Culture Ministry revises industry's standard contract for music artists

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced revisions to the standard contract for artists in an attempt to better the relationships between management agencies and artists through fair contracts.

Girl group Fifty Fifty [ATTRAKT]

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced revisions to the standard contract for artists in an attempt to better the relationships between management agencies and artists through fair contracts.

The revision focuses on the attribution of intellectual property rights, including copyrights and publicity rights, as well as management rights and artists' obligations. It also aims to improve settlement and profit distribution and reduce tampering.

Tampering is originally a sports term, referring to the act of covertly contacting players from other teams with the purpose of recruiting them despite their contract period still being active.

“The new contracts were based on the analysis of disputes and issues that frequently occur in management contracts between agencies and artists,” according to the Culture Ministry.

The revision made it clear that management can use the trademarks of artists only to provide pop culture and art services, preventing management from abusing trademarks.

Fifty Fifty pose for a photo at a press conference held in April 2023. [NEWS1]

Terms detailing the surrender of trademarks by agencies can now be categorized depending on whether the artist is a group act or a solo act under the agency.

Under the current standard contract, a contract period exceeding seven years is possible, but the termination of the contract can occur at any time after the seven years. Under the revision, the initial contract period cannot exceed seven years. It now requires a written agreement between all parties involved for extension.

When performing popular culture and arts services, management must consider an artist's mental and physical situation and cannot impose a schedule that goes against the artist's explicit intentions. Artists also can refuse to provide services in situations that have unjustifiable grounds or when management makes unreasonable demands beyond the exclusive contract.

Girl group Fifty Fifty [NEWS1]

When an artist moves to a new agency after the end of an exclusive contract, the ban on the reproduction or sales of similar content by the new agency has been extended from one year to three years.

This clause will likely result in lowering the intial expected profits of the new agency. It is intended to discourage tampering and prevent settlement disputes by specifying the end dates of intellectual property rights after the contract period.

"The new standard exclusive contract has focused on resolving difficulties and disputes raised across the industry among artists and businesses,” said Yune Yang-su, director of the Content Policy Bureau at the Culture Ministry. “We hope that this revision will reduce the possibility of disputes between contracting parties and establish a mature contract culture in which members of the pop culture and arts community can respect each other."

The revised standard exclusive contract will be posted on the websites of the Culture Ministry and the Korea Creative Content Agency and will be distributed to related organizations. The content of the revised contract will be actively implemented in the required legal education for management personnel throughout the country.

BY KIM MIN-YOUNG [kim.minyoung5@joongang.co.kr]