to online rights information, has been re-constituted as a permanent organization. The new LCC is a not-for-profit global consortium of standards bodies and registries with a remit to facilitate and expand the legitimate use of content in the digital network. Its Ten Targets for a Digital Future aim to ensure that every creator and every creation can be automatically identified on the net if they wish to be; that every creation can have machine-readable rights information linked to it (whether for commercial or free use); and that existing standards of different media types can be interoperable. View the complete press release here.

SUISA joined Armonia

created by: Carolin Unger, on: 09.06.2014 Kommentare (0)

Armonia, the world's largest network for international music licences, got a new member: SUISA, the Cooperative Society of Music Authors and Publishers in Switzerland. The membership will strengthen SUISA's position in the online music bisiness. View the complete press release here.

Amazon and ISMN

created by: Carolin Unger, on: 09.06.2014 Kommentare (0)

Amazon, perhaps the topmost global player in the book-trade, fell victim to a deplorable misunderstanding. They did not know the ISMN despite the fact that they are now dealing with notated music on a small but considerable scale. For this reason they put pressure on music publishers in a number of countries, e.g. Scandinavia and Hungary, to drop the ISMN and adopt the  ISBN - a clear breach of international standards. ISO 2108 (ISBN) clearly states that music is excluded ...
It does happen all the time that staff make mistakes, and we could just quote: O Lord, forgive them as they do not know what they are doing! and continue our work. But in the case of Amazon the situation is more serious - because of its strong position on the market the company cannot be easily reached - there are no email addresses that can be found easily, and using them would not lead to a reply; the same holds good with regular mail, not only with Seattle but also with national branches.
So does that mean that big companies can cancel international standards?
Fortunately, GS 1 the worldwide barcoding company rescued ISMN - in their update of the authoritative GTIN Validation Guide they included a clear statement that ISMN is - technically – on the same level as ISBN and is a valid identifier and transaction number. Thank you, GS 1 colleagues!
No comments from Amazon so far ... 
If there are any further difficulties please report to the International Agency.
The GTIN Validation Guide can be downloaded here.

As every five years, the ISMN Standard will be up for systematic review now. If a ballot proves that the ISO member countries are in favour of a revision a working group will be formed towards this end. This would give the possibility to update the standard a bit where necessary.

As CISAC reports ITV, PRS for Music and Soundmouse announced a significant advancement in the automation and streamlining of the music reporting workflow process for broadcasters, using ISAN (International Standard Audiovisual Number) to identify productions and music cue sheets. View the complete press release here.

CISAC and BMAT, a technology company specialized in music identification technologies, signed an agreement to integrate the ISWC into Vericast, a global music identification service that monitors millions of songs over radios and televisions across more than 50 countries worldwide. this will improve transparent and efficient royalty distribution. View the complete press release here.

As CISAC (the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers) reports Koda, Kono and Teosta, three Scandinavian collective rights management societies, formed a cross-border alliance called Polaris Nordic. It "aims to create higher value for music creators, and lead the way for the future of music rights management". They have agreed to develop, and run, joint back-end systems for music reporting and distribution of the revenues collected by the organisations. View the complete press release here.