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Spotify subscribers in 97 countries will no longer have to leave the app to watch their favorite artists’ music videos, the company announced on Tuesday (Oct. 15). The beta test, which started earlier this year in around a dozen countries — including the U.K., Germany, Brazil and Colombia — will also expand to South Korea […]
YouTube and SESAC have settled their rate dispute, meaning the performance rights organization’s catalog will soon be back up on the YouTube platform, according to representatives from both sides.
“We are pleased that SESAC reconsidered our offer,” a YouTube representative said in a statement. “We’ve reached a deal and content will come back shortly. We appreciate everyone’s patience during this time.”
SESAC executives also say they are pleased with the deal. “We have reached an agreement with YouTube to equitably compensate SESAC’s songwriters and publishers for the use of their music,” SESAC Performing Rights president/COO Scott Jungmichel said in a statement. “We appreciate the support and patience of our affiliates, as well as the artists who perform those songs. During our negotiations with YouTube, our affiliates’ works were unilaterally removed by YouTube ahead of the contract end date of October 1, 2024. YouTube has begun the process of reinstating videos featuring these songs.”
The deal was struck after YouTube pulled down a portion of SESAC’s repertoire, including songs from the likes of Bob Dylan, Adele, R.E.M., Green Day and Zac Brown, among others. When YouTube users wanted to play a video containing music from artists signed to SESAC, they were greeted with a message stating, “This video contains content from SESAC. It is not available in your country.”
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Artists and songwriters including J Cole, Sam Smith and Kanye West who are not signed to SESAC also had songs taken down due to having credited co-writers who were signed with the PRO. In addition, sources say, even some SESAC songwriters whose publishers have direct deals with YouTube had their songs taken down.
The YouTube representative indicates it will take a day or two for everything to go back up online. As it is, some videos still have the “is not available in your country” notice, while other songs by songwriters signed to SESAC are once again available on the service. Apparently, YouTube was still in the process of removing videos when the deal was struck, so while some notable SESAC songs were taken down over the weekend, other songs by the same artists, and even songs on the same album, were still available.
According to sources, YouTube global head of music Lyor Cohen was making phone calls at the end of last week to managers, labels and publishers, warning them that the takedown was coming. When executives who received the calls asked why the music was taken down, Cohen apparently answered that YouTube and SESAC were too far apart in negotiating the rate.
Meanwhile, other industry sources say they heard that an agreement was reached in principle on Saturday morning (Sept. 28), before YouTube started heavily pulling down SESAC songs.
Until YouTube and performing rights organization SESAC reach an agreement on renewal terms of their expiring contract, consumers might find many of their favorite songs unplayable on the video streaming service.
Some (but not all) songs by artists including Adele, Mariah Carey, Bob Dylan, Green Day, Kendrick Lamar, Nirvana and R.E.M. were among those unavailable on YouTube over the weekend, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
At press time Sunday night (Sept. 29), Billboard can confirm hits like Adele’s “Hello” and “Someone Like You,” and R.E.M.’s “Losing My Religion,” as just a few examples of music videos that remain unplayable on YouTube while its licensing deal with SESAC remains unsettled. When the page loads, an error message appears in place of a music video preview. The message reads, “Video unavailable. This video contains content from SESAC. It is not available in your country.”
In a statement sent to Billboard, a YouTube spokesperson wrote, “We have held good faith negotiations with SESAC to renew our existing deal. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we were unable to reach an equitable agreement before its expiration. We take copyright very seriously and as a result, content represented by SESAC is no longer available on YouTube in the US. We are in active conversations with SESAC and are hoping to reach a new deal as soon as possible.”
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Billboard reached out to SESAC but did not receive a response on Sunday.
SESAC, which licenses the public performance of more than 1.5 million songs, collects royalties and helps protect copyrights on behalf of thousands of songwriters and publishers in the U.S.
As THR points out, YouTube customer service has been addressing users’ frustrations in responses on X (formerly Twitter). On the TeamYouTube account, replies to complaints have read, “Our music license agreement with SESAC has expired without an agreement on renewal conditions despite our best efforts. For this reason, we have blocked content on YouTube in the US known to be associated with SESAC – as in line with copyright law … We understand this is a difficult situation and our teams continue to work on reaching a renewal agreement.”
A-ha’s chart-topping hit, “Take on Me” reached two billion YouTube views this week, marking the first song released in that decade to achieve this milestone. The Norwegian trio — Magne Furuholmen, Morten Harket and Paul Waaktaar-Savoy, who were 22, 26 and 24, respectively at the time — released their debut album, Hunting High and Low, in […]
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Candace Owens shared that her YouTube channel has been suspended due to antisemitic comments made by Ye aka Kanye West last month.
On Monday (September 9), conservative media personality Candace Owens shared that YouTube shut down her channel for seven days. She stated that an appearance by Ye aka Kanye West on her show in August was the reason for it. “There will be no show today, or at all this week. That’s because @YouTube has issued me a strike and a one-week suspension for my sit-down with Kanye. They also removed the interview as “hate speech”, as it was mass reported by Zionists. Their tactics never change,” she wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter. She also shared screenshots of the messages she received from YouTube.
https://twitter.com/RealCandaceO/status/1833550415171932214
The comment in question was Ye claiming that Jewish people control the media.” Owens felt that a recent discussion that she had with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach on Piers Morgan’s show led to the suspension and demonetization of her channel. The channel currently has 2.4 million followers. “The world knows why I am being targeted and frankly, I have never felt more confident that I am the right person for this to happen,” she added in another post on X.
“Thus far, I have had zero strikes on my @YouTubeCreators account,” she said, continuing: “I have now been inundated with 3 back-to-back content hits within minutes, plus an email that I am now fully demonetized. We all know exactly who is behind this and why.” The suspension is a blow to Owens, who was fired by The Daily Wire after a public feud with co-founder Ben Shapiro over Israel and antisemitism.
A spokesperson for YouTube confirmed the suspension to the New York Post. “We’ve suspended channels associated with Candace Owens from the YouTube Partner Program following repeated violations of our policies, including our Advertiser-Friendly Guidelines and Community Guidelines,” Jack Malon said in a statement. The statement went on to say that she would no longer be able to make money from the platform, but creators would be able to reapply in 90 days.
Maroon 5 and Cardi B‘s cameo-stuffed 2018 video for “Girls Like You (Volume 2)” has reached the billion views mark on YouTube. The female empowerment anthem and fifth single from the band’s fifth album, 2017’s Red Pill Blues, got a bonus-edition visual in May 2018 with Cardi slotted-in midway through for a verse about her her come up from stripper to world-beating rap superstar.
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The ascension to the billie club for the Vol. 2 version of the tune marks the fifth time both M5 and Cardi have landed billion view music videos on YouTube.
The original video for Billboard Music Award-winning song — which spent seven weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and 33 weeks in the top 10 — has racked up more than 3.6 billion views to date. That David Dobkin-directed clip found the camera swinging in a circle around M5 singer Adam Levine as a series of famous female singers, comedians, athletes, activists, politicians, actresses and models materialized behind the vocalist and danced along to the bouncy pop tune.
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Among the stars popping in were: Camilla Cabello, Phoebe Robinson, Aly Raisman, SarahSilverman, Gal Gadot, Lilly Singh, Amani al-Khatahtbeh, Trace Lysette, Tiffany Haddish, Angy Rivera, Franchesca Ramsey, Millie Bobby Brown, Ellen DeGeneres, Jennifer Lopez, Chloe Kim, Alex Morgan, Mary J. Blige, Beanie Feldstein, Jackie Fielder, Danica Patrick, Ilhan Omar, Elizabeth Banks, Ashley Graham and Rita Ora, as well as Levine’s wife, model Behati Prinsloo and their daughter, Dusty Rose.
In addition to dancing and lip synching along to the tune, a number of the women in the clip rock message T-shirts with pointed social messages, including immigration activist Rivera’s “Undocumented Unafraid Unapologetic” one, as well as U.S. gymnast Raisman’s “Always Speak You Truth” shirt and activist Fielder’s “Divest, Water Is Life” top.
Watch the “Girls Like You (Volume 2)” video below.
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BLACKPINK have two billion reasons to celebrate this week after the video for their 2019 No. 41 Billboard Hot 100 hit “Kill This Love” became the K-pop girl group’s second visual to cross the double billion mark. Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news “Kill This Love” now […]
Kesha fans were sent for a loop on Sunday (Aug. 18) after claims that the “Eat the Acid” singer’s name was removed from the video credits of Pitbull‘s 2013 hit “Timber.” According to screenshots posted on Reddit of what appeared to be the altered credentials for the visual for the single from Mr. Worldwide’s Meltdown […]
Susan Wojcicki, a pioneering tech executive who helped shape Google and YouTube, has died, her husband said. She was 56.
Wojcicki played a key role in Google’s creation and served nine years as YouTube’s CEO, stepping down last year to focus on her “family, health, and personal projects I’m passionate about,” she said at the time.
She was one of the most respected female executives in the male-dominated tech industry.
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Her collaboration with Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin began shortly after they incorporated their search engine into a business in 1998. Wojcicki rented the garage of her Menlo Park, California, home to them for $1,700 a month, cementing a formative partnership. Page and Brin — both 25 at the time — continued to refine their search engine in Wojcicki’s garage for five months before moving Google into a more formal office and later persuaded their former landlord to come work for their company.
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Wojcicki joined Google, now known as Alphabet, as its marketing manager in 1999 and served in various positions as Google grew its online advertising presence by acquiring YouTube in 2006 and DoubleClick in 2008. She served as Google’s senior vice president of advertising and commerce from 2011 to early 2014 and CEO of YouTube from 2014 to 2023.
“Her loss is devastating for all of us who know and love her, for the thousands of Googlers she led over the years, and for millions of people all over the world who looked up to her, benefited from her advocacy and leadership, and felt the impact of the incredible things she created at Google, YouTube, and beyond,” Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in a note to employees.
Former Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, who was vice president of Google’s sales and operations from 2001 to 2008 before decamping to Facebook, said in a Facebook post that Wojcicki was formative in her tech career.
“She taught me the business and helped me navigate a growing, fairly chaotic organization at the beginning of my career in tech,” Sandberg wrote. “She was the person I turned to for advice over and over again. And she was this person for so many others too.”
Her husband, Dennis Troper, announced her death in a social media post late Friday.
“My beloved wife of 26 years and mother to our five children left us today after 2 years of living with non small cell lung cancer,” he wrote.
“Susan was not just my best friend and partner in life, but a brilliant mind, a loving mother, and a dear friend to many,” Troper said.
No other details of her death were immediately provided.
Wojcicki and Troper’s 19-year-old son, Marco Troper, died in February at the UC Berkeley campus where he resided as a freshman student.
Ahead of the release of his highly awaited studio album Rayo, J Balvin continues to crown YouTube’s Billion Views Club as the artist with the most titles in the coveted club. He has a total of 15 music clips with more than 1 billion views, at time of publishing, and surpasses previous titleholders such as Ozuna and Justin Bieber.
The Colombian artist’s most recent BVC entry is his collaboration on Tainy’s “Agua,” part of the 2020 The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run movie soundtrack. The next visual clip that’s closest to the 1 billion mark is “Sensualidad” with Bad Bunny and Prince Royce (currently at 930 million views).
In 2023, Balvin reclaimed his crown as the artist with the most videos in YouTube’s Billion Views Club, climbing to the top with the entry of David Guetta’s 2018 “Say My Name,” in collaboration with Bebe Rexha and Balvin.
“With the move, Balvin breaks a three-way tie with Bad Bunny and Ozuna for the artist with the most entries in the Billion Views Club as a lead, featured artist or collaborator,” according to former press release. At that time, “Say My Name” marked the French DJ’s fifth title with more than one billion views, as well as Rexha’s third entry, and Balvin’s 14th entry.
The artist born José Álvaro Osorio Balvin made his comeback in early 2023 after a nearly 10-month hiatus from social media and creating music.
“Really right now, I’ve been focused on my family,” he previously told Billboard about his break. “I left social media to be connected to my reality and to my family. That has taught me a lot — to live more in the present. Obviously, I miss my fans, but when the time is right, I’ll be back.”
Balvin’s sixth studio album, Rayo, is set to drop Aug. 9, following his sets La Familia (2013), Energía (2016), Vibras (2018), Colores (2020), and José (2021).
In celebration of his new set, Billboard spotlights all of his music videos in the coveted BVC, below:
“Mi Gente,” J Balvin & Willy William