Meta announced today the non-renewal of the license agreement with the Società Italiana Autori ed Editori (SIAE), the body that manages and distributes the proceeds of copyright for artists of all kinds (from music to film scripts). Failure to do so has various consequences, the most obvious of which is the removal of the entire SIAE music catalog from social networks Mark Zuckerberg. So goodbye to music on Facebook and Instagramboth in Reels and in Stories.
This of course it doesn’t mean that all the songs in the world will disappear from social networks. You will still find all the songs of popular foreign artists that are not part of the SIAE repertoire. An important backlash instead for Italian musicgiven that the vast majority of artists in Italy (including the big names) are part of the SIAE catalogue.
What changes for users?
For Facebook and Instagram content creators it changes a lot, given that users will no longer be able to use songs from the SIAE repertoire in Reels, videos and Stories. Meta will soon block all content that uses music it doesn’t have the rights to. In particular:
- Facebook videos with music from the SIAE repertoire will be blocked. It will be possible to reload them by replacing the piece of music.
- Are Instagram, where music can be inserted both in posts with photos and in Reels, the songs will be muted. However, users will be able to decide to replace the muted music with a song from the catalog.
- In Stories of both social networks the music of the SIAE repertoire will be muted and will no longer be available for future content.
The removal of the SIAE catalog from the Meta platforms will start as early as today (Thursday 16 March 2023).
SIAE: “Meta’s decision is incomprehensible and unilateral”
The position of SIAE is tough, defining Meta’s choice as a “unilateral decision to exclude the SIAE repertoire from its library”. In a press release (sent to Corriere della Sera) the Italian Society of Authors and Publishers states that the maneuver “leaves Italian authors and publishers baffled”.
According to the SIAE, the social giant would have made a unilateral economic proposal. “This position – continues the company’s press release – together with Meta’s refusal to share relevant information for the purposes of a fair agreement, is evidently in contrast with the principles sanctioned by the Copyright Directive for which the authors and publishers of all Europe fought hard”.
It is, in essence, a significant damage for the Italian authors, who will see their music (and related revenue from it) removed from two major social media platforms globally. A condition underlined again by SIAE, which closes the press note with these words:
“Siae has continued to seek an agreement with Meta in good faith, despite the fact that the platform is without a license as of January 1, 2023. Siae will not accept impositions from an entity that exploits its position of strength to obtain savings to the detriment of the Italian creative industry”.
Meanwhile on TikTok we dance
“Where we dance” he sang Dargen D’Amico at a recent Sanremo Festival. There is certainly dancing on TikTok, the main competitor of Instagram, where the SIAE catalog continues to exist and persist.
Finally, we quote the words of Mogulto the century Julius Repettifamous author and current president of SIAE:
“These digital platforms earn billions and are reluctant to pay anything to authors, who live off their rights. What we do to protect artists is a fair battle, it is a sacred battle. The copyright was approved in the House and in the Senate and has been stuck for 7-8 months in the implementing decrees, everything is still and we can’t understand why, if it doesn’t unlock it’s a battle we’ve lost.”