YouTube Allows Music Videos Again

YouTube has made a deal with copyright holders to allow the service’s viewers in the UK to watch music videos on the site, removing the need for YouTube to remove certain videos for infringement.

Earlier in the year, YouTube moved to block a significant amount of copyrighted content. Now though, thanks to the deal reached with collecting society PRS. The move to block copyrighted content followed the expiration of a previous agreement and the failure to come to a new arrangement. Details of the relationship between YouTube and PRS seem hard to come by. In a post on its UK blog, YouTube outlined the new agreement,

“We work hard to make YouTube a place where existing fans and new audiences can discover their favourite content, whatever it might be … Today we’re pleased to announce that an agreement for a licence has been reached and both PRS for Music and YouTube are happy that the negotiations resulted in a mutually acceptable deal. As a result of the new agreement, premium music videos in the UK are coming back to YouTube.”

If nothing else, it’s good to see company’s coming into line with the idea that a web presence, even if it’s not a phenomenally profitable one, offering free content can be used to drive sales of other content. You can read more about the whole deal between YouTube and PRS over at the YouTube Blog.

Tags: copyright, google, music, music videos, PRS, uk, youtube