[Harp-L] MUSIC VIDEOS MAY BE PULLED FROM YouTube & MySpace
MUSIC VIDEOS MAY BE PULLED FROM YouTube & MySpace
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Universal Music Group, the world's biggest record
company, is stepping up pressure against popular online sites YouTube and MySpace,
accusing them of infringing the copyrights of its artists' music videos.
Universal chief executive Doug Morris described video site YouTube and News
Corp.'s social networking site MySpace as "copyright infringers".
"The poster child for (user-generated media) sites is MySpace and YouTube,"
said Morris "We believe these new businesses are copyright infringers and owe
us tens of millions of dollars."
He added, "How we deal with these companies will be revealed shortly."
"This could be the first salvo from a content player against business models
based on user-generated content, much of which relies on copyrighted
material."
The runaway success of the free-to-view online video sites has raised the
question of whether rights holders such as record companies and movie companies
should be compensated, even if the clips are uploaded by the users.
To date, YouTube has said it will take down any copyrighted material
illegally posted on the site once it has been alerted by the rights holder.
Record companies are keen to avoid repeating the mistake they believe they
made when Viacom Inc.'s MTV was set up 25 years ago -- allowing their artists'
music to be aired for free.
Morris in his remarks to investors on Tuesday said MTV "built a
multibillion-dollar company on our (music) ... for virtually nothing.We learned a hard
lesson."
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