John Hichborn is a one-man royalty tracker. “Royalty tracking, as an industry, has become increasingly important in the electronic age, when well-known songs are sampled for commercials, thrown onto cheap CD compilations, and even used for video games. There can be considerable money at stake. A publisher is supposed to be paid 8 cents per song for each copy sold. The writer then receives his share from what he has agreed to as part of the deal. That can add up. ‘The record industry is a swamp of disappearing money’.”