The Recording Academy has announced a new initiative to facilitate leadership roundtables between music creators and Maria Pallante, the Register of Copyrights and Director of the U.S. Copyright Office. The initiative is a response to Pallante’s stated goal of hearing from stakeholders on all sides of the copyright discussion.
The Academy initiative, which will begin in New York on Jan. 14, 2014, and continue to other Academy Chapters whenever the Register or her senior team are in town, will feature roundtables with leading performers, songwriters and studio professionals. Appointed to lead the Copyright Office in 2011, Pallante serves as a key advisor to Congress during its review of copyright law. In recent testimony before Congress, she asked lawmakers to keep creators at the center of policy discussions, underscoring that the interests of creators are intertwined with the interests of the public.
The Academy initiative responds to the Register’s plan to seek out the perspectives of individuals and businesses, not only through the usual channels in Washington, D.C., but through direct conversations across the country. At its recent GRAMMYs on the Hill� Advocacy Day, The Recording Academy conducted a town hall with policy staff of the Copyright Office and offered to provide input from the important music sector.”How individual creators and small businesses interact with the copyright system is a fundamental measure of how well the law is working,” Pallante said. “I appreciate the support of The Recording Academy in giving me unfiltered access to its members and their stories.””As policymakers continue their review of copyright in Washington, it is extremely important that it be informed by the voices of creators,” said Neil Portnow, President/CEO of The Recording Academy. “We are grateful that Ms. Pallante is eager to hear from music makers and honored to be able to assist in this effort.”The United States Copyright Office promotes creativity by administering and sustaining an effective national copyright system.
The office serves as the principal advisor to Congress on copyright issues and administers the national copyright registration system. For more information about the U.S. Copyright Office, please visit www.copyright.gov and follow @CopyrightOffice on Twitter.