RIAA-Led Coalition Launches DMCA Section 512 Revamp Campaign Criticizing YouTube
Music industry entities' Thursday launch of ValuetheMusic.com appears aimed at influencing simultaneous examinations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's Section 512 on Capitol Hill, at the Copyright Office and the EU, lawyers and lobbyists said in interviews. The RIAA-led website directly criticizes Google-owned YouTube's use of Section 512's safe harbor provisions at a time when Google is under fire for its placement of advertising next to objectionable content (see 1703240004).
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“Companies like YouTube continue to hide behind these dial-up era laws, profiting by selling ads to viewers who come for these illegal streams, and unfairly shortchanging artists in the process,” the music industry officials said on ValuetheMusic.com. “These companies are not just passively ‘hosting’ unlicensed material anymore -- they are actively profiting from it.” The other 15 entities that are leading the website include the National Music Publishers Association, The Recording Academy, SoundExchange and the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers.
RIAA CEO Cary Sherman announced ValuetheMusic.com's launch on Medium and criticized YouTube's effect on streaming royalty revenue. He lauded RIAA's report that overall U.S. music revenue grew more than 11 percent in 2016 after years of decline and stagnation. “The unfortunate reality is that we have achieved this modest success in spite of our current music licensing and copyright laws, not because of them,” Sherman said. “It makes no sense that it takes a thousand on-demand streams of a song for creators to earn $1 on YouTube, while services like Apple and Spotify pay creators $7 or more for those same streams.” Platforms like YouTube use “legal loopholes to pay creators at rates well below the true value of music while other digital services -- including many new and small innovators -- cannot,” he said.
“The timing of this new campaign is ironic” given RIAA's report on the U.S. music industry's 2016 growth, said Digital Media Association General Counsel Greg Barnes. That report “properly credited the rise in income to online music streaming” but the industry is saying “it's still not enough,” he said. “Policymakers are not likely to be fooled.” Google didn't comment.
The ValuetheMusic.com campaign appears to be the “crescendo” of the music industry's yearslong effort to raise awareness about the “value gap” generated by YouTube and other platforms, said music industry attorney Chris Castle. It appears timed to return the issue to the spotlight as House Judiciary members begin to finalize and file music licensing legislation, Castle said. House IP Subcommittee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., appears likely to bow music licensing legislation as soon as this week, said Castle and other lobbyists. House IP ranking member Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., and House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., refiled their Fair Play Fair Pay Act Thursday, which would require most terrestrial radio stations to begin paying performance royalties (see 1703300064). Blackburn and other lawmakers indicated they're also working on other music licensing bills (see 1703030059). The campaign may also be aimed at the Copyright Office, which is still considering stakeholders' comments on its study of Section 512's safe harbors and notice-and-takedown framework (see 1702210059 and 1702220070), Castle said.
The campaign appears to also be targeted at promoting the European Parliament's consideration of the European Commission's proposed copyright directive for the digital single market, said a tech sector lobbyist. The proposal currently under consideration contains language that would require YouTube and other platforms that feature user-generated content to filter uploads for instances of copyright infringement. “The music industry appears to be generating additional resources to try and persuade EU and U.S. lawmakers,” the lobbyist said.
“It doesn't hurt” that the music industry's campaign is launching in the midst of the Google advertising “debacle,” Castle said. “If there was ever anything that pointed out what's going on with YouTube and have people understand it, it's this.” Lawmakers “are pissed,” he said: “You won't find a better moment” to publicize issues with Google.