DDEX Standard

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1 Introduction

This standard was developed by the member organisations of the Digital Data Exchange, LLC (DDEX) and provides a message that gives a uniform mechanism to enable Licensees (typically Digital Service Providers) to report to Rights Controllers (typically Music Rights Societies, Music Publishers, Music Licensing Companies and/or Record Companies) information regarding the level of usage and/or revenue generated from the distribution of such products, as well as sales of products based on Releases, to the relevant Rights Controllers.

This Profile of version 3.0 of the Flat File Variant has been developed in response to concerns regarding the file size and computational complexity of the XML Variant, and will lead to reduced implementation and running cost for Licensees and Licensors for user-generated content where the Message Sender either has, or has not, received a claim for a sound recording from the owner of that sound recording (the “master” Recording).

Any organisation wishing to implement this (or any other DDEX standard) is required to apply for an Implementation Licence. The terms of the licence and an application form can be found on https://ddex.net/implementation/implementation-licence-and-ddex-party-identifiers.

Essential Reading

 Download/Print standard (PDF)

This standard is Part 4 of a multi-part standard. The other parts (incl. samples) are available here.

Older versions of the various parts of the DSR standard can be accessed here.

 

 

2 Scope

 2.1 Introduction
The message defined in this Part provides a mechanism for Licensees (typically Digital Service Providers) to report to Rights Controllers (typically Music Rights Societies, Music Licensing Companies, Music Publishers and/or Record Companies) User-Generated Content (UGC) Usages, Revenues or Sales.
 2.2 Organisation of the Standard
This standard comprises six clauses and one annex. Clauses 1-4 provide the scope, abbreviations and core definitions used in this standard. Clause 5  then defines the UGC profile.

Finally Annexes A provides some examples.

 2.3 Release Notes (Informative)
Version 3 of the Flat File Variant of the Digital Sales Reporting Message Suite Standard utilities a fundamentally different architecture than Version 2. This new architecture allows more Profiles to be supported than was possible in Version 2. Part 4 of this standard supports communicating sales and usages for UGC services.

Version 1.1 of the UGC Profile provides a series of minor updates to some record types and replaces the use of SY03 with SY04 and SY05.

Version 1.1.1 of the UGC Profile corrects a bug in the LI01 record.

Version 1.2 of the UGC Profile makes use of updated SY04, SY05, AS01, AS02, MW01, SU03 and LI01 records that support additional business requirements.

3 Normative References

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The following normative documents contain provisions, which through reference in this text constitute provisions of this standard. For dated references, subsequent amendments to, or revisions of, any of these publications do not apply. For undated references, the latest version applies.

  • DDEX. Digital Sales Reporting Message Suite Standard - Part 1: Architecture of the Flat File Variant.
  • DDEX. Digital Sales Reporting Message Suite Standard - Part 2: Allowed Value Sets.
  • DDEX. Digital Sales Reporting Message Suite Standard - Part 8: Record Type Definitions.

4 Terms and Abbreviations

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The terms and abbreviations used in Digital Sales Reporting Message Suite Standard – Part 1: Architecture of the Flat File Variant. also apply to this Standard.

5 UGC profile

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This Profile is for reporting all Usage, Revenue or Sales for user-generated content where the Message Sender has received a claim for a sound recording from the owner of that sound recording (the “master” Recording). The Message Sender may or may not include information specific to the Licensors or RightsController of the Musical Works. 

To indicate that a Sales/Usage Report is created in accordance with this Profile standard, the Profile Cell in the HEAD Record shall contain the value UGCProfile and the ProfileVersion Cell shall contain the value 1.2.

The following Records shall be communicated for each Block in this order:

  1. One Resource Record of type AS02.02 describing the Resource including basic information of the underlying Work (the Work part of this data shall be included as provided by the record company to the Licensee).
    The Message Sender may wish to split the information into multiple Records instead of using one AS02.02 Record:
    1. The first Record, of type AS01.01, contains information regarding the Sound Recordings, Videos and other “master” Resources that have been used in creating the user-generated content that has been accessed;
    2. The following none, one or more Musical Work Record(s), of type MW01.01 contain information about the Musical Work(s) utilised as provided by the record company to the Licensee. If the Resource contains more than one Work, the Work shall be communicated in multiple Blocks so that only one Work is reported in a Block). 
  2. None, one or more UGC Release Usage Records of type RU01.01 describing the use of UGC Releases.
    Instead of a RU01.01 record, the Message Sender may use one RU02.01 Record for each UGC Release and its use.
    It is not permissible to communicate RU01.01 and RU02.01 Records in one Block.
    The Block shall contain multiple RUxx Records for each ASxx Record in that one RU01.01 Record shall be provided for each ContentCategory (for a maximum of 100 Releases); one RU02.01 Record shall be provided for each UGC Release.
  3. None, one or more Intra-Block Groupings of Records providing
    1. One UGC Sales/Usage Record of type SU03.02 Record followed by
    2. None, one or more Licensor-specific Usage Data Record of type LI01.02  providing Licensor-specific information for the usages reported in the preceding SU03.02.
    3. Each of the LI01.02 records followed by none or one MW01.01 Record to indicate Licensor-specific Work information. These Records shall contain the Work information provided to the DSP by the RightsContoller referenced in the preceding LI01.02 Record.

The Blocks shall be preceded by one or more Summary Records SY02.02, SY04.01, SY05.02 or SY09 for each type of use, commercial model and territory any Release contained in the Sales Report Message has been traded under. In cases where a Message Sender provides information at RightsController level, the fields at RightsController level in SY02.01 or SY04.01/SY05.02 and LI01.02 records can be provided.

When using SY04.01, all SY04.01 Records for the same RightsType and sales context (as defined in Clause 6.5 of Part 1 of this standard) may carry the same SummaryRecordId if per-subscriber minima information needs communicating per context, but across different subscriber types. Each SY04.01 records shall be followed by 1-n groupings of 1 SY09 Record, followed by 1-n SY05.02 Records:

  • 0-n SY04.01 
    • 1-n SY09
      • 1-n SY05.02


It is recommended to provide the Summary Records in a logical order to aid human readability. This would typically mean that Summary Records of different types are not mixed. For example a sequence of SY02.02 SY02.02  SY04.01 SY04.01 meets this recommendation, whereas SY04.01 SY02.02 SY04.01 does not.

Figure 1 shows two ways in which this Profile can be implemented. The left-hand diagram shows the case where Musical Work information is provided as part of the Resource Record (AS02.02) and only a usage summary Record is RU01.01 is provided and the right-hand diagram shows the case where Musical Work information is provided on an extra MW01.01 Record and usage information is provided in multiple RU02.01 Records. For the avoidance of doubt, it is also possible to use AS02.02 Records together with RU02.01 Records as well as AS01.02/MW01.01 with RU01.01.

 

Figure 1 – One Block of Records when Reporting UGC-related Usages, Revenues or Sales  


 The table below provides an overview of the order and cardinality of the Records to be used in this Profile.

RecordTypeCardinality
Comment

HEAD

1 

SY02.02 or SY04.01/SY09/SY05.02

1-n

A combination of the four Summary record types is allowed:

  • First all SY02.02 Records (if there are any),
  • Then all SY04.01/SY09/SY05.02 Records as follows: Each SY04.01 shall be followed by 1-n sequences of 1 SY09 Records immediately followed by 1-n SY05.02 Records.
Block0-n 
  AS01.01 or AS02.02 1  
    MW01.01 0-n

May only follow an AS01.01 record. If the AS01.01 contains more than one Musical Work, multiple Blocks must be provided, one for each Musical Work.

These AS01.01 and MW01.01 Records shall contain the Work information provided to the Licensee by the record company.

  RU01.01 or RU02.01 0-n

One RU01.01 Record shall be provided for each ContentCategory (for a maximum of 100 Releases).

One RU02.01 Record shall be provided for each UGC Release.

    Intra-Block Grouping0-n 
    SU03.02
1

The SU03.02 record points to a SY02.02 or SY04.01 and SY05.02 Record, but only if there is no LI01.02 Record following. In that case the relevant SYxx Record provides non-Licensor specific summary information.

This record will point to an RUxx Record for the relevant ContentCategory as well as the SYxx Record without a specific Rights Controller.

       LI01.02
0-nOne LI01.02 for each RightsController (if provided).
          MW01.01 0-1

This MW01.01 Record is intended to contain Musical Work information relative to the Rights Controller in the preceding LI01.02 Record.

This/these instance of MW01.01 shall contain the Work information provided to the Licensee by the RightsContoller referenced in the preceding LI01.02 Record.

If MW01.01 Records are provided for multiple LI01.02 Records within an Intra-Block Grouping, it is possible that the MW01.01 Records contain the same data.

FOOT 1 

 

For cases where the Message Sender has not received a claim for a sound recording from its owner, the AS01.01/AS02.02  record shall be virtually empty, only containing a RecordType and a BlockId.

Annex A (informative) Examples

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Published alongside this standard are a series of Examples in the form of an Excel workbook. To transform them into Sales Report messages in accordance with this standard, the individual tabs of the spreadsheet can be saved as a tab-delimited file

Evaluation Licence for DDEX Standards

 

 

Subject to your compliance with the terms and conditions of this Agreement, DDEX™ grants you a limited, nonexclusive, non-transferable, non-sublicenseable, royalty-free licence solely to reproduce, distribute within your organisation, and use the DDEX standard specifications (“DDEX Standards”) solely for the purpose of your internal evaluation. You may not make any commercial use of the DDEX Standards under this agreement. No other licences are granted under this agreement.

No representations or warranties (either express or implied) are made or offered by DDEX with regard to the DDEX Standards. In particular, but without limitation, no representations or warranties are made in relation to:

  1. The suitability or fitness of the standards for any particular purpose;
  2. The merchantability of the standards;
  3. The accuracy, completeness, relevance or validity of the standards; or
  4. The non-infringement of any third party intellectual property rights related to the DDEX Standards.

Accordingly, DDEX and/or its members shall not be liable for any direct, indirect, special, consequential or punitive loss or damages howsoever arising out of or in connection with the use of the standards. IN THE EVENT THAT ANY COURT OF COMPETENT JURISDICTION RENDERS JUDGEMENT AGAINST DDEX AND/OR ITS MEMBERS NOTWITHSTANDING THE ABOVE LIMITATION, THE AGGREGATE LIABILITY TO YOU IN CONNECTION WITH THIS AGREEMENT SHALL IN NO EVENT EXCEED THE AMOUNT OF ONE HUNDRED U.S. DOLLARS (US$ 100.00).

Users of the DDEX Standards are cautioned that it is subject to revision. Users are recommended to use the latest versions, which are available at http://www.ddex.net. The use of outdated versions of the standards is not recommended but may be required by agreement between implementers in particular cases.