Only Took 9 Months, But Warner Music Videos Finally Back On YouTube

from the how-big-were-the-losses? dept

Mon, Sep 28th 2009 1:56am — Mike Masnick

You may recall last December that a spat over how much Google would pay Warner Music for hosting its videos (for free, mind you) created a situation whereby Warner Music videos were taken off the site (there are conflicting stories over who actually made the call to take the videos down). The end result of this was basically bad for everyone -- and even Warner's own musicians got pretty pissed off at Warner -- especially as they saw other musicians use YouTube to grow their audience. It only took nine months, but it looks like Warner Music and YouTube have finally worked out a deal to allow the videos back online. You have to wonder how much harm this did to Warner artists, and to the label itself. I'd argue that the failure to leverage a rather useful promotional platform to connect with audiences was likely to have been much greater than any "harm" done from file sharing.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: copyright, music, videos
Companies: google, warner music group, youtube

8 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

LoL, 28 Sep 2009 @ 2:14am

Google missing an opportunity.
Google could do the Google Studios, they have the capital to invest in silly(for now) models and could improve their bottom line making their own content. Microsoft to could do it :)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Sep 2009 @ 2:29am

You have to wonder how much harm this did to Warner artists
But I thought free downloading was stealing and did not do the artists any good.

Well thats what they are always saying
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Richard (profile), 28 Sep 2009 @ 2:48am

Logos
It's just like clothing with logos on it. They want you to pay them to advertise their stuff.

If I had been Google I would have run the negotiation like Tuco in the gun shop in "the Good the Bad and the Ugly".
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Misanthropist (profile), 28 Sep 2009 @ 4:25am

wow
anyone else notice the subliminal ad for vevo in there?

never before heard of them, and I hope I never hear of them again.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
drewmerc (profile), 28 Sep 2009 @ 4:33am

do you know what is needed a way to stop people ripping youtube video's some sort of drm.........

i cant go on, my lack of imagination will always stop me from being a good troll
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased) (profile), 28 Sep 2009 @ 6:40am

Great news!
Now I can go back to not watching Warner Music videos on YouTube like I was able to nine months ago. But if Disney gets all those old Donald Duck cartoons taken down...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ChimpBush McHitlerBurton, 28 Sep 2009 @ 12:55pm

Re: wow
No I didn't see any subliminal message in there. Unless you are talking about the subliminal message for the new DAN BULL album and single which is rocketing up the charts. It's an open letter to Lily Allen, and it's fucking hilarious.
But no, other than that, I didn't see any subliminal messages.
CBMHB
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David Gerard (profile), 29 Sep 2009 @ 3:02am

Edgar Bronfman, what do you expect?
Warner Music is now owned by Edgar Bronfman Jr, the Seagram's heir and lucky sperm club member who previously lost a fortune on Universal Music. His operating method at Warner Music seems to be to keep everything locked up forever. There are so many entire catalogues that are unavailable anywhere on earth, except via MP3 blogs. (As an Australian, I'm particularly pissed off he got his hands on the Festival/Mushroom catalogue when Festival was finally sold off for scrap.)

But yeah, I can see his fear of having 96kbps MP3s of FM radio quality TV sound available on YouTube.

*headdesk*
[ link to this | view in thread ]