The class action lawsuit opened against Spotify by Melissa Ferrick and David Lowery has been settled. Months prior, Ferrick and Lowery brought Ferrick v. Spotify USA Inc. to the court system, suing the popular music streaming service for copyright infringement, alleging that Spotify made some music available on its platform without the license to do so. Those artists whose compositions were shared via Spotify consequently did not receive royalties for their music’s use, but may now collect compensation from the $43.45-million-dollar class action settlement.
Those eligible to receive a payout from the settlement fund include those who own copyrights on compositions that were made available by Spotify for stream/download without a license during the class period, December 28, 2012-June 29, 2017. Artists whose compositions were shared via Spotify during the period must have had a certificate of registration issued or applied for the appertaining compositions during the class period.
Artists affected by the lawsuit will need to submit a “timely, valid” claim form in order to become an authorized claimant. Those whose claim forms are approved will received a pro rata payment from a fixed portion of the settlement fund dependent upon the number of streams charted by the given composition(s). The payout will be relative with respect to the rate at which the streams amounted—claimants will also receive a share of the fund based on the division of the total number of streams of the artist’s composition(s) by the total number of streams of all of the qualifying musical compositions made available without a license.

Claimants must fill out a claim form here.

H/T: Hypebot

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