CWR Workflow Overview

CWR is more than just a file format: it encodes the business logic of rights management and the workflows that connect publishers, partners, and societies. To use it effectively, it is important to understand who declares what, to whom, and at which stage.

Ownership and Collection in Workflows

Every CWR file revolves around two dimensions:

• Ownership: the legal reality of who owns which shares of a work.
• Collection: the administrative mandate to collect royalties for those shares, in specific territories.

How much of this information you include depends on the context:

• Registration of a new work with your CMO: send ownership only. The society manages collection locally and through reciprocal agreements.
• Exchange with a partner (sub-publisher or administrator): share ownership only. The partner enriches the file with collection rules for their mandate.
• Registration of sub-publishing or administration to a CMO: send ownership plus collection. The society needs both to recognize the mandate and process royalties.

This division ensures clarity: societies receive the full information they need, while partners remain in control of their own administration details.

The CWR Workflow

Submitting a work in CWR follows a predictable cycle:

1. New Work Registration (NWR): the publisher, sub-publisher, or administrator sends a CWR file to the society.
2. Acknowledgement (ACK): the society returns an ACK confirming whether the registration has been accepted or rejected.
3. Enrichment: accepted ACKs often include official identifiers such as the ISWC or internal society codes, which should be fed back into your catalog.

This cycle turns each CWR delivery into a two-way exchange: you send ownership and collection data, and you receive authoritative confirmation and identifiers.

Good Practices

Because CWR exchanges involve multiple parties and strict standards, coordination is essential. Always align with your partners and societies before exchanging data, and begin new relationships with a single-work test. Once the ACK confirms everything is aligned, larger deliveries can follow with confidence.