NMPA, Rap Genius Announce Agreement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE / May 6, 2014
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) and Rap Genius announced today a partnership that offers NMPA’s music publisher members the opportunity to enter into a settlement and license with Rap Genius.
“Rap Genius is a unique site that allows music fans to connect with songwriters and the emotions they express through their lyrics. That’s why today’s announcement is a welcome one, and I applaud Rap Genius for respecting the rights of songwriters and compensating them fairly for their work,” said David Israelite, NMPA president and CEO. “As more music fans find lyrics they relate to and are curious about online, it becomes imperative that various industries form collaborative partnerships such as what NMPA and Rap Genius have accomplished today.”
“The NMPA’s members represent some of the best songwriters in the world. Rap Genius allows these songwriters to showcase their work and interact with their biggest fans in unprecedented ways – we couldn’t be more excited about this partnership” said Rap Genius Co-Founder Ilan Zechory.
About NMPA: Founded in 1917, the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) is the trade association representing American music publishers and their songwriting partners. The NMPA’s mandate is to protect and advance the interests of music publishers and songwriters in matters relating to the domestic and global protection of music copyrights.
About Rap Genius: On Rap Genius, fans and the artists themselves explore lyrics interactively via line-by-line annotations that they can read, create, and edit as part of a worldwide knowledge project. Beyond music, it is the definitive source of annotated texts online, including poetry, news, history, science, the bible, and much more.