The royalties maze, or how creators' money is getting skimmed along the way

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If you're an artist wondering what's the deal with receiving quarterly royalties checks that aren't worth a coffee cup, or fans who are wondering why artists complain about not being able to make ends meet, you should have a look at the chart below, which attempts to clarify the meandering ways royalties are prevented to go into your pocket and instead end up in multiple third parties each taking their "royal" cut. 

This chart below from TheMusicMaze.com is specifically about the US, and to be honest, I'm not quite sure how the recently passed MMA bill is going to make things better, but just be aware that each country has its own byzantine way of screwing up artists when it comes to collecting royalties... The names of the entities involved will differ, whether you're in Canada, Australia, the UK or the EU, but everywhere the principles are the same: when it comes to royalties, why make it simple when it can be complicated enough to skim money from artists along the way?

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