by Joel FreimarkJun 23, 2014 | Death + Taxes Mag
As we reported last week, YouTube is in a major fight with independent labels, as the video service has begun to remove artist uploads from bands that have not signed on to their new “YouTube Music Pass” service. A handful of smaller labels have come together to fight as one, and from the back and forth accusations the clearly unfair, almost blackmail-level nature of YouTube’s move has been completely revealed.
Attempting to defend their money-grubbing actions, YouTube stated that they will only block content “in certain countries,” and that they have somehow managed to come to terms with “95% of all labels.” Along with this, the video giants said that videos uploaded via VEVO channels as well as “some fan videos” will remain online, though they gave no reasoning or criteria on why some will avoid the cuts that are expected later this week.
However, when it comes to questioning whether or not YouTube has evil and greedy intentions, the company removed all doubt when they stated that any label that refuses their new terms will no longer have access to the ad monetization system. In other words: if labels don’t sign up, YouTube will take 100% of any ad revenue generated from the videos they do not remove. For both labels and publishers, this can mean millions of dollars each year. There hasn’t been as clear an act of bullying in music in quite some time.
There was one rather dim, but still present light when YouTube further complicated the scenario, stating that some artists who own their own music, or those who work with un-partnered labels “may not be affected.” However, the company once again failed to provide any detail on how this would be determined, and it’s likely it will only be used to keep completely independent videos that have massive view-counts safe on the site.
In short, Google (who own YouTube) has a new service that they want to force onto the general public, and they’ve decided that any company who doesn’t like it can just be removed. While Google is free to do what they wish, it’s hard to look at this situation and not recall the hilarious disaster that was their forced Google Plus integration.
Joel Freimark hosts a daily music-related webseries HERE and you can follow his daily music musings and suggestions HERE as well.
