Marchingontogether
TK Veteran
Music videos turned out to account for more than 1/3 of all views on YouTube, making it the world’s biggest music streaming service. YouTube confirmed that the company has paid out to the music industry over the last several years more than a billion dollars. However, musicians, independent labels and industry bodies alike still like neither YouTube nor Google, its parent company.
Well, everyone understands the cause of friction between YouTube and the entertainment industry. However, it should be noted that there are many ways the two parties are cooperating – for example, YouTube helps record labels to identify user-generated videos which use their music and make money from them. There is also such thing as Google Play music subscription service.
Industry experts pointed out that even UK music outfit BPI, which has been criticizing Google over the high rankings for piracy websites on its search results, has already created its own YouTube channel in order to promote UK music. Still, the music industry has doubts in YouTube’s commitment to music and wonders why the latter doesn’t pay even more to labels and publishers.
BPI compared YouTube unflatteringly to such streaming music services as Spotify and Deezer. As you know, those mix advertising-funded free streaming with premium subscription tiers. Apparently, YouTube is supposed to do the same. In the meantime, other music portals agree, calling YouTube “the most important legal pirate”. Spotify, for example, has recently contrasted its own average payout of $6,000 per million streams to the $3,000 per million streams paid out by YouTube.
On the other part, YouTube also has defenders in the music industry, including independent labels, which claimed that YouTube remains a top 5 revenue source at the moment and is going up. In the meantime, some of the multi-channel networks who help artists make a living suggest that increasing payouts means cleverer use of Google’s service, not just demanding higher per-stream rates. They explain that the music world has changed and its members should understand that. Today, for every piece of content an artist releases, there should be 7 other pieces to support that. Others believe that YouTube is not a right place to make money at the moment, but only because people representing the content fail to understand the marketplace.
Some of the industry’s concerns about YouTube are connected with their arguments with Google over its copyright policies. They ask what the streaming service is doing about “stream-ripping” apps which allow to convert videos into MP3 downloads. BPI confirmed that they have been asking YouTube to deal with that problem for many years, but it still act as a free download service. Their efforts to persuade Google to downgrade piracy portals in its search results also continue.
Well, everyone understands the cause of friction between YouTube and the entertainment industry. However, it should be noted that there are many ways the two parties are cooperating – for example, YouTube helps record labels to identify user-generated videos which use their music and make money from them. There is also such thing as Google Play music subscription service.
Industry experts pointed out that even UK music outfit BPI, which has been criticizing Google over the high rankings for piracy websites on its search results, has already created its own YouTube channel in order to promote UK music. Still, the music industry has doubts in YouTube’s commitment to music and wonders why the latter doesn’t pay even more to labels and publishers.
BPI compared YouTube unflatteringly to such streaming music services as Spotify and Deezer. As you know, those mix advertising-funded free streaming with premium subscription tiers. Apparently, YouTube is supposed to do the same. In the meantime, other music portals agree, calling YouTube “the most important legal pirate”. Spotify, for example, has recently contrasted its own average payout of $6,000 per million streams to the $3,000 per million streams paid out by YouTube.
On the other part, YouTube also has defenders in the music industry, including independent labels, which claimed that YouTube remains a top 5 revenue source at the moment and is going up. In the meantime, some of the multi-channel networks who help artists make a living suggest that increasing payouts means cleverer use of Google’s service, not just demanding higher per-stream rates. They explain that the music world has changed and its members should understand that. Today, for every piece of content an artist releases, there should be 7 other pieces to support that. Others believe that YouTube is not a right place to make money at the moment, but only because people representing the content fail to understand the marketplace.
Some of the industry’s concerns about YouTube are connected with their arguments with Google over its copyright policies. They ask what the streaming service is doing about “stream-ripping” apps which allow to convert videos into MP3 downloads. BPI confirmed that they have been asking YouTube to deal with that problem for many years, but it still act as a free download service. Their efforts to persuade Google to downgrade piracy portals in its search results also continue.