Until then, they belong to the status category of "extraordinary member," with limited voting rights (and usually a meagre share of fee revenues, ca.

The overwhelming majority of those represented by GEMA have no access to membership status as defined and protected under the German civil code (see Articles 21–79), holding instead the pseudo-title of "associated member."

[4] The purpose of GEMA is to collect royalty fees from the organisers of events where music protected by this organization is played as well as media manufacturers, publishers, and broadcasting stations.

In 2004, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) applied to lower the licensing fee rates for sound recording media from 9.009% to 5.6% of the manufacturer's price.

GEMA criticized this push as "an attempt by the German phonographic industry to solve their problems on the backs and at the expense of creative composers and lyricists."

In 2005, the board of arbitration of the German Patent and Trademark Office in Munich decided in favor of GEMA, preventing the proposed licensing fee rate-reduction.

[10] Upon coming into effect in January 1902, the Law Concerning Author's Rights to Works of Literature and Musical Art (German: Gesetz betreffend das Urheberrecht an Werken der Literatur und der Tonkunst) first set down in law that the public performance of a musical work required the permission of the author.

This came much later than in other states such as France, where the collecting society SACEM had already been founded in 1851, having its roots in the Agence Centrale, an interest group of musicians and publishers.

The GDT was headed by some of the most successful composers of the time, including Engelbert Humperdinck, Georg Schumann and most notably Richard Strauss.

In 1904, the GDT published a memorandum on the spirit and purpose of the AFMA, as there remained a great deal of confusion—as much among musicians as among event promoters and users.

A central point of the memo was the following paragraph, most of whose contents now appear in the association rules of GEMA: The time after the foundation of the AFMA was quite turbulent.

In 1909, the GDT founded a second society focused exclusively on the exploitation of mechanical reproduction for phonograph records, the Institute for Mechanical-Musical Rights LLC (German: Anstalt für mechanisch-musikalische Rechte GmbH; AMMRE).

The legislator responsible for this law, Joseph Goebbels, did so with the aim of bringing all collecting societies into line and granting them a monopoly position.

On 28 September 1933, the State-Approved Society for the Exploitation of Musical Performing Rights (German: Staatlich genehmigte Gesellschaft zur Verwertung musikalischer Aufführungsrechte; STAGMA) arose out of the Verband zum Schutze musikalischer Afführungsrechte für Deutschland and was issued a monopoly on the exercise of musical performing rights.

The Reichsmusikkammer (English: Reich Chamber of Music), under the direction of then-president Richard Strauss, stipulated in its guidelines that, "non-Aryans are categorically not to be viewed as bearers and stewards of German cultural goods."

The CEO of STAGMA was Leo Ritter, who occupied the same position in the original GEMA and was in the habit of giving Hitler's Mein Kampf as a prize to worthy employees.

[13] STAGMA continued its work after the Second World War, but under the title of GEMA (Gesellschaft für musikalische Aufführungs- und mechanische Vervielfältigungsrechte) starting from 24 August 1947.

Albrecht Dümling's book, Musik hat ihren Wert (English: Music has its Value) was published to mark the 100-year anniversary of the first collection society in Germany.

[14] In 1950, after the founding of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) and the partition of Germany (and as a consequence of the division in currencies), a society with comparable functions came into being in the GDR, the Institute for the Preservation of Performing and Reproduction Rights in the Area of Music (German: Anstalt zur Wahrung der Aufführungs- und Vervielfältigungsrechte auf dem Gebiet der Musik; AWA).

These numbers illustrate that, since the appearance of YouTube on 15 February 2005, absolutely no negative effects on earnings from usage rights can be detected to date.

In an online petition initiated by Monika Bestle on 19 May 2003, artists and event-organizers demanded a revision of GEMA's regulations with respect to better transparency, adjusted payment methods and other critical points.

[21][22] On 2 April 2009, a lawsuit took place before the regional court of Munich, in which the plaintiff, German singer Barbara Clear [de], demanded a court-backed disclosure of GEMA's business practices.

[27] It came to light on 28 May 2010, that two employees along with ten GEMA members were embroiled in a fraud scandal, in which money was paid out for events that never took place.

"[28][29] GEMA garnered a great deal of attention in January 2011 when it sent a letter to 36,000 Kindergartens, charging them a yearly lump-sum fee of €56 for the photocopying of music scores with children's songs on them.

The hacktivist group Anonymous claimed responsibility for both attacks, accusing GEMA of making exorbitant demands in regarding the required licensing fees for accessed videos.

On 22 August, the hackers directly attacked the content of the website, redirecting viewers to an image that played on the dispute with YouTube.

Another demo party, Revision, made a similar decision in 2013 after having to pay GEMA because of GEMA-registered artists participating in music competitions during the previous year's event.

[40] Google Inc., the world's biggest Internet search engine company, partly lost a German copyright infringement suit over how much it must do to remove illegal music videos from its YouTube website.

[41] On 20 April 2012, the regional court of Hamburg decided in favor of GEMA in the dispute with YouTube, ordering the removal of seven copyright-protected videos from its platform.

The award is conferred in ten categories, and the honorees are selected by an independent jury of experts: composers, lyricists, and producers from a variety of musical genres.