Music to Everyone's Ears: Binding Mediation in Music Rights Disputes

Litigation has been the mainstay of copyright disputes since America's earliest copyright statute first permitted a cause of action for copyright infringement in 1790. While alternative dispute resolution ("ADR") has become more prevalent in other areas of the law, many copyright attorneys and their clients do not typically consider ADR processes a viable option because these processes are still relatively new to copyright law. This Note proposes greater use of binding mediation, a specialized ADR process, in music rights disputes, which are fundamentally copyright infringement disputes. Section I discusses the background of copyright litigation and modern application of ADR in copyright disputes.

Section II describes critical issues surrounding music rights, details the process of binding mediation, and examines other considerations relating to binding mediation. Finally, Section III considers the implementation of binding mediation in music rights disputes.