We fight very hard for our members, in our case authors, composers, and publishers as well, but it's nothing new. When I say we fight hard, in this case it's on complex legal issues.
Back in the 1990s we had to go to the courts to ensure that our members were paid for the use of their music in specialty television programming, such as on TSN. Things we take for granted today, we had to fight for 25 years ago. We're continuing those fights. We appear before the Copyright Board, where the royalties that ultimately are distributed to our members are set. In order for those royalties to be set, they have to be confirmed as a matter of law that we can legitimately collect them.
Our members were extremely disappointed two years ago to find that well over $20 million that was with SOCAN and awaiting distribution to our members had to be repaid to this little company called Apple iTunes. Ironically, Apple was not among the companies challenging our members' rights to receive royalties for downloads. We're still fighting for our members' rights in that regard as a result of changes to legislation that came through with the adoption of Bill C-11 two years ago.
One way in which we try to ensure that royalties continue to make their way to our members is by representing them in these very significant legal battles that existed 25 years ago and that are simply now been shifted to a new front with the advent of these new technologies. We're going to continue to do that.