Photo Credit: International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC)

CISAC launches the first global format to modernize audiovisual music data and improve payments, but will it cause more confusion than clarification?

The International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC) has announced the launch of AVR+, the first fully documented and machine-readable technical format designed to transform how music data is shared and processed across the global audiovisual industry. The format was created to help ensure that creators are more accurately identified and fairly paid.

Developed as the first implementation-ready format based on the Global Cue Sheet Standard 2.0—a shared framework for how music used in film and television is documented—AVR+ aims to be a major step toward more consistent and interoperable metadata exchange across the audiovisual value chain.

“This is a major step forward in modernizing the global infrastructure that supports creators,” said Sylvain Piat, Director of Business and Technology at CISAC. “By improving the accuracy and interoperability of audiovisual music data, AVR+ has the potential to massively increase the efficiency and timely processing of usages. It’s about making sure the value of creative work flows back to the people who made it.”

Cue sheets are documents that list the music used in audiovisual productions. They are essential for ensuring that royalties are distributed correctly—but have historically been fragmented, inconsistently formatted, and often incomplete. That creates inefficiencies across the global rights ecosystem, which AVR+ aims to address by providing a structured, machine-readable format that enables automation, improves data quality, and ensures greater consistency across systems.

Built as a structured JSON schema—a widely used digital format that allows systems to exchange data in a consistent and automated way—AVR+ incorporates all mandatory and optional data elements defined in the Global Cue Sheet Standard 2.0, including full support for recording metadata such as identifiers and contextual usage. It introduces standardized terminology agreed upon by CISAC and its global partners and is designed to work seamlessly with existing rights databases and downstream workflows, allowing for integration into production, rights management, and royalty processing systems.

According to CISAC, the format enables a range of practical improvements, including more efficient processing and amendment of cue sheet data, streamlined registration of works and sound recordings, stronger linkage between usage documentation and payment records, and greater consistency between publisher registrations and society distributions. By translating the global standard into an operational format, AVR+ is designed to support automation of cue sheet ingestion, reduces metadata gaps, and enable consistent validation across production partners, with the ultimate goal of improving transparency for all rights holders.

“AVR+ is more than a technical format—it is a practical blueprint for the future of audiovisual rights data. By creating a common language for the exchange of cue sheet information and integrating both musical works and recording metadata, we are helping to build a more transparent, connected, and scalable rights ecosystem,” said Jens Kindermann, GEMA, Chair of CISAC’s Audiovisual Working Group. “The work of the Audiovisual Working Group has always been guided by the belief that better data leads to better outcomes for creators, and AVR+ turns that vision into a practical reality.”

While on the surface, this seems like a tremendous improvement, it’s worth noting that the AVR+ rollout could place an unrealistic burden on smaller production companies and independent TV producers who lack the technical infrastructure and time to generate complex JSON metadata.

Moreover, the decision to plow forward with an independent “standard” creates friction with existing global DDEX frameworks, which could force tech platforms to build specialized cross-handling tools while smaller, legacy collection societies lack the systems to adopt it.

CISAC says a key advancement of the Global Cue Sheet Standard 2.0 that is now fully realized through AVR+ is the integration of recording metadata alongside musical works. This, in theory, expands the system beyond authors’ rights to support neighboring rights as well, allowing for more complete identification of both musical works and sound recordings used.