Weeks after its appeal against the Copywrite Royalty Board was dismissed, SoundExchange is involved in more litigation – this time against SiriusXM. The digital streaming royalties collector has filed a lawsuit in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia accusing the satellite broadcasting company of withholding more than $150 million in unpaid royalties.
The lawsuit alleges that Sirius XM has manipulated federal regulations to create an artificially low calculation of “revenue” on which it pays creator royalties. Specifically, SoundExchange claims Sirius XM ascribed an “excessive and unjustified value” to the webcasting part of its bundled packages, thus reducing the satellite radio royalty pool. An audit of Sirius XM also revealed other deductions that SoundExchange…
