How to Lease a Publishing License

According to U.S. Copyright Law, to reproduce and distribute the original work by someone else, you need to obtain written permission in the form of a compulsory mechanical license as outlined in section 115 of the 1976 Copyright Act. You can purchase either a non-exclusive rights license, known as a lease, which grants you limited reproduction and distribution rights as defined in the contract between you and the publisher, or an exclusive rights license which gives you optimum freedom to reproduce and distribute the work as if it were your own. The royalty rate paid to the publisher is determined by U.S. law and known as the statutory rate. For example, an original song would be issued a mechanical license for $91 (each), with the current royalty rate of 9.1 cents per song less than 5 minutes and $1.75 per minute.

Things You'll Need

• Mechanical license agreement

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Instructions

1. • 1

     Contact the publisher of the work you wish to lease by researching it on a retail website, like Amazon.com. Request a mechanical license agreement from the publisher to use the published work. Note that publishers can range from large, multi-national corporations to self-published individuals.

   • 2

     Obtain the mechanical lease agreement from the publisher in writing, including duration of the lease, terms of the lease, i.e, what you can do and for how long, and the amount that it will cost you.

   • 3

     Make sure you understand the exact terms of the lease before you sign it, i.e., a mechanical license or lease agreement to use a song which states that you are allowed to make only one master copy of your own for profit and is limited to duplicating it up to 1,000 times via download, CD, or DVD.

   • 4

     If the exclusive rights to the work that you have previously purchased a lease to publish are sold, you will be able to fulfill the specifications of the original lease but will not be able to buy any further rights to use the work.