How to use BWARM

The Bulk communication Work And Recording Metadata standard (BWARM) has been designed to allow a company to provide its business partners with a bulk feed of work and work right share information. BWARM is a “database dump” comprising a number of files. Each file can be thought of as an export of a relational database table.

As a consequence, the BWARM feed can be depicted in the form of an entity relationship diagram:

(While BWARM was specifically designed to allow The Mechanical Licensing Collective to provide a feed as required by the US Music Modernization Act, other companies may find the format helpful as well.)

The coloured frames in the diagram highlight the main entities whose data is communicated in a BWARM data feed: musical works, right shares, recordings and releases.

Musical works

The blue frame groups the files relating to musical works. The key file is the Works file and loading the data of the ProprietaryWorkIdentifiers and WorkAlternativeTitles files only make sense if the Works file is loaded:

Each record in the Works file describes a musical work by an ISWC, a WorkTitle, a NominalDurationand other data items.

To provide alternative titles for a work (translations for example) relevant data can be provided in the WorkAlternativeTitles file. The links between the WorkAlternativeTitles records and the related Works records are established by the FeedProvidersWorkId cell in the records of the WorkAlternativeTitles file.

It is also possible to provide proprietary identifiers for the musical work using the ProprietaryWorkId file. Again, the link to the Works record is effected by the FeedProvidersWorkId.

Sound recordings and music videos containing musical works

The orange frame groups the files relating to recordings such as sound recordings and music videos. The key file is the Recordings file and loading the data of the ProprietaryRecordingIdentifiers and RecordingAlternativeTitles files only make sense if the Recordings file is loaded.

Each record in the Recordings file describes a recording by an ISRC, a RecordingTitle, a DisplayArtistName and other data items.

To provide alternative titles, for example translations, data in the RecordingAlternativeTitles file can be added. The links between the RecordingAlternativeTitles records and the related Recordings records are established by the FeedProvidersRecordingId cell in the RecordingAlternativeTitles records.

It is also possible to provide proprietary identifiers for the recording using the ProprietaryRecordingIdentifiers file. The link to the Recordings record is effected by the FeedProvidersRecordingId.

The link to the underlying musical work(s), which is embodied in the sound recording, is effected via the WorksRecording file (see below).

Releases containing sound recordings and/or music videos

The red frame groups the files relating to releases. The key file is the Releases file and loading the data of the ProprietaryReleaseIdentifiers file only make sense if the Releases file is loaded.

Each record in the Releases file describes a release by a UPC (in the ICPN cell), a ReleaseTitle, a DisplayArtistName and other data items.

It is possible to provide proprietary identifiers for the release using the ProprietaryReleaseIdentifiers file. The link to the Releases record is effected by the FeedProvidersReleaseId.

The link between a release and the recordings it contains is effected by the FeedProvidersReleaseId in the Recordings file.

Right shares of musical works

BWARM’s main purpose is to communicate right shares using the WorkRightShares file. It provides data such as the share percentage, the territory and the rights type.

In addition, BWARM also enables a feed provider to make available all shares of all works for which the feed provider has unallocated shares, using the UnclaimedWorkRightShares file.

These two files are marked in green in the diagram.

The link to the work for which the right share is provided is effected by the FeedProvidersWorkId. The WorkRightShares file also has a link to the Party file (see below).

Parties

Parties are, in the context of BWARM, entities that hold a right share (which can be writers or publishers) as well as companies that have allocated a proprietary identifier. Each such party may be identified by a FeedProvidersPartyId, FullName, ISNI, IpiNameNumber and other data items in the Parties file.

The link of a WorkRightShares record to the party is effected by the FeedProvidersPartyId in the WorkRightShares file. The same reference identifier is also used, as FeedProvidersAllocatingPartyId for indicating the party that created a proprietary identifier.