EU Attempts To Boost Online Music Sales

The European Commission has put forward a proposal for a Europe-wide copyright and Licensing system for online music which aims to help European based online music services compete with those in the US.

Currently anyone interested in selling music downloads has to deal with 25 different licensing bodies in 25 different countries and as a result sales have lagged behind those in America. Last year, people spent an estimated 207 million euros (US$248 million) on music downloads in the US, compared to 27.2 million euros (US$32.5 million) in Europe.

Commenting on the situation Internal Market and Services Commissioner Charlie McCreevy said: "The absence of pan-European copyright licences makes it difficult for new European-based online services to take off. This is why we are proposing the creation of Europe-wide copyrights clearance."

The BBC reports that as well as dealing with the national licensing bodies companies must also set up systems to collect royalty payments from each EU member state. A single system governing music rights would save money and boost revenues for artists, according to the EU.

Officials at the EU hope to reach an agreement by the end of October on ways to implement the idea.