Category: YouTube

YouTube’s Attack On Indies Gets Strong Response From WIN, But It’s Time For Artists To Take Action | Hypebot

YouTube/Google and Amazon Are Using Their Power Against Creatives

If you’ve been watching the last 15 years or so of web development, you’ve seen a relatively wide open field of entrepreneurial potential gradually get taken over by major corporations in a manner similar to what occurred in industrial societies beginning in the late 1800s. They may be dropping fewer bodies than did the industrial giants but close-to-monopoly digital land grabs by companies like Google and Amazon have put them in a situation where they seem to feel that any terms they name are acceptable if they have the power to force compliance.

Amazon’s current battle with Hachette is but one example of how they’ve used their dominating position in book and ebook retail on the web to have their way with companies that are often struggling to survive.

YouTube’s dominance of the web video space sets up a similar near-monopoly situation in which they’re willing to use their position to behave in monopolistic fashion and force non-compliant entities into line.

READ THE FULL STORY AT HYPEBOT:
http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2014/06/youtubes-attack-on-indies-gets-strong-response-from-win-but-its-time-for-artists-to-take-action.html

by trichordist

YouTube’s DMCA Abuse and Indie Labels: How Google is Blowing it for the Honest People

* * MUST READ * * From Music Tech Daily

Music Technology Policy

In a speech at Canadian Music Week, Beggars Group Chairman Martin Mills was not only right, he was prescient:

Google, the parent of YouTube, [is] one of the companies that have made billions on the back of [the DMCA notice and takedown,] a statutory provision intended to protect ordinary people acting innocently.

Google has now refined the DMCA to a tool to leverage its anticompetitive activities.  Here’s how it works.

1.  Google opens the YouTube platform to unauthorized “user generated content” and says to artists (literally in this case) “Does yuse wants to play whack a mole or make some dough?”  This is called the notice and shakedown.

2.  Google then jams a settlement down the throats of major labels and sticks it to everyone else.  Publishers are next.

3.  Google pays the lowest royalty online with a big advance to majors and spaghetti statements to everyone else that probably…

View original post 326 more words

by Trichordist Editor

YouTube steps up row with indie labels by confirming imminent video blocks | Music Ally

This story is taking on a lot of dimensions of what it might be and what it might mean, Music Ally tries to get some late breaking insight. Of particular note is the comment by Radiohead manager Brian Message, read on…

“YouTube executives argue that they cannot offer music on the free service without it also being available on the paid service as this would disappoint its subscribers,” as Billboard puts it.

Meanwhile, you had the BBC suggesting that indie videos uploaded to YouTube via Vevo would still be available, while only “videos which are exclusively licensed by independent record labels, such as acoustic sets or live performances” will be taken down.

Clear as mud, then. Radiohead manager Brian Message was asked at Music Ally’s transparency event last night whether he thinks YouTube will follow through on the threats: “I quite hope that they do! It would be quite interesting to see what happens next!” – not as flippant as it reads in print, but more an admission that it’s only once blocking start happening that the industry will know exactly what YouTube is threatening.

This dispute is bad for everyone: for labels and artists, for fans, and particularly for YouTube, for whom accusations of bullying indie labels will be hard to brush off.

READ THE FULL STORY AT MUSIC ALLY:
http://musically.com/2014/06/18/youtube-steps-up-row-with-indie-labels-by-confirming-imminent-video-blocks/

by trichordist

!! Gizmodo Reports Google to Censor Videos By XL Recordings, Domino Records, Adele, Animal Collective, Arctic Monkeys and More !!

This just in from Gizmodo regarding the YouTube Music Pass for which the major labels have already made a deal with Google. Indie labels however are being bullied by the tech giant with the threat of Censorship if the artists and indie labels do not submit to sub-standard royalties. Wow. Just wow.

The problem is Google’s plans for the other 10 percent. The company’s head of content Robert Kyncl told the FT that it plans to start blocking videos from indie labels that haven’t signed licensing deals “in a matter of days.” The FT says that these labels include XL Recordings and Domino records, whose rosters include Adele, Animal Collective, Arctic Monkeys, and loads of other popular artists. In a statement to Gizmodo, Google confirmed the FT story as well as its intentions to launch a subscription-based service.

Some labels are refusing to sign up because they say they’re getting a raw deal from Google. They say that while the major labels have negotiated lucrative contracts, Google is offering indies comparatively bad terms. It’s their right to say they don’t want to sign up if they don’t like the deal Google is offering them. In response, Google is drawing a line in the sand: If your label won’t sign on to Google’s crappy licensing deal for a new streaming service, you can’t host videos on YouTube at all.

READ THE FULL STORY AT GIZMODO:
http://gizmodo.com/googles-about-to-ruin-youtube-by-forcing-indie-labels-t-1591957089

 

 

by trichordist

Merlin on YouTube music payouts: ‘Their figures are by far the worst’ | Music Ally

“The ironic thing is that the service that pays the least is the service that’s the most well funded and run by the biggest company in the world: their figures are by far the worst, whether you measure them on a per-stream basis or a per-user basis. I tend to get myself in trouble when I talk about that company…”

Hence his desire not to name them directly, but quote instead from an interview with Billy Bragg conducted by Music Ally earlier this year. “If we’re pissed off at Spotify, we should be marching to YouTube central with flaming pitchforks,” said Bragg – Caldas read this quote out before delivering his own pointed follow-up. “I can’t say Billy’s right, but I can say that he’s not wrong,” said Caldas.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE AT MUSIC ALLY:
http://musically.com/2014/04/30/merlin-youtube-music-payouts-charles-caldas/

RELATED:

What YouTube Really Pays… Makes Spotify Look Good!

Streaming Price Index : Now with YouTube pay rates!

by trichordist

Google/YouTube Said to Be Threatening Censorship Of Artists Videos | The Guardian UK

There is an interesting story breaking in the UK’s Guardian about negotiations between indie labels rights organization Worldwide Independent Network (WIN) and Google’s YouTube.

“Music industry trade association the Worldwide Independent Network (WIN) has accused YouTube of strong-arm negotiating tactics trying to force indie labels to sign up to the new service.

WIN, which represents independent labels worldwide, claims that YouTube is approaching labels directly with a “template contract” and threatening that if they do not sign it, all their music videos will be blocked on YouTube.”

Bring on the black out? How ironic would it be that Google would resort to content blocking as the champions of an open internet and freedom of speech online.

We can see it now…

This video has been removed by Google who chose not to compensate the creator fairly for their work. Sorry about that ;-(

READ THE FULL STORY AT THE GUARDIAN UK:
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/may/22/indie-labels-youtube-subscription-music

by Trichordist Editor

DMCA “Take Down and Stay Down” Is The Logical Solution to a Flawed Loophole [VIDEO]

Earlier this week Digital Music News reported that Google is getting over 1 million DMCA take down requests per DAY! If this isn’t the single greatest illustration of the failure of the DMCA to protect artists and creators we don’t know what is.

No matter how many notices can be sent, or the standardization and efficiency in doing so, the volume of infringement far exceeds any rational ability to combat the flood of infringement.

The only logical solution is to fix the DMCA whereby when a valid notice is sent and complied with, that the infringing content can not be re-uploaded again, and again and again as we detailed in our post “The DMCA Is Broken.”

These videos below illustrate the issue, both present testimony from the Congressional hearing on March 13, 2014.

https://vimeo.com/94514834

 

We’d also like to thank Congresswoman Judy Chu for acknowledging and entering into congressional record our post by Chris Castle on how to address these issues with the DMCA. Video below.

You can read that post here:

Safe Harbor Not Loophole: Five Things We Could Do Right Now to Make the DMCA Notice and Takedown Work Better

 

 

by Trichordist Editor

Merlin on YouTube music payouts: “Their figures are by far the worst” | Music Ally

No surprise to us…

“The ironic thing is that the service that pays the least is the service that’s the most well funded and run by the biggest company in the world: their figures are by far the worst, whether you measure them on a per-stream basis or a per-user basis. I tend to get myself in trouble when I talk about that company…”

Hence his desire not to name them directly, but quote instead from an interview with Billy Bragg conducted by Music Ally earlier this year. “If we’re pissed off at Spotify, we should be marching to YouTube central with flaming pitchforks,” said Bragg – Caldas read this quote out before delivering his own pointed follow-up. “I can’t say Billy’s right, but I can say that he’s not wrong,” said Caldas.

READ THE FULL STORY AT MUSIC ALLY:
http://musically.com/2014/04/30/merlin-youtube-music-payouts-charles-caldas/

RELATED:

What YouTube Really Pays… Makes Spotify Look Good!

Artist Revenue Streams : Streaming Marketshare By Volume and Revenue (includes YouTube and Spotify)

Streaming Price Index : Now with YouTube pay rates!

 

by Trichordist Editor

Researchers Claim That Releasing YouTube Music Videos Reduces Album Sales | Hypebot

In 2009, Warner blocked videos on YouTube by not only their artists but by anybody using bits of their music. This period gave researchers a chunk of data to compare and after doing their statistical magic on all other causes, found that the “blackout had both statistically and economically significant positive effects on album sales, specifically the best-selling albums in a week.”

The paper is available for free:

“Online Music, Sales Displacement, and Internet Search: Evidence from YouTube”

The key point seems to be that for top-selling albums by artists with which listeners are already familiar, YouTube’s free listening acts as direct competition to sales of such albums. In fact, they seem to claim that not having videos on YouTube increased sales by “on average 10,000 units per week for top albums.”

READ THE FULL STORY AT HYPEBOT:
http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2014/04/report-claims-that-releasing-youtube-music-videos-reduces-album-sales.html

by Trichordist Editor

Billy Bragg and Beggars Group Rethink YouTube & Streaming… | MusicAlly

We wonder if this is the future of music and artist revenue streams?

While Wheeler was positive about subscription streaming services, he opened both barrels on YouTube. “If YouTube launches a subscription service and it eats Spotify and Rdio, you’ll look back at these times as great days,” he cautioned. “They want to eat all the other music services and our business. That’s their plan.” He said the record industry was “caught out” in the early days of YouTube and didn’t realise the video site would become so big, initially thinking it was just about licensing music for a video of “a cat on a skateboard and then it became the biggest music service in the world”.

Bragg backed him up by saying, “If you want to talk about artists getting angry about the use of their music, YouTube is the place we should be looking at.”

Wheeler concluded, “We got caught out and that needs addressing. Otherwise they will eat our dinner.”

READ THE FULL STORY AT MUSICALLY:
http://musically.com/2014/04/07/beggars-group-recalibrates-50-streaming-payment-to-artists-and-attacks-youtube/

RELATED:

Exclusive: ‘YouTube Music’ Is Launching This Summer… | Digital Music News

#SXSW REWIND : Venture Capitalist Admits Artists Can Not Make A Living On Streaming Royalties…

What YouTube Really Pays… Makes Spotify Look Good! #sxsw

by trichordist