Radio Facts

Federal Copyright Royalty Judges have released updated cost-of-living figures for 2026 that touch several statutory royalty programs at once, covering how noncommercial educational radio stations pay for certain music catalogs, how phonorecords are manufactured and distributed, and how satellite carriers pay compulsory licensing fees.

Soundverse is marketing CAVE, its AI Music Studio, as an all-in-one production space that lives entirely in a web browser, letting creators generate, arrange, edit, and export both music and video from a single shared timeline with no software installation required.

According to a new topline guide from Kits AI, producers and songwriters have a hands-on roadmap for crafting the vocal hook that rides above an instrumental track.

A newly filed settlement now before the Copyright Royalty Board would hold U.S. mechanical royalty rates for physical formats and permanent downloads at their present levels all the way through 2032, still adjusting each year for inflation.

FAMM, the label representing Jorja Smith, wants a portion of the royalties generated by Haven's breakout single "I Run," arguing that the track relied on an artificial-intelligence replica of Smith's voice.

Universal Music Group and Udio have struck a landmark deal that puts an end to their copyright infringement lawsuit while laying the groundwork for a brand-new, commercially licensed AI music platform slated to debut in 2026.

Federal regulators have kept The Mechanical Licensing Collective in place as the official body tasked with running the blanket compulsory mechanical license that eligible U.S. streaming and download platforms rely on.

For the first time, The Mechanical Licensing Collective sent out a monthly round of mechanical royalty payments, distributing over $24 million to its Members based on usage data that American digital service providers reported for January 2021.

After three years of courtroom battles, BMI and the Radio Music License Committee have reached a settlement covering the fees nearly 9,000 radio stations pay to license music, closing out a rate dispute that had been working its way through the federal courts.

ByteDance has rolled out Ripple, a no-cost music-creation application designed to let creators build and refine audio tracks for short-form videos, though for now only invited testers in the United States can get in.