Mid-Summer Review

Happy August! This has been one of the busiest and most productive summers 🌞 that I’ve had in Los Angeles in recent years. Here’s a mid-Summer review:

The summer began with a downer that turned out to be a good thing. My “Music Industry Entrepreneurship” summer class at UCLA was cancelled, but ultimately that cancellation freed up more of my time for the things that followed.

In June, I began work on the Royalty Claim website and database platform. Royalty Claim is a product of my ongoing research into the global music licensing and royalty flow ecosystem, specifically my research into its inefficiencies and the legal loopholes that lead to billions of dollars in unpaid royalties owed to music creators and rightsholders. The Royalty Claim Initiative will aid in creating transparency in the global music licensing ecosystem by offering a free online searchable database of unclaimed royalties and music licenses. I recently joined the Music Industry Research Association and will be presenting a state of music licensing report at its first inaugural MIRA Conference at UCLA on August 10th. This will also serve as the launch of Royalty Claim.

At the end of June I hopped over to Puerto Vallarata, Mexico where I spent a week with a group of friends. It was so fun and I got to check off a bucket list item: ziplining in the wilderness. Good times!

During my trip to PV, the deal that I had been working on for several months had officially closed. That is, my in-store music video network business that I founded in 2012 had been acquired by Empire Distribution. It was great timing. The acquisition frees me up to focus and invest more on my company TuneRegistry and my new project Royalty Claim.

Also in July, I produced in San Francisco the first of a series of summer events for my client Shiekh. It was an event for the launch of the Puma x Kylie Jenner “Velvet Rope” sneaker collection. My #EventsByDae team kicked butt and we had a successful event for client and guests.

I will be producing the next event on Aug 14th at Hyde Bellagio in Las Vegas.

I also attended FYF Fest for the first time and I got approved for a new apartment that I’ve been eye’ing for months.