This summer I interned at the Recording Industry Association of America (the RIAA) focusing mainly on copyright and licensing. The RIAA is infamous for being the online police for the illegal downloading of music and also for rewarding artists with gold, platinum, and diamond records to artists that sell a specific quota of albums. I was mainly drawn to this internship because I thoroughly enjoy music, and you can find me playing guitar and singing in my spare time.
Right now business is not the greatest in the music industry. Since there has been an increase in online illegal downloading of music, artists are not getting paid the fair amount they deserve for their works. Unfortunately, due to outdated copyright laws, it is difficult to protect artists’ interests because it is difficult to hold websites accountable for their actions when there is no applicable law that directly states that they are performing infringing activity.
I was very lucky to be at the RIAA this past summer because of the change that the music industry is experiencing right now. Of course there was the whole Taylor Swift advocating for musicians rights movement, but there was also the release of Apple Music, which hopefully will help the music industry in the long run.
During my internship there was only one other legal intern alongside me and we split our time working with each other and individually on projects. Some of the projects that we worked on included performing an analysis of circuit split within the United States for the defenses corporations use for right of publicity claims. I also did a lot of statute and bill interpretation and predicted their effect on trends in the music industry. Further, I was able to sit in on a Copyright Royalties Board hearing, in which RIAA was a part of, and I was able to see first hand how the negotiations for artists’ rates for royalties is determined for music that is streamed on the radio.
Additionally, the location of the office is ideal, being right in the heart of Gallery Place. Not to mention the office is beautiful! There are gold and platinum records located all around the office from many famous artists. At my desk I had Michael Buble staring at me from across the room. Moreover, the main perks of the internship included being able to attend events with artists such as the Shadowboxers performing and also seeing Dustin Lynch receive a platinum album award!
Overall I thoroughly enjoyed my time at RIAA and received a gold record to boot! I think that the environment was incredibly welcoming and friendly, and the people were more than willing to go out of their way to assign projects or just chat about recent music video releases. I think I gained a profound understanding of copyright law, and would recommend this internship for anyone interested in soft intellectual property law.