Vis Slashdot… Google has been busy lately taking down all music related content from YouTube’s UK viewers. This is in response to the content organization, PRS For Music’s royalty demands. Google won’t pay the rates they’ve set for online music, and is simply taking down any music contant that PRS has rights to. So PRS is happy, right?<\/p>\n
Wrong<\/a> …<\/p>\n Here’s what PRS has to say about the tiff between it and Google, from it’s website…<\/p>\n Fair Play for Creators is an online forum set up by PRS for Music so that creators everywhere can publicly demonstrate their concern over the way their work is treated by online businesses.<\/p>\n Fair Play for Creators was established after Internet-giant, Google, made the decision to remove some music content from YouTube.<\/p>\n Google’s decision was made because it didn’t want to pay the going rate for music, to the creators of that music, when it’s used on YouTube.<\/p>\n Music creators rely on receiving royalties whenever and wherever their work is used. Royalties are vital in nurturing creative music talent. They make sure music creators are rewarded for their creativity in the same way any other person would be in their work.<\/p>\n Fair Play for Creators believes that fans should have access to the music they love, and that the work of music creators should be paid for by the online businesses who benefit from its use.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n So…I guess they see some value in their music being played on YouTube after all. That wouldn’t happen to be because sites like YouTube bring more new music to the attention of listeners these days…particularly Young<\/em> listeners…then all the radio stations in the world combined would it…?\n<\/p>\n Never mind that some musicians actively despise PRS…I’ll get to that in a minute. There was a nugget of insight in the Slashdot comments that illuminated something I’d been puzzled by, ever since the music industrial complex went on the warpath against the Internet. Why the hell are they so bent on killing Internet Radio…???<\/em><\/p>\n I put it down to their fear of piracy. I put it down to greed. But there’s another aspect to this here that proves Heinlein was right when he said never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity. See it here, in Pete Waterman’s pathetic whining that he isn’t being paid every time one of his magnificent works is played on YouTube…<\/p>\n\n
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YouTube is not alone in the online hall of shame where the worthy notion of greater consumer choice is used as a cloak to disguise the fact that copyright infringement happens on a grand scale.<\/p>\n
I co-wrote ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’, which Rick Astley performed in the eighties, and which must have been played more than 100 million times on YouTube – owner Google. My PRS for Music income in the year ended September 2008 was £11.<\/p>\n
Music videos and music generally is at the very heart of User Generated Content sites. It is the hard work and creative endeavour of songwriters and musicians everywhere that has been the bedrock upon which many of these websites have been built, creating along the way huge value for their owners. As well as arguing with them over royalty rates, we should be fighting them to get proper recognition for the part we’ve played in building their businesses.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Pete Waterman, songwriter<\/strong> – 24 March 2009<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Now, never mind that a lot of people think they’re<\/em> owed compensation for having to listen to this song every time they’re Rick-Rolled. Look at it. Just look at it. Waterman really thinks that a single play on YouTube is the same as a single play on radio, for which he gets a PRS royalty. One Slashdot commenter put’s it in perspective…<\/p>\n