The meaning of this heading, in terms of the music industry and record labels such as Columbia Records, is that they basically have to be extremely careful with their artists; for one thing, copyright can actually pose huge problems on record labels today (for example, other artists sometimes feel the inclination to 'borrow' a part of a song, etc - the record label then has to act accordingly in order to settle whether or not the artist has actually broken a law). The definition of copyright is that it is essentially the right to prevent copying of intellectual property - such as music, lyrics and sound recordings! The copyright owner is able to protect their work and simultaneously control how it is used. Furthermore ethical issues, such as offensive material (perhaps an artists song lyrics) and censorship also proves to be very tricky, and record labels like Columbia must again be prepared to deal with the consequences, if one of their artists releases anything with an ethical controversy.
In terms of copyright, the rules a record company like Columbia Records set out are incredibly complicated; but I have an example! To begin, of course it is completely illegal for one artist to copy another's song, whether that be the melody/lyrics - however of course there have to be boundaries, and so the difficulty is in knowing when a record company can claim that someone has ripped off their artist. However I'm sure major record labels such as Columbia Records have a team of people who keep an eye on the music being produced on a daily basis.
Furthermore, the copyright strikes can even go as far as to reach fans of artists; for example, if a fan goes to a concert of an artist that is owned by a record label, such as Columbia or Sony as a whole, records a favourite song to watch back later and then uploads it to YouTube, technically they do not own anything, despite capturing the footage themselves; in fact, if the record company so wishes to, they can actually get the videos taken down from YouTube, and sometimes even get the account it was uploaded on terminated! Again though it is very difficult for record labels to know when to go this far in placing down the rules; YouTube actually has a copyright system, in which if an account gets more than 3 copyright strikes, the account is allowed to be taken down (whether the record label wishes it too or not).
Above is an example of what appears on a YouTube video once it is taken down by the record labels. The person who has uploaded the video has absolutely no rights/claims to it, despite recording. Everything belongs to the artist and the record label!
Furthermore every song or recording by a creator or an artist can actually be licensed for value in the UK and globally, which therefore generates a substantial positive balance of export income for the UK from copyright licensing. It provides incentive to industries such as record labels like Columbia to continue to invest in new creative content! There are issues with copyrights though, as more and more seem to pop up everyday for the record labels. The internet allows us to create, market and sell music, as well as providing innovative service and platforms that enjoy such creative content (ie YouTube, Vevo, MySpace, etc). At the same time of course the opportunity to unlawfully acquire (and infringe) copyright protected works is hugely increased by such things like these websites! Copyright infringement damages the music industry and record labels hugely; if a record labels artists music is illegally downloaded far more than actually downloaded (bought) properly, the record label will not receive any revenue, from any sales, because they do not exist!
Royalties are also greatly relevant when it comes to legal issues; they are paid to musicians and artists through different 'streams', depending on their musical activities, and involvement in the creation or exploitation of music/recordings. For example, going into more detail about legal issues, PRS for Music actually represents songwriters and publishers - they collect and distribute licence fees when a members music has been performed or broadcasted. Furthermore MCPS (Mechanical Copyright Protection Society), now a part of PRS for Music, collects and distributes licence fees to writers and publishers when their music is released or sold on CD, or as a download! PLL collected and distribute royalties from recorded music, to the owners and performers, when it is broadcasted/played in public.
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