Here is an interesting story that I’ve been meaning to blog about for a while.

Earlier in 2013, Sony released in Germany, France, Sweden and Britain a compilation of early Bob Dylan recordings, consisting of previously unreleased studio outtakes and live recordings from 1962 and 1963.  (The release is not available to U.S. consumers, except as a re-sale.)  According to Sony, the point of the release was to keep the recordings under copyright protection in Europe.  In 2011, the EU revised its copyright laws to extend protection for recordings to 70 years (from 50).  The change is not yet in effect but will be in 2014.  There is a catch, however—recordings cannot benefit from the 20-year extension unless they were published before the 50-year term expired.  These recordings were approaching the 50 year mark.  The release is subtitled, “The Copyright Extension Collection, Vol. 1.”

This demonstrates that recording labels are willing to respond to pending shifts in copyright laws by releasing material for the purpose of maintaining rights in recordings.  This is hinted at in one of my earlier posts (see here).  Similar to the Sony/Bob Dylan situation described above, we may see record labels preparing remixes prior to termination of transfer.  By doing so, the label could continue to utilize the remix even after the transfer is terminated.  Even though this would result in two (2) mixes of the same recording in the marketplace, sold by competing parties (namely, the record label (selling the remix), and the artist (selling the original mix)), the record label would at least be able to maintain a foothold in the market for the recordings.  The alternative would be no rights at all.