Getty Images CEO Jonathan Klein on music licensing

Digital Music Trends – Midem 2010 Special – Day 3 by digitalmusictrends

A delegation of Getty Images  has been to the yearly music conference MIDEM  in Cannes. The company has taken the opportunity to unveil more of their music licensing plans.  Digital music trends featured a podcast with Getty Images CEO Jonathan Klein . In the podcast he says every image is worth the same (i.e. nothing) until there is a need for it. He also speak out against the anti-piracy movement. He says that rather than spending valuable time going after pirates companies should develop licensing models that are convenient and provide added value like indemnity and call centers. When talking about iStockphoto  he says the business unit licensed 22-23 million images in 2009.

The company announced a number of strategic alliances with key players in the music industry. In the po This includes Gracenote ® and Hello Music . So far it looks like a one-way partnership where Getty Images will leverage its images to allow these companies to enhance the experience of music listeners. The imagery will be used to provide contextual content  around the music entertainment.

“Getty Images is delighted to partner with all these notable industry leaders, to offer consumers an enhanced musical experience,” said Jonathan Klein, co-founder and chief executive officer, Getty Images. “These alliances reflect how Getty Images continues to strengthen and grow its offering in the digital space and highlights how we are helping the music industry in its move towards building more compelling online content.”

During Jonathan Klein’s keynote speech he  was also asked to outline how the music industry can learn from Getty Images’ licensing model and increase revenue by reinventing it. He said Getty Images intends to use its platform to make it easier to license and monetize music content.

“Our approach to sync licensing is directly in line with our success in still and moving imagery, where we offer pre-cleared rights for a wide variety of uses and customers on a global scale,” Klein added. “Getty Images’ focus on aggregating independent artists made this approach possible and we were able to offer an extensive catalogue of high quality music to our customers. We have since augmented our music catalogue with known artists at varied price points that can support a similar customer-centric approach. We continue to explore opportunities to funnel other sources of music through this model, to expand the volume of customers and uses.”