There is no doubting the quality of modern YouTube videos. The everyday content creator can now produce and upload YouTube videos that can compete with many of the professionally produced shows you will see on TV. There has traditionally always been one aspect of their production, however, that has always fallen short, the music. YouTube content creators have always had to avoid playing copyrighted music for fear of having the videos pulled down by the platform. Now, however, this looks set to change as YouTube has announced a new revenue sharing model. Here is what you need to know.
YouTube has announced that it is working on a new feature called Creator Music, which will offer musicians and content creators on the video sharing platform a way to work together.
The Creator Music program will offer YouTube content creators access to a catalog of popular music curated by the video platform. Using any of the tracks available in the catalog will not result in any of the punitive action normally associated with including copyrighted music in YouTube videos such as having your video taken down or demonetized.
To make this possible, YouTube has made agreements with over 50 record labels, publishers, and distributors. Essentially, the deal will see the music rights holders taking home half of the YouTube content creators’ revenue from the videos their tracks are used in.
Although YouTube says the catalog will grow to hundreds of thousands of tracks, at the moment there are no major artists on the list just yet. Also, the feature is currently only being tested in the US, but it is expected to roll out to other countries next year.
In other news, Spotify is currently expanding into offering audiobooks too.
Image via: Billboard
