Warner Music Taking Its Music Off YouTube And Going Home
from the still-not-getting-it dept
Warner Music desperately wants people to believe that it's not the evil record label that people make it out to be, but it's going to have a very difficult time proving that's true when it keeps doing strategically braindead things like pulling all its music off of YouTube because it's upset Google won't pay more money. This is classic Warner Music. The company almost always overvalues its music, compared to the services that help promote that music, and is always demanding a larger cut. Last summer, it did a similar thing and pulled its music off of Last.fm. With plenty of other startups, the company has a history of suing until they agree to cough up a huge chunk of equity. This, of course, is the same company whose boss, Edgar Bronfman Jr. just a year ago declared that the industry had made a mistake in going to war against consumers, ignoring the fact that it was his own speech back in 2000 that basically kicked off that war.To be honest, Warner Music should be hugely thankful that Google is paying the company anything for music on YouTube. Legally, Google has no reason to pay a dime. Thanks to the DMCA safe harbor provisions, if Warner wants to go after anyone, it should be going after those who upload the videos, but Google worked out a totally unnecessary (and somewhat questionable) deal to pay the labels for a promise not to sue users. However, it looks like Warner Music is getting excessively greedy again. Perhaps it's the recent reports that Warner's larger competitor, Universal Music is bringing in significant cash from YouTube that got Bronfman and crew angry, but it's doing exactly the wrong thing in pulling its videos.
Pulling the videos off of YouTube doesn't punish Google. It punishes fans: the folks who Warner desperately needs on its side, though it's been failing at that for a long, long time. Google's response should be "good riddance." Let's see how Warner Music copes with angry musicians who want fans to promote their music on YouTube, while seeing plenty of other bands build up larger audiences that way.
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Filed Under: copyright, music, videos
Companies: google, warner music group, youtube
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Ooh
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here's a fix
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Not Really
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No loss
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Perhaps - but I think it might be hard to find someone who could do it WORSE than the current players out there.
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no missed
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They haven't realised just how little such fights matter to the consumer.
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Apple could hire a few tech-savvy A&R reps that would go to each market on a quarterly basis to teach free workshops in iMovie, Garageband, perhaps even Avid and Protools. Apple's business goal would be to enhance the entire Apple Ecosystem, by assisting in tools/techniques for production-quality content distributed on the iTunes and Youtube Platforms. Perhaps recommend B&H for renting filming equipment, or whatnot.
But in this hypothetical, they could also scout out talent and/or financing for a major label. Much of music is NY/LA/Memphis based, and an idea such as this opens up for better scouting.
But considering that MTV doesn't show music videos anymore, the consumption needs to replaced with a different platform to justify production costs. Using music videos as a promotional tool online would be nice. Youtube has the audience, and I don't understand Warner's logic.
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Observations on New Music
My daughter finally saved enough money to buy herself a Creative Zen. Now, when she likes something from YouTube enough, we will buy the MP3 from Amazon. But, even after putting the MP3s on her Zen, she uses YouTube as her music player on her PC. (This also speaks to the ubiquitousness of good internet connectivity, but that is another discussion.)
There are several points here that the labels had better catch on to, or they will lose this (and future) generations completely:
- She NEVER goes into record stores (why do we still call them record stores?) and has NO interest in buying CDs.
- What radio stations are playing simply is irrelevant. Radio has no place in how they experience music.
- If the music is not on YouTube, her group of friends will never be exposed to it nor be interested in it. From my point of view, YouTube has replaced the function that radio played with my generation (at least with my daughter and her friends).
- The video is as important to them as the music.
These are the future music buyers, and as far as I can tell, the record companies are not meeting their needs at all. The future will be interesting to watch.
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Amusing Quote
From the 2000 Bronfman speech:
Completely missing the point, that the Internet is built, not on content, but on connectivity. What drew people to the Internet--and led them to abandon the proprietary alternatives like CompuServe, the original AOL, and the original MSN--was that it let them connect to all the other people also going on the Internet. The "premium content" that the proprietary services tried to offer was never enough to offset this. In the end those services could not get the Internet to come to them, they had to go to the Internet.
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WHAT??!!
I listen to a lot of my music on youtube and then for the most part if I really like the artist I might buy their CD and support them. But if they have absolutely no videos on you tube I probably won't even bother. I don't understand what Warner Music could possibly accomplish by this. Why does it hurt to have people listen to music by artists under their label? Wouldn't it be better to have their videos on you tube?
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come on people. i am SO sick of money hungry companies like warner. you know, these companies DEPEND on the consumers. we as fans can really turn them around. make THEM cater to us. we're buying into their companies aren't we? it just takes a very large group effort, and maybe some media coverage. these little things need to stop, because they will amount to something huge in the long run.
i just wish that we could come together and cry out against these atrocities instead of painfully watch them slide by.
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