On Sunday, October 28th, join us at the MIT Media Lab for a day-long  legal and technology hackathon to learn about and develop solutions for musicians and artists to control their digital works. In collaboration with the Open Music Initiative and Legal Hackers chapters around the world, this distributed event will happen in venues across the word (San Francisco, New York, Tokyo, Kansas City, Dallas, DC, Vienna, San Paulo and other venues throughout the month of October, culminating with the legal hackathon at MIT. Learn more at LegalHackathon.org

Event Tracks

The event includes three tracks:

• the learning track for lectures, panels and tutorials, 
• the discussion track for small group focused conversations
• the hacking track for team-based rapid project development

Learn about the Music Modernization Act, enacted by Congress a few days ago,  and how it enables novel business models and legal frameworks that can transform the music and media industry through innovative technologies.   

Through the month of October, we are collecting key challenges and ideas from experts and the broader communities to seed discussion and creative work by small teams at the event.  At the end of the event, all of the project demos and other presentations will be published to a digital media gallery, that will be freely available and accessible to all through OpenMedia.Space and Archive.org.  

The event is free and open to all.  To participate, signup at: http://LegalHackathon.org For more information, reach out to Dazza Greenwood (dazza@media.mit.edu).

Resources

Learn about the Music Modernization Act, enacted by Congress a few days ago,  and how it enables novel business models and legal frameworks that can transform the music and media industry through innovative technologies.   Specifically, this new statute established a publicly accessible database for song ownership information and creation of a single licensing entity called the "Mechanical Licensing Collective" to administer mechanical rights and royalties for musical works. 

Learn more at:

• Press summary from US House Judiciary Committee: https://goodlatte.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=1298
• Music Modernization Act: What Is It & Why Does It Matter? (Guest Column) | Billboard: https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8216857/music-modernization-act-what-is-it-why-does-it-matter-jordan-bromley
• A Hit Songwriter Explains Why The Music Modernization Act Is At A Tipping Point: https://www.forbes.com/sites/dannyross1/2018/08/02/a-hit-songwriter-explains-urgency-for-music-industry-overhaul-in-washington/#7ebcf08b4fdd
• Music Modernization Act Update: MLC Will Be Prohibited from Licensing Synch, Lyrics, Performances: https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2018/08/03/music-modernization-act-mlc-mechanical/
• Why Won’t Anyone Budget the MMA’s Mechanical Licensing Collective? | Music Technology Policy: https://musictechpolicy.com/2018/06/06/why-wont-anyone-budget-the-mmas-mechanical-licensing-collective/
• In Support of the Music Modernization Act: Letter from Berklee President Roger H. Brown — Open Music Initiative: http://open-music.org/blog/2018/9/5/in-support-of-the-music-modernization-act-letter-from-berklee-president-roger-h-brown
• Congressional Text of the Statute: https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1551/text

Learn about open source smart/legal contract and blockchain-based data analytics tools you can use to hack the law for open music and media (including short "how-to" videos we have made with the project teams for each tool) at: http://legalhackathon.org/#resources including:

• Endor: https://www.endor.com
• Monax: https://monax.io
• OpenLaw: https://openlaw.io
• RChain: https://www.rchain.coop