Hi Steen. No I'm not registered with anyone. I never even though about it, but I was watching a different video on youtube (about a guitar technique thing) and youtube recommended that video for some reason. It made me a bit annoyed that SC and other sites were collecting money and doing IPOs on the backs of artists and knowingly not paying them.
I think I have like 2500-3000 total SC plays since I joined a year ago so i'm not sure it's worth registering with anyone.
The guy in that video does another video and in that one he says that BMI and ASCAP all were under-representing plays by as much as 80%. He referenced TuneStat as the source of that study. It seems like there's a lot of weird stuff going on. Like even if you sign up for one of those agencies, they misrepresent the figures??
This area of the industry is changing every day but questioning if/how they pay, and setting up the mechanisms for getting paid are two very different concerns.
Youtube, for example, seem to have separate arrangements with different publishers which is why one of your cover videos will be taken down, another will be blocked in Germany, and another will be monetised via ads.
I don't believe anyone gets performing rights royalties for material on youtube, although I'm not certain about that.
In cases where videos are monetised the publisher is getting the money one way or other - I'm just not sure if it goes through a royalty collection agency or not.
Either way, registering with a performing rights organisation is very much your responsibility.
It's impossible to accurately distribute everything that's owed to every individual artist in many cases, so we get an average. If you're not in, you don't get it.
In cases where an average is taken and artist names aren't recorded, royalty collection agencies have no way of knowing that they 'should' be paying you.
That's certainly how it works where broad licenses for music use are paid, as with most commercial radio stations, for example.
Of course, other areas are specifically reported and the person who is owed gets paid by name.
That's how census radio works and, I guess, Soundcloud?
It's a complicated enough system but the bottom line is if you aren't in, no one's going to come looking for you.
All of that said, a few thousand soundcloud plays will most likely generate pence at best, although I appreciate that's not why you're asking.
As far as I know, PRS won't backdate for works which weren't registered at the time of use so, if you think there's any chance of radio play or commercial use, it's worth registering as you go just incase.
I don't know for sure if the US agencies work the same way, but it seems likely.