In recent years, the surge in athlete trademarks has marked a strategic shift in how sports personalities approach their personal brands. Having recognized their inherent commercial value, athletes today are viewed as powerful brands with marketable identities.
Continue Reading Guarding the Name of the Game: The Role of Lawyers in Safeguarding Athlete Trademarks
Just like Napster triggered a global, technological shift in the way music is consumed and distributed, we are now on the precipice of another major revolution certain to disrupt the music industry. Artificial intelligence, or “AI” as it is more commonly referred, has quickly emerged as a game changer across a myriad of industries and music is no exception. AI offers the promise of innovative opportunities and avenues for music creation, publishing, recording, synchronization, distribution, consumption and revenue generation. However, these opportunities also present significant, novel challenges for music rights holders and users alike—and the legal challenges have just begun.
Continue Reading Rise of the Machines: How AI is Shaking Up the Music Industry
Now more than ever, access to quality data translates to monetization opportunities and this is especially true in the world of collegiate and professional sports. In the past two decades, data analytic tools measuring athlete health and performance have come a long way, and now, it is not just players or teams that stand to potentially profit. In particular, the advent of wearable technology has produced a sports biometrics boom that could soon become a gold rush for players, teams, universities, and companies looking to use or sell biometric data.
Continue Reading Navigating the Sports Biometrics Boom
Background
The first domino fell in late 2019 when Governor Newsom signed The Fair Pay to Play Act into law.[1] This was the first statute allowing collegiate student-athletes to profit off their name, image, and likeness (NIL). Specifically, the statute bars universities, athletic conferences and the NCAA from preventing student-athletes in California from profiting off their NIL. Despite the NCAA’s vigorous opposition initially, close to 30 states have since enacted similar legislation or have otherwise legalized NIL deals in their own states.[2] Moreover, last year’s unanimous Supreme Court ruling in NCAA v. Alston may not have reached the
Continue Reading What Brands Can Expect from College Sports’ Ever Evolving NIL Landscape
With content distribution methods evolving rapidly, major players within the entertainment industry are looking to mergers and acquisitions (M&A) as a means to strengthen their position and maintain market share. Industry insiders predict a continued increase in M&A activity within the entertainment sector. In light of the likelihood that entertainment companies may be presented with an M&A opportunity, either as a buyer or as a seller, it would serve entertainment companies well to prepare for such an opportunity.
Continue Reading Practical Considerations for Reviewing Entertainment Agreements in M&A Transactions
There are a number of issues relating to distribution that arise in split rights deals for motion pictures. Whether it’s an acquisition, co-production or co-financing arrangement, one of the more important deal points is what kind of agreements a distributor should make vis-à-vis the sharing with or granting access to another party of picture materials. These can range from physical materials such as trailer materials and TV, airline or other versions of the picture, to marketing materials such as artwork, value-added materials and electronic press kits. If you’re a distributor and are contemplating sharing materials you’ve created (or those created
Continue Reading Sharing Motion Picture Materials: Practical Considerations
Nollywood, as Nigeria’s movie industry is widely known, has grown in leaps and bounds since the acclaimed 1992 home video movie, “Living in Bondage”. In less than two decades, the average film production budget has increased by ten-fold to about US$250,000 to US$750,000 while straight to DVD release has given way to windowing across theatrical, TVOD, SVOD, and/or DVD.[1] Nigeria’s TV and video market revenue grew by 7.49% to reach US$732 million in 2018 and was projected to reach US$806 million by the end of 2020.[2] Widely known for comedy, drama, and romance (many times of average storyline
Continue Reading Nollywood Needs Co-Production Treaties to Move to the Next Level
A newly inked strategic partnership between Sony Music Entertainment and Roblox is another indication of a maturing relationship amongst the music, gaming, and esports industries, a synergy that has evolved for years and in particular, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The major record label and game creation platform have enjoyed the mutual success of their recent collaborations and are now gearing up to allocate more resources to developing “innovative music experiences for the Roblox community that offer a range of new commercial opportunities for Sony Music artists to reach new audiences and generate new revenue streams around virtual entertainment.”
Continue Reading Strategic Partnerships Advance Music and Gaming Synergy
Live entertainment venues, an economy nearly destroyed by the COVID-19 pandemic, are finally re-opening around the country and must consequently adapt to varying state restrictions for holding indoor events. Despite being able to reopen, many venues will remain closed until regulations and capacity maximums are relaxed, reasoning that such restrictions make reopening financially implausible.
Continue Reading Safe in Sound: A Reopening Checklist for the Live Entertainment Industry
On October 22, 1939, the first NFL game aired on television.[1] Over 80 years later, the first NFL game was exclusively accessible via a streaming platform[2]. What started as two cameras and eight staffers broadcasting to 1,000 television sets has grown into a worldwide multi-billion dollar industry[3]. Local, national, and international networks bid on the rights to broadcast live sporting events from the Olympics to the World Cup to every league of every sport in every country around the world.
But with the continued rise of streaming platforms, many of which have launched in
Continue Reading The Future of Watching Sports
As the COVID-19 pandemic has ravaged the movie theater business in 2020 and into 2021, all Hollywood studios have had to adjust their theatrical release strategies via straight-to-VOD exhibition or concurrent theatrical and digital exhibition. According to one report[1], as the reopening of U.S. theaters at full capacity became more remote towards the end of last year, straight-to-VOD movie premieres increased over three times year-over-year in Q4 2020. While 126 films premiered in either SVOD or TVOD in Q3 2019, 424 films premiered this way in Q4 2020. However, even with the arrival of a COVID-19 vaccine and
Continue Reading The Rise of Straight-To-VOD and the Fate of Box Office Bonuses
In February 2021, SAG-AFTRA’s National Board voted to approve a new Influencer Agreement. But, the announcement included few details, leaving many Brands and so-called Influencers to wonder what’s the deal?
To date, SAG-AFTRA has not released the actual long form agreement covering Influencers, but it has posted an Influencer Agreement Fact Sheet online here. The Fact Sheet makes clear that, for now, the Influencer Agreement is extremely narrow in reach. Indeed, it all but places the entire onus of documentation, compliance, and pension and health contributions solely on the Influencer. Therefore, the Influencer Agreement will allow Influencers to earn
Continue Reading Brands And Influencers Need To Know About SAG-AFTRA’s New Influencer Agreement
Almost a year ago now, the pandemic outbreak disrupted the worldwide entertainment industry – and in particular, film and television production. Similar to the US, European audio-visual productions were halted, movie theaters were closed, events, premieres and entire marketing and distribution campaigns were postponed or cancelled.
Continue Reading The EU’s Initiatives to Redress the Effect of COVID-19 on the Entertainment Industry
Almost a year ago now, the pandemic outbreak disrupted the worldwide entertainment industry – and in particular, film and television production. Similar to the US, European audio-visual productions were halted, movie theaters were closed, events, premieres and entire marketing and distribution campaigns were postponed or cancelled.
Cinemas across the European Union saw a 69.0 % drop in box office numbers in 2020, accounting for a total decrease of €4 billion in revenues compared to 20191. With movie theaters on the brink of bankruptcy, postponed productions with huge increases in costs (in part due to COVID-19 safety measures), and a consumer
Continue Reading The EU’s Initiative to Redress the Effect of COVID-19 on the Entertainment Industry
To date, there are over 1 billion augmented reality (“AR”) users and 171 million virtual reality (“VR”) users worldwide[1], a number that continues to increase as more industries turn to AR and VR to create immersive user experiences. Companies are offering stand-alone experiences that integrate augmented reality and virtual reality at events, such as Samsung and Live Nation’s broadcast of a VR Coldplay concert, as well as through in-store location based applications to encourage a seamless “try before you buy” approach, like Gucci’s AR apparel and accessories try-on app. AR and VR are shaping the future of advertising
Continue Reading Is it Time to Make AR and VR a Part of Your Reality?
Trademarks are the heartbeat of all businesses that rely on brand identity to reach their audience. Nowhere is this more important than for entertainment and media companies that constantly struggle through the often confusing morass of advertising messages. A clear message requires a strong trademark. And a strong trademark may depend on an understanding of how the recently enacted Trademark Modernization Act of 2020 changes the branding landscape.
The Trademark Modernization Act (TMA) was signed into law on December 27, 2020. The Act introduces significant amendments to the Lanham Act designed to strengthen the rights of legitimate trademark owners. The
Continue Reading Trademark Modernization Act Strengthens Rights of Brand Owners