Rainbow audio tape unspooling from a reel-to-reel tape reel

Starchive

Notes from the Archive

Writing for artists, estates and rights holders on owning, licensing and running a catalog.

Metropolitan Opera librarian Lionel Mapleson with the Edison phonograph and wax cylinders he used to record live opera, about 1901

Who decides whether AI learns from your catalog?

AI companies want catalogs to learn from. Owners can stay silent, opt out or license on their own terms, and each needs a catalog that knows what it holds.
  1. Songwriters Richard Rodgers, Irving Berlin and Oscar Hammerstein II in Broadway theatre seats, with choreographer Helen Tamiris behind What makes a catalog licensable A licensing request arrives with a deadline. The six things a music, film or photo catalog needs in place to answer in days rather than months.
  2. The facade of the National Theatre on Sycamore Street, Cincinnati, photographed for the Historic American Buildings Survey in 1934 What would you own if your platform disappeared? Five questions to ask any platform that holds your catalog or your fans, about exports, originals, metadata, customer data and the cost of leaving.
Rainbow audio tape winding back onto a reel-to-reel tape reel