Spedidam is a collective management organisation (CMO) for performers’ neighbouring rights.  

Spedidam and SACEM (Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers of Music) are both CMOs. 

 SACEM manages music authors’ and publishers’ rights (copyright), while Spedidam manages performers’ rights. 

Copyright protects works of the mind. In the music industry, this may apply to a lyricist who writes song lyrics or a composer who composes a piece of music. 

Meanwhile, the publisher acts as the copyright assignee and is responsible for the commercial exploitation of the work. 

Performers’ rights protect the performance of a work of the mind. This can include any type of performance: singing a song, playing an instrument, acting in a play or film, dancing, performing a circus act, etc.  

In many cases, the same person may be both the author and the performer.  

Both are French CMOs representing performers’ rights and there is no delineation of responsibilities between them.  

All performers can become Spedidam members no matter where they’re from, what they do (music, dance, comedy, circus, etc.), or what their role is (lead or supporting artists in the music industry).  

Statutory remuneration is shared between the two organisations as follows:  

• When it comes to equitable remuneration and remuneration for private sound copying, 50% of the amounts due to performers are paid to Spedidam and 50% to ADAMI. 

• For remuneration for private audiovisual copying, 80% of the amounts due to performers are paid to ADAMI and 20% to Spedidam. 

Each society distributes these amounts based on its own distribution rules. 

You can join both Spedidam and ADAMI and participate in internal governance of both CMOs. 

However, only one of them can handle collecting and managing your remuneration from abroad. 

If you are also an author, phonogram producer, or holder of any other rights recognised by the French Intellectual Property Code (CPI), you can join other CMOs in the cultural field for comprehensive management of all your rights. 

Spedidam is responsible for collecting and distributing statutory remuneration (equitable remuneration and remuneration for private copying) in France for all eligible performers, including those who are not members. These remuneration rights are subject to “mandatory collective management”, so it is not necessary to be a member of Spedidam in order to receive them. 

However, in order to effectively and correctly manage your rights and identify you as the rightful recipient of this remuneration, Spedidam needs certain information, which is easier to obtain through a declaration of your performances. 

Spedidam needs an authorisation to collect and distribute remuneration from abroad and exclusive right.  

Spedidam manages exclusive right on a voluntary basis.. Performers must express their desire to do so by becoming members (which gives Spedidam a general authorisation via the transfer of rights) and/or by declaring their participation in a recording (which gives Spedidam specific authorisation for that recording). 

All performers may become Spedidam members regardless of the type of performances – whether they are actors or performers, provided they meet the membership requirements stated in Spedidam’s Statute and General Regulations. 

When it comes to legal licences (equitable remuneration and remuneration for private copying), you may be entitled to receive rights if you have participated in sound recordings (as a narrator, storyteller, or voice actor, etc.). 

However, when you participate in audiovisual recordings (fiction, animation, documentaries, etc.), including voice-overs, you will not be eligible for remuneration from Spedidam as an actor and will need to contact Adami instead. 

Performers have several types of rights:  

• Moral right (Article L. 212-2 of the French Intellectual Property Code). 
• Exclusive right (Article L. 212-3 of the French Intellectual Property Code). 
• A right to remuneration under legal licences (and particularly includes equitable remuneration and remuneration for private copying (Articles L. 214-1 and L. 311-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code)). 

 All the rights held by performers are defined on Spedidam website

As a performer, you have an exclusive right to authorise or prohibit the fixation of your performance and the exploitation of that fixation (the reproduction and communication to the public of that fixation, its rental, distribution, and making available to the public on demand) (Article L. 212-3 of the French Intellectual Property Code). 

 Therefore, nobody is allowed to fix your performance without authorisation or to use it for purposes other than what was initially authorised (i.e. for secondary uses). These new uses must be authorised by Spedidam in your name and on your behalf, and require the payment of additional remuneration (see question 19 on the difference between primary and secondary use).

As a performer, you have an exclusive right to authorise or prohibit the fixing and exploitation of your performance (see question 9). However, there are legal exceptions to this right. There are certain cases provided for by law where performers lose their right to authorise or prohibit certain, specifically defined acts of exploitation of their performance. However, some of these exceptions still allow for a right to remuneration for rightholders. These are known as legal licences and particularly include equitable remuneration and remuneration for private copying. 

Equitable remuneration was established by Article L. 214-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code. This remuneration is paid by broadcasters to music performers and phonogram producers when a phonogram released for commercial purposes is:  

• Directly communicated in a public place (restaurants, discotheques, hotels, etc.) provided that it is not used in a show.  
• Broadcast (audio – radio – or audiovisual – TV) or when this broadcast is fully and simultaneously distributed by cable.  
• Simulcasted and Webcasted in a non-interactive manner (web radio), except for services whose main programme is dedicated primarily to a single performer, author, composer, or comes from a single phonogram. 

This remuneration is collected by SPRE (Société civile pour la perception de la rémunération équitable), an umbrella organisation that collects equitable remuneration for performers and phonogram producers, and distributes it to the various CMOs for performers and phonogram producers according to predefined sharing criteria.  

Remuneration commonly referred to as “remuneration for private copying” was established by Article L. 311-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code. This remuneration is paid by manufacturers and importers of blank recording media (USB sticks, smartphones, tablets, MP3 or MP4 players, etc.) to authors, performers, phonogram producers and videogram producers, and publishers, for the reproduction of such works exclusively for the copier’s private use, made from a lawful source. This remuneration is often included in the purchase price of blank recording media.  

 It is collected by Copie France, an umbrella collective management organisation that collects remuneration for private copying from manufacturers and importers of blank recording media and redistributes it to its members, which are CMOs representing copyrights, producers’ rights, and performers’ rights (notably Spedidam), so that they can make payments to their rightholders.  

Spedidam does not currently collect any remuneration for audio and audiovisual streaming. 

Under current French law, only a few artists receive remuneration for audio or audiovisual streaming. Only certain major artists receive indirect royalties proportional to the income from the exploitation of their recording via their producer. The other artists only receive a flat fee from their producer at the time of recording in exchange for the transfer of their rights, which is unrelated to the economic value of those rights. 

To address this value-sharing issue, Spedidam advocates with public authorities for an inalienable right to remuneration for performers. This remuneration would be collected directly by performers’ CMOs from streaming and download platforms, in both the music and audiovisual sectors. This right to remuneration would be in addition to any usual remuneration paid to the performer by their producer.  

 It should be noted that, as a performer, you have economic rights (Article L. 212-3 et seq. of the French Intellectual Property Code) and a moral right (Article L. 212-2 of the French Intellectual Property Code).  

Your moral right includes the right to have your name, status, and performance respected. This is a perpetual, personal, unalienable right. 

Your economic rights are divided into an exclusive right and remuneration rights. 

 Under French law, you can transfer your exclusive rights to your producer provided that: 

• You receive remuneration for each mode of exploitation of your performance that you have transferred, as well as for your work and your authorisation to fix it. 
• Each right transferred is identified in your contract.  

 However, it is impossible to transfer your rights to remuneration under legal licences (specifically, equitable remuneration and remuneration for private copying). These rights are subject to mandatory collective management governed by law. 

Regardless of the contract you may have signed, even if you have transferred all your exclusive rights, you will still receive remuneration for legal licences from Spedidam as a rightholder. 

When it comes to exclusive rights, provided you’ve given Spedidam authorisation and depending on the scope of the transfer you’ve agreed to with your producer, Spedidam may or may not take action and make payment to you for the remuneration you’re owed based on its rates for secondary uses of your declared recordings. For example, if you have only granted authorisation to your producer for a primary use of your recording (e.g. in an advertisement), Spedidam will still have the right to claim royalties for any other unauthorised use that may occur (e.g. commercial phonogram, soundtrack for a film or video game, etc.).

You can appoint Spedidam as your general representative for managing your rights by signing a membership agreement. Your application must be accompanied by the payment of the share (€16) and supporting documents proving your professional activity as a performer and your participation in a sound recording or audiovisual recording. Membership means that you transfer your exclusive right to Spedidam for all your recordings and that you authorise Spedidam to manage your remuneration from abroad. 

You can limit Spedidam’s remit to certain territories and/or certain categories of rights. Please note that any revocation or limitation of the authorisation given to Spedidam to manage your rights and of the effect of your membership shall take effect on 1 January after Spedidam has received notification thereof. 

You may also grant special authorisation for managing your exclusive right to a particular recording by declaring your participation in one or more recordings by signing a physical or digital recording session sheet. 

If your performance has been fixed on a phonogram or videogram and this recording has been exploited (by making it available to the public via physical or non-physical copies or by communication to the public), the protection period is limited to 50 or 70 years from 1 January of the calendar year after it was first exploited (Article L. 211-4 of the French Intellectual Property Code): 

• 50 years for a performance fixed in a videogram (videogram: fixation of a sequence of images with or without sound (Article L. 215-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code))
• 70 years for a performance fixed in a phonogram (phonogram: fixation of a sequence of sounds (Article L. 213-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code)) 

However, your moral right lasts indefinitely. 

For a declaration for documenting purposes: Spedidam needs information to identify the recipients of the remuneration it receives and to distribute it to the rightsholders. By declaring your participation to Spedidam, you enable it to identify you and make the payment of the remuneration you are entitled to.  

For a declaration granting a specific authorisation to Spedidam : your declaration identifies the primary intended use that you have authorised for your recording and authorises Spedidam to grant permission for all secondary uses on your behalf and to make payments of the relevant royalties to you based on its scales.  

Performers are asked to report to Spedidam whenever they participate in a recording, indicating the primary use of the recording, i.e., the primary mode of exploitation of the performance authorised to their producer (e.g. commercial phonogram, audiovisual production, original soundtrack of a show, etc.). 

The declaration made to Spedidam (recording session sheet or online declaration) is equivalent to the artist giving the producer direct authorisation to exploit the recording for its primary use (or to only make a single fixation in the case of the recording of an original soundtrack for a show). 

Any use other than this primary use shall be deemed secondary use and shall be subject to written authorisation from Spedidam and the payment of royalties by the user to Spedidam (e.g. you have authorised your recording to be used for a film soundtrack; this is the primary use. The use of your recording to provide sound for a video game, advertisement, etc., is considered a secondary use). 

The amounts collected by Spedidam will then be distributed to the performers who participated in the recording that Spedidam has been granted exclusive right to manage. 

The term “commercial phonogram” refers to a phonogram published for the purpose of selling it as a phonogram, either by making physical copies available to the public through sale or exchange, or by making it available to the public on demand via online platforms. 

Please note that not all phonograms are commercial phonograms (for example, an original soundtrack for a show is a phonogram but is not a commercial phonogram).

It is always a good idea to declare your recordings, even older ones. 

Firstly, it will enable Spedidam to identify you and make the corresponding payments for any future use. 

Secondly, Spedidam’s internal policy also provides for retroactive payment of rights to you. Spedidam is able to make payments to you for the rights it has collected on your behalf for the five years prior to your declaration. The amounts collected for rights beyond this five year period are allocated to Spedidam cultural action. 

Example: if you submit a declaration in 2025 regarding your participation in a recording that took place in 2018 and we have collected rights on your behalf in the meantime, we will be able to make a payment to you for these rights, up to a limit of five years prior to your declaration, i.e. only for amounts collected between 2020 and 2025. 

If several performers participated in the same recording, you can declare your participation by filling out a single recording session sheet containing information about the recording (date, studio, producer, general title of the project, titles of the recorded tracks, etc.) and each of the participating artists (last name, first name, titles performed, Spedidam number, mailing address, telephone number, signature, etc.). 

Please note that if one of the participating artists has declared their own participation on a hard copy but did not mention your participation in their declaration, you will not be able to be added to this declaration and will need to fill out a new recording session sheet to declare your participation.  

However, if the initial declaration was made online via one of the participating artists’ accounts, you can attach yourself to this declaration, but only online.  

Absolutely. When an original soundtrack is recorded specifically for a show, you are entitled to remuneration when that recording of your performance is played during the show. 

So, please fill out and sign the Spedidam recording session sheet to show you have authorised the fixing of your performance. 

Please note that signing a recording session sheet with “Original soundtrack for a show […]” as a primary use only authorises the recording of your performance, but does not authorise the broadcast of the recording. Anyone wishing to broadcast this recording must submit a separate request for authorisation to Spedidam. 

Pursuant to Article L. 328-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code and Article 34 of Spedidam’s Statute, member and non-member rightholders may submit a written complaint to Spedidam regarding the management of rights and, where applicable, the conditions, effects, and termination of the rights management authorisation. 

The written complaint must be sent to Spedidam at the following mailing address: 16 rue Amélie, 75007 Paris, or by email at: service-juridique@spedidam.fr, or via the contact form on Spedidam’s website. 

Non-distributable amounts are amounts collected by Spedidam that cannot be distributed either for practical reasons (“practical non-distributable amounts”) or for legal reasons (“legal non-distributable amounts”). (Article L. 324-17 of the French Intellectual Property Code):  

• Practical non-distributable amounts include all amounts collected pursuant to Articles L. 214-1, L. 217-2 and L. 311-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code (for performers’ rights) “which could not be distributed because their recipients could not be identified or located before the expiry of the period provided for in Article L. 324-16 of the French Intellectual Property Code”, i.e. before the expiry of a period of five years from the date on which Spedidam collected these amounts.  
• Legal non-distributable amounts are amounts that could not be distributed by Spedidam under international agreements to which France is a party (including the Rome Convention of 26 October 1961 and the WIPO Treaty of 20 December 1996).  

These “non-distributable” amounts are allocated to initiatives supporting the creation and promotion of live performances, developing artistic and cultural education, and artists’ training by Spedidam’s Grants Committee. 

This allocation results from legal obligations (for remuneration referred to in Article L.324-17 of the French Intellectual Property Code) or statutory obligations (for other remuneration) Spedidam must comply with. 

Spedidam has implemented various strategies to limit « non-distributable amounts »:  

• It conducts research, identifies and updates information relating to rightholders in order to reduce the amount of practical non-distributable amounts.
• It conducts monthly campaigns to remind rightholders to update their bank details.
• It has set up a search platform on its website to allow any relevant person to view the list of tracks and rightholders that have not been identified or located by Spedidam. You can access this platform here 

Spedidam has set up a search platform on its website. This platform provides the public with a list of tracks broadcast featuring unidentified performers, as well as a list of rightholders searched for by Spedidam (i.e. those for whom Spedidam does not have a mailing address and/or bank details). It is designed to enable people to search for tracks or rightholders and share information that could help identify and locate rightholders.

Spedidam provides financial support for live performances through its cultural action programmes, provided that the live performance organisation meets the criteria for each funding programme and submits an application to be considered by the Grants Committee.  

If you are a member, Spedidam can also provide personalised legal advice for all artists’ projects (live performances or recorded music). 

However, Spedidam does not manage remuneration for performances played live, which is paid directly to the artist by the producer. If these performances are recorded in audio or audiovisual form, the recording may be declared to Spedidam so that any secondary use of it can be tracked and royalties paid where applicable. 

Any use of recorded music for which Spedidam manages the rights must be subject to prior authorisation from Spedidam, even if the excerpt used is only a few seconds long. 

If you find that your performance has been recorded without your authorisation, you should notify Spedidam about this illegal recording by identifying yourself and the other performers involved on a Spedidam recording session sheet, providing any information you have about the person who made the recording. Do not check any intended use on the recording session sheet, but indicate “Unauthorised recording: recording session sheet drawn up for identification purposes only, excluding any authorisation for use” 

If this happens, you can contact Spedidam’s legal service at service-juridique@spedidam.fr. 

If you discover unauthorised use of one or more of your recordings, we recommend that you contact Spedidam’s legal service (service-juridique@spedidam.fr) which will then contact the user. 

General distribution consists of: 

• Individual distribution, relating to legal licences (a portion of equitable remuneration and a portion of remuneration for private audio and audiovisual copying).
• Distribution to unidentified performers, with seniority determined based on the earliest identified date of a recording in which an artist participated or their year of membership. 

Since these are distributed at the same time, it is customary to refer to this as “general distribution”. It consists of distributing a portion of the equitable remuneration and a portion of the remuneration for private copying (audio and audiovisual) to performers who have participated in sound recordings or audiovisual recordings based on the musical genres and private copying uses identified by polling institutes (CSA, MEDIAMETRIE, IPSOS, YACAST, etc.).  

This is done twice a year: in June/July and at the end of the year. 

Broadcast‑based distribution refers to the distribution of equitable remuneration based on broadcasts.   

Broadcast records and samples are used in the radio and discotheque sector to grant to the broadcast phonograms a share of the amounts collected in  proportion to their duration or number of plays. 

The rights are distributed in several ways, depending on where they come from: 

• Distribution of exclusive rights, which is done after identifying the performers represented by Spedidam who participated in a recording used by the user of recorded music, then dividing the amount collected, after deducting management fees, by the number of performers who contributed to the recording.
• Broadcast-based distribution: based on broadcast records and samples (radio stations, discotheques) of commercial phonograms, consisting of allocating a share of the amounts collected to the phonograms broadcast in proportion to the broadcast time.
• Individual distribution (semi-annual): relating to legal licences (a portion of equitable remuneration and a portion of remuneration for private audio and audiovisual copying).
• Distribution to unidentified performers: seniority determined based on the earliest identified date of a recording in which an artist participated or their year of membership. 

he rights are distributed as soon as all the information needed for calculating them is available (for more information, please contact the Support service). The provisional schedule for distributions and payments is published on Spedidam’s website.  

In addition, the French Intellectual Property Code requires that payment to be made no later than 9 months after the end of the financial year in which the rights were collected (unless there is a legitimate reason, such as a lack of information enabling the rightholders to be identified or located as recipients).  

There are several reasons why you may not have received payment, including: 

• Your bank details and/or mailing address have not been provided: you can go to your personal account on myspedidam.fr to enter this information.
• Spedidam has not yet received the rights for the use of your recordings.
• Distribution has not been made yet (you can check the provisional distribution schedule on our website).
• The recording has not been declared to Spedidam or your participation has not been identified (you can request a list of your declared recordings by emailing carriere@spedidam.fr)
• The recording has been declared to Spedidam but is not eligible for calculating rights. 

Please contact our Artist Relations team by telephone or email at relation.artiste@spedidam.fr to discover the exact reason for this non-payment. 

You can contact our Artist Relations team by telephone, email (at relation.artiste@spedidam.fr) or regular mail with any complaints regarding distribution: Spedidam – Service Relation Artistes – 16, rue Amélie – 75007 Paris. 

To notify Spedidam of a rightholder’s death, please contact our Estate Service: 

• via email: succession@spedidam.fr.
• or by post: Spedidam – Service Succession, 16 rue Amélie, 75007 Paris. 

When a rightholder dies, the rights associated with their performances are transferred to their heirs, upon presentation of an inheritance certificate, or to the estate administrator who has contacted Spedidam. If there are no heirs to whom these rights can be paid, they will be allocated to Spedidam’s Cultural Action fund. 

However, the rightholder’s economic rights expire 70 years after 1 January following the first communication or making available to the public of their performance. 

Moral rights, on the other hand, last indefinitely: they can be transferred to heirs to protect the deceased’s performance and name. 

•  The performer’s account is a space reserved exclusively for living performers and is unfortunately not yet available to heirs. However, heirs listed with Spedidam may request any information they may need.
• A career statement for a deceased rightholder can be obtained upon request by any heir (or heir’s representative) listed with Spedidam, by emailing carriere@spedidam.fr. 

 

Yes, member status is passed on to heirs, and a single heir may attend General Assemblies. 

If there are multiple heirs, they must appoint one of them as sole representative with a special power of attorney. All rules relating to the member’s participation in General Assemblies shall then apply to this proxyholder. 

Whether it is for a concert or recording an album, there is nothing to prevent you from performing works that you have neither written nor composed as long as you have authorisation to do so. SACEM will issue this authorisation if the works you intend to perform belong to its repertoire or to that of a foreign authors’ society that it has an agreement with. 

The same applies if you use a recorded performance by another performer in your recording or performance. This use must be authorised either by the collective management organisation that the artist has authorised or by the artist themselves.  

Absolutely. Even if your performance is based on a work that is in the public domain (i.e. a work whose author died more than 70 years ago), your performance of that work is protected and has its own protection period. 

Indeed, the performers’ economic rights over their performance remain valid for 70 years from 1 January after the first exploitation of the sound recording of their performance, or 50 years in the case of audiovisual recordings, regardless of whether their performance relates to a work that has become part of the public domain. 

Yes, even as a self-producer, you should declare your recordings to Spedidam. Since this status as a self-producer is specifically linked to your work as a performer, Spedidam is therefore likely to be involved in managing your neighbouring rights as a performer. Declaring your recordings will allow Spedidam to identify you and distribute the remuneration that you are entitled to as a performer.  

Your declaration may also enable you to grant Spedidam specific authorisation for some of your recordings, so that it can grant authorisation for any secondary use of them and pay you the relevant royalties based on its scales.