BigShinyThing

We’ve said before that the corporations and content owners who will survive in the convergence age are the ones that set their content free to proliferate. Warner Music have today demonstrated that they utterly understand this. As Warner proudly exclaim on their press release:

Warner Music Group becomes the first media company to embrace power of user-generated content. YouTube to deliver innovative new architecture to help media companies harness the financial potential of user-generated content.

What Warner have done is hand over all their entire library of music videos as well as behind-the-scenes footage, artist interviews, original programming and other formerly proprietary content. In doing this Warner have given YouTube users creative carte blanche with both the footage and their music catalogue to remix, mess up and distribute as they please. WMG has thus become the first music company to exploit YouTube as a distribution channel — as the press release goes on to state:

More importantly, [Warner] becomes the first global media company to broadly embrace the power and creativity of user-generated content through a wide-ranging agreement with the category leader, enabling its artists to connect with a vast new audience in an entirely new way.

So far so thrilling. But how (I hear WPP, Viacom, Fox et al cry) does anyone — the artists, Warner, YouTube — plan to make money out of this? Here’s the science bit:

WMG will have the opportunity to authorize the use of its content by the YouTube community by taking advantage of YouTube’s advanced content identification and royalty reporting system, set for release by the end of the year. YouTube and WMG will share revenue from advertising both on WMG’s music videos and user uploaded videos that incorporate audio and audiovisual works from WMG’s catalogue. WMG’s music video library and special artist content will be made available simultaneously with the launch of YouTube’s content identification and royalty reporting system.

Some guy who runs the company, with a nice turn of phrase which we plan to nick, adds:

Technology is changing entertainment, and Warner Music is embracing that innovation. Consumer-empowering destinations like YouTube have created a two-way dialogue that will transform entertainment and media forever. As user-generated content becomes more prevalent, this kind of partnership will allow music fans to celebrate the music of their favourite artists, enable artists to reach consumers in new ways, and ensure that copyright holders and artists are fairly compensated.

We wish Microsoft and Viacom all the best in playing catch up.