Via Alan Jacobs, here’s Henry Porter in the Guardian warning about the vast evil perpetrated on the unwary by Google:
Google presents a far greater threat to the livelihood of individuals and the future of commercial institutions important to the community. One case emerged last week when a letter from Billy Bragg, Robin Gibb and other songwriters was published in the Times explaining that Google was playing very rough with those who appeared on its subsidiary, YouTube. When the Performing Rights Society demanded more money for music videos streamed from the website, Google reacted by refusing to pay the requested 0.22p per play and took down the videos of the artists concerned.
It does this with impunity because it is dominant worldwide and knows the songwriters have nowhere else to go. Google is the portal to a massive audience: you comply with its terms or feel the weight of its boot on your windpipe.
Its boot on your windpipe! Because of a commercial disagreement with another enormous industry over the acceptable size of royalty payments!
Whatever. But what I’m really curious about is whether the PRS really thinks it can get 30 cents per play for YouTube music videos. At a guess, that sounds too high by a factor of ten or a hundred. What are they thinking?
