Photo Credit: Tommy Diner
The Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC) is officially set to begin distributing a sizable pile of unmatched and unclaimed “black box” royalties in April 2027.
The MLC disclosed the distribution timetable during its annual membership meeting, which also saw the entity confirm north of “$4.2 billion in total royalties distributed” to date. Latter figure aside, that the non-profit’s black box has long been the subject of scrutiny and criticism isn’t a secret.
Amplifying these concerns, the tranche – consisting of mechanicals due but, for one reason or another, not forwarded to the rightful recipients – is (and has for some time been) poised for distribution “to rightsholders based on their relative market shares.”
Now, almost three years after tapping proper companies to help match the royalties, the MLC intends to begin doling out the capital in April 2027.
This first-month payout, stemming from January 2021 usages, currently totals $6.3 million (consisting of $3.24 million in unmatched royalties, the remaining $3.06 million unclaimed).
(For reference, the January 2021 black box had shrunk to “less than $7 million” following the January 2026 distribution’s completion, per the MLC.)
In a perfect world, the aforesaid rightful recipients would collect the entire sum before the market-share payouts begin reaching today’s largest publishers – or, better yet, would have done so at the outset.
But in April, whatever’s left of the January 2021 black box will be distributed to other members “on a pro rata basis for each DSP and offering,” per the MLC, which touched on plans “to undertake additional matching efforts specifically focused on the remaining 2021 royalties before we begin distributing.”
Furthermore, the February 2021 unmatched ($2.99 million) and unclaimed ($2.84 million) royalties will be paid out in the same manner in May 2027, followed by the March 2021 total ($6.05 million) in June 2027, and so on.
Overall, then, the MLC is tentatively preparing to distribute $75.13 million in 2021 black box royalties on a market-share basis. Additionally, the entity acknowledged that this process will lay the groundwork for the distribution of historical black box royalties – i.e., those it ingested from DSPs upon beginning to operate in 2021.
At that point, the royalties reportedly totaled $397 million; the MLC is said to have “matched over $317 million” and distributed “nearly $239 million” since then. Of course, quite a lot has changed in the interim, and even the remaining $158 million or so is accruing (or should be accruing) a nice bit of interest at present.
However, the multifaceted sub-topic is best left for a different time. In the MLC’s own words, it will distribute the “royalties with interest calculated at the statutory rate.”
“Every song or share of a song that earned monthly royalties (whether initially or via reprocessing) will receive its pro rata share of the remaining pool of unmatched and unclaimed royalties for that month,” the MLC proceeded, noting as well that the payments will appear in its “regular monthly royalty reporting.”
