Common Music Group has indicated its intention to tug its music from TikTok, accusing the platform of using strong-arm techniques to push via a renewal settlement that’s much less useful than their earlier contract.
What Occurred: UMG has expressed its dissatisfaction with TikTok’s strategy to the renewal of its licensing settlement.
The deal, which is because of finish on Jan. 31, is between the music big and TikTok’s dad or mum firm, ByteDance. UMG acknowledged its readiness to cease licensing content material to TikTok and its music companies if the negotiations didn’t yield a brand new contract, reported Selection.
UMG, which has artists like Taylor Swift, Drake, and Ariana Grande on its roster, identified three key areas of rivalry. These embrace inadequate artist compensation, the damaging influence of AI on human artists, and the difficulty of on-line security for TikTok customers.
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The group accused TikTok of proposing to pay artists at charges decrease than different main social platforms. It additionally alleged that TikTok permits AI-generated music to oversaturate the platform, which in flip diminishes the royalty pool for human artists.
As well as, UMG criticized TikTok for not taking sufficient measures to deal with copyright infringement, content material adjacency points, and rampant hate speech, bigotry, bullying, and harassment on the platform. The music firm stated that its request for TikTok to handle these points was met with “indifference, after which with intimidation.”
The corporate went on to state that TikTok tried to “intimidate us into conceding to a nasty deal that undervalues music and shortchanges artists and songwriters in addition to their followers.”
“As our negotiations continued, TikTok tried to bully us into accepting a deal price lower than the earlier deal, far lower than truthful market worth and never reflective of their exponential progress,” the group stated.
In an e mail response Benzinga concerning UMG’s allegations, TikTok stated, “It’s unhappy and disappointing that Common Music Group has put their very own greed above the pursuits of their artists and songwriters. Regardless of Common’s false narrative and rhetoric, the actual fact is that they have chosen to stroll away from the highly effective help of a platform with properly over a billion customers that serves as a free promotional and discovery car for his or her expertise.”
“TikTok has been capable of attain ‘artist-first’ agreements with each different label and writer. Clearly, Common’s self-serving actions will not be in one of the best pursuits of artists, songwriters and followers,” the platform acknowledged.
The short-form video internet hosting service reportedly intends to take away all music licensed by UMG within the coming days, beginning on Jan. 31.
It’s pertinent to notice, in February 2021, UMG celebrated a worldwide settlement with TikTok, asserting that it “delivers equitable compensation for recording artists and songwriters and considerably expands and enhances the businesses’ current relationship, selling the event of recent modern experiences.”
Why It Issues: This dispute between UMG and TikTok arises amidst ongoing issues in regards to the platform’s content material and its security for younger customers. Beforehand, it was reported that investigations have revealed that TikTok’s algorithm exposes younger customers to war-related content material.
In the meantime, authorized motion initiated by Iowa’s legal professional common earlier this month additionally sparked recent debates in regards to the security of the app for kids.
Picture by Eliseu Geisler on Shutterstock
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Disclaimer: This content material was partially produced with the assistance of Benzinga Neuro and was reviewed and printed by Benzinga editors.
