The 50-year anniversary of the German collecting society for performing artists, record producers and organizers, the “German Collecting Society for Performance Rights (GVL)”, was marked by a symposium sponsored by the Institute for the Legal Protection of Industrial Property and Copyright, Humboldt-University of Berlin, in the fall of 2009. The now published and revised contributions to the symposium address a variety of topics including a historical review of the GVL, a critical analysis of German collecting societies' situation in light of European competition as well as the expectations of performance artists, record producers and users with regard to the GVL.