Български
EnglishPROPHON is a collecting society of phonogram producers` rights in Bulgaria. It was founded in 1998 and according to the Bulgarian law it is a non-profit organization, registered in the Ministry of Culture. The legal regulation of PROPHON`s activity is the Bulgarian Copyright and Neighboring rights Act /article 40/ and the Law for the Non-profit Corporate Bodies. The society is authorized to collect remuneration from public performance, broadcasting, cable retransmission and copy levy. Our members are one of the most popular independent Bulgarian producers and licensees of worldwide famous major companies: UNIVERSAL MUSIC INT`L, SONY MUSIC INT`L, WARNER MUSIC INT`L, EMI MISIC INT`L, ToCo INT`L, VIRGIN, V2 GROUP, PLAY IT AGAIN SAM, PREMIUM LATIN MUSIC, MAGIC RECORDS, DELTA INT`L, HANSLER MUSIC etc. PROPHON is a joint collecting society and represents the neighbouring rights of producers and performers as well.
The General Assembly made up two tariffs: one for public performance and the other for broadcasters. From the second half of the year 2000, PROPHON started negotiations with various users and the first contracts were signed.
The main goal of our activity now is settling the neighboring rights with the broadcasters. According to the Bulgarian Copyright Law the remuneration for neighbouring rights is fixed in a mutual agreement between the Contracting Parties, so we try to persuade the users that our broadcasting tariff is moderate and equitable.
We contact the users and we negotiate with them on an equal basis.
It means that PROPHON sticks to the same strategy while approaching similar broadcasters. We propose to them equal conditions and an identical draft of contract. Meanwhile we try to be flexible and to consider all individual objections and concrete demands of the broadcasters based on good reason, so that we should not infringe the Antitrust Act.
The tariff is based on a criterion, which combines several parameters: the media market in which the user broadcasts, the broadcasting license - public or commercial; national or local and the format of the radioTV - the volume of music in airplay according to the programme scheme. The required remuneration is differentiated in relation with these principles. Generally speaking these broadcasters who use music more intensively should pay more money, TV or radio stations with a national license or with a license for Sofia and the region should pay more than the local ones.
Besides, each user has a right to choose whether to pay a fixed percentage of the total income but no less than a monthly guaranteed minimum, or an annual lump sum.
Another important aspect of collective administration of neighboring rights is collecting revenue for public performance. Bulgarian copyright and neighboring rights act sets out the rights of the owners of neighboring rights - producers and performing artists, to authorize each form of public performance of legal protected repertoire through signing a contract. Main criteria in PROPHON`s Public performance tariff is the type of the user and his special features, regardless the technical equipment installed. Recently PROPHON have licensed over 280 sites publicly to perform protected repertoire.
PROPHON is acting according the applicable national legislation - Bulgarian copyright and neighbouring rights act as so as and the international conventions covering the rights of phonogram producers and performing artists.
Our activity is based on wide international relationships. PROPHON is a member of the East Europe Performance Rights Committee of International Federation of Phonogram Industry (IFPI) and attends all its regional and global meetings and workshops. We also actively participate in the IFPI mentoring programme, which gave us the opportunity to gain expertise and support from one of the worldwide most advanced collecting societies - the Holland society SENA. We highly appreciate and value the helpfulness of all SENA staff and exceptionally this of Mr. Hans van Berkel.
One of the goals of PROPHON is keeping in touch with many foreign neighbouring societies. We maintain close relationships with the collecting societies from Austria, Poland, Turkey, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Greece, Ukraine, etc.
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