The RIAA recently negotiated a $210m settlement with satellite-radio provider Sirius XM over royalties for songs produced before 1972, but that’s not an end to the dispute. Flo & Eddie of 60s band The Turtles, who’ve been at the forefront of the class-action lawsuits to secure payments for artists of that era in the US, are challenging the settlement.
Why? Because the settlement was negotiated between the RIAA, representing major labels, and Sirius XM – and that means that Flo & Eddie’s lawyers don’t get paid. Or, as their filing put it: the settlement was “fracturing the Class, destroying the leverage of the absent Class members to obtain a settlement on similar terms, and preventing Class Counsel from receiving a fee”. For its part, the RIAA is describing the challenge as “without merit and could force the delay of long-awaited payments to artists and labels”.
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