Following a recent letter of complaint signed by over a thousand pop stars and sent to the EU president, YouTube is once again under fire from rightsholders.
This time around, another thousand-plus signatories from across Europe's creative sectors have called on Jean-Claude Juncker to 'quickly find a real solution to enable fair sharing of value on the internet'.
They say that current safe harbour provisions are used by internet giants such as YouTube to avoid paying rightsholders fairly and the situation must be addressed.
'It’s not just major pop stars or the music sector at large that is under threat because of this; it is the entire creative ecosystem made up of composers, authors, directors, screenwriters, photographers, sculptors, painters, etc'.
The letter, which was personally delivered by a delegation of rightsholders, adds: 'The dominant players on the market, like YouTube, are platforms built on user uploaded or aggregated content that don’t or only barely provide remuneration for our work, and this pulls the entire market value of creative works down in a never ending race to the bottom.'
Prominent UK signatories include PRS director Crispin Hunt, songwriter Imogen Heap, Debbie Wiseman and The Hoosiers' Irwin Sparkes.
The move follows a similar letter last month, signed by over a thousand international artists including Ed Sheeran, Coldplay and Sir Paul McCartney, calling for an end to safe harbour.
Their letter to Juncker stated that the future of music is being ‘jeopardised by a substantial “value gap” caused by user upload services such as Google’s YouTube that are unfairly siphoning value away from the music community and its artists and songwriters.’
It also called on Europe’s leaders to help create ‘a fair playing field for artists and rights owners. In doing so, you will be securing the future of music for generations to come.’
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This time around, another thousand-plus signatories from across Europe's creative sectors have called on Jean-Claude Juncker to 'quickly find a real solution to enable fair sharing of value on the internet'.
They say that current safe harbour provisions are used by internet giants such as YouTube to avoid paying rightsholders fairly and the situation must be addressed.
'It’s not just major pop stars or the music sector at large that is under threat because of this; it is the entire creative ecosystem made up of composers, authors, directors, screenwriters, photographers, sculptors, painters, etc'.
The letter, which was personally delivered by a delegation of rightsholders, adds: 'The dominant players on the market, like YouTube, are platforms built on user uploaded or aggregated content that don’t or only barely provide remuneration for our work, and this pulls the entire market value of creative works down in a never ending race to the bottom.'
Prominent UK signatories include PRS director Crispin Hunt, songwriter Imogen Heap, Debbie Wiseman and The Hoosiers' Irwin Sparkes.
The move follows a similar letter last month, signed by over a thousand international artists including Ed Sheeran, Coldplay and Sir Paul McCartney, calling for an end to safe harbour.
Their letter to Juncker stated that the future of music is being ‘jeopardised by a substantial “value gap” caused by user upload services such as Google’s YouTube that are unfairly siphoning value away from the music community and its artists and songwriters.’
It also called on Europe’s leaders to help create ‘a fair playing field for artists and rights owners. In doing so, you will be securing the future of music for generations to come.’
Related:
Music business must unite to push government for best Brexit deal
PRS for Music chief exec: 'We cannot live in a broken digital market'
