#10 – Copyright

I understand copyright, I really do. I understand the importance of an artist or creator protecting their intellectual property and creative endeavour. The performing rights and mechanical rights agencies are there to ensure each recording artist and songwriter is properly compensated for their works. This is fair and proper.

I also understand fully that I don’t own the copyright of most of the music I use on the channel. Nor does a radio station. Or TV channel. Or a thousand other outlets. They all pay a fee to performing rights agents to have the rights to use and broadcast music. In the UK, the main one is literally called PRS (Performing Rights Society). I am a member. I have received the princely sum of £15 in a little over 10 years for the use of my own music by other people. When I started the YouTube channel I tried to pay PRS to have a licence to use music in my videos – the licence covers internet use worldwide but crucially NOT YouTube. This is a right pain in the proverbial….

Of course I don’t mind an artist receiving recompense for their work. In fact I advocate meaningful and fair compensation. How would an artist ever be able to make a living and generate income without this fundamental exchange of payment for goods received? We pay and expect to pay for everything else in life, so with something as life affirming, human and positive as music of course there should be payment. But… there are a number of things that bother me about how copyright works, especially on YouTube.

An artist releases a new track into the world. It is released on all the streaming services, download sites and via physical media. It will have an official release on YouTube. The song is pretty popular, and generates millions of plays. There will inevitably be a decline in plays over time. In the first few days or weeks, a steep and sharp upward curve will be followed by a levelling out and in due course a downward slope. That song has now had its moment and the artist has collected as much as they could realistically expect. A year or two later, or in my case 40, a YouTuber plays this song to their own audience. This isn’t stealing. This is breathing life and awareness into older songs, bringing them out of the shadows and in some cases giving them CPR! And what is the response of the publisher? Monetise that video and extract every last cent from the views they didn’t generate. The fact that a creator has spent hours and money buying the music, recording the video and broadcasting to an overwhelmingly receptive audience, generating new sales, plays and fans is irrelevant to them.

Now, I’m not asking to have the sole income from using that piece of music, but I’d like to be able to have a percentage of the advertising revenue that I have generated. My channel has had 4.3 million views with a watch time of over 469,000 hours. The advertising income I’ve generated could be up to £25,000. I say could be because I don’t actually know and have never seen that number. It slips away into the ether and is divvied up between the copyright holder and YouTube. Ah yes…. YouTube. While they are vocal and seen to be very much on the publishers’ side, they would be in trouble if reaction channels just all stopped. YouTube makes a lot of money out of its creators.

The other BIG problem is creators’ content being BLOCKED. Why would ANY rights holder of music NOT want it to be heard? We’re already not getting any money for it so it’s not that as a reason. Why? It makes no sense and the lack of consistency across the board is frustrating to say the least.

YouTube is wholly on the side of the record labels and publishers. They have a stranglehold over everything that the reaction community might try to do. It is so stupid because we create buzz, excitement, interest and ultimately sales for the artists, labels and publishers. My channel has become a regular stop for a lot of people wanting to find new music. I’m so proud of that and what we’re achieved, but the behaviour of the music establishment is out of step.

It makes no difference as I don’t expect this carries any weight, but I’d like to see a much fairer playing field. Radio doesn’t have the same reach as it did 10, 20, 30 or more years ago, while playlists and algorithms feel impersonal and without soul. I would argue that a music reaction channel is wholly about the music, rather that using it incidentally as background music for a mountain bike video or TikTok short. We are bringing the music to the attention of the audience. We are promoting this music. we are shouting its virtues from the rooftops. Why are you trying to inhibit us?

This is why so many channels have embraced external monetising techniques: Patreon, Buy Me A Coffee, sponsorships. We need to invest in our channels to keep making content. We need to earn livings. We keep doing it because we love music, and it’s certainly not because we want to get rich.