Green Day on YouTube

Warner and YouTube finally agree to money sharing deal after Warner artists watch the competition grow audience on YouTube

Warner Music and YouTube just inked a deal to put Warner musicians back on YouTube. According to Advertising Age, the money deal ends the stalemate between the two that say official Warner artists pulled from YouTube last December.

Of course, in the YouTube world all that means is the “official” videos got pulled. Fans are posting fan vids and copies of their favourite songs every day. Warner just made it harder in the war of attrition between fans and the music companies.

Amanda Palmer - pissed when Warner had her taken off YouTube for Christmas

The ever-vocal Amanda “Fucking” Palmer tore a stripe off her label back on Christmas Eve the man strikes again, youtube wars No wonder she wanted off her label.

“Unable to reach new licensing terms, the Warner Music Group has demanded that thousands of its videos be removed from YouTube, which is owned by Google. Warner Music’s videos, the source of a billion views on YouTube, gradually began disappearing from the site on Saturday, although many remained online Sunday evening.”

in other words, roadrunner is a subsidiary of warner and i’m stuck in hell with madonna and the other poor bastards, because warner wants more money. even worse, warner has almost no bargaining power…they’re not even in the top ten of labels who have huge artists with material streaming on youtube. they’re just starving for cash right now and they’re doing anything they can think of to come up with cash. it’s abSURD. they are looking for money in a totally backwards way.

Warner is living in the past when rich record companies could force the big money out of the public. They have a rich catalogue of music and they intend to milk it for all its worth.

Try to put your favourite song from a Warner artist on a CD. The minimum fee was $35,000 US last time I looked. Warner is just to greedy for their own good.

In the meantime, fans are posting videos on YouTube, recording covers of their faves and posting them on YouTube and generally avoiding the fuss.

YouTube, owned by Google, is the most popular video sharing network. They have the technology for video streaming and the audience. YouTube has built its community of posters and viewers. While things are not always smooth – you can lose your account by posting unlicensed material – the world spins on YouTube.

Warner found out the hard way – their power is limited.

YouTube reports it will take some time to return the whole catalog from Warner to their site.