Indiantelevision.com's Digital Edge: YouTube signs deal with EMI, to share music, videos

Indiantelevision.com's Digital Edge

YouTube signs deal with EMI to share music, videos

Indiantelevision.com Team

(1 June 2007 5:01 pm)

MUMBAI: YouTube users will soon have access to Electronic and Musical Industries Ltd's (EMI Group) audio and video libraries.

In a joint statement on Thursday, Internet search giant Google Inc. and EMI PLC's group EMI music record label announced that that they have agreed to let users of Google-owned video-sharing site access videos and music by EMI artists. Music by David Bowie, Coldplay, Gorillaz, Lily Allen and Norah Jones are part of the collection.

EMI thus has become the fourth major record company after Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group and Sony BMG Entertainment that entered into a content deal with YouTube.

Although the two companies have not yet disclosed any financial details of the deal, but EMI chief executive Eric Nicoli said in a statement that "EMI Music and its artists will be fairly compensated for their work."

As part of the deal, EMI Music will work with YouTube and parent company Google to develop revenue-generating business models. This will enable EMI to track and attach monetary value and control content.

The Youtube-EMI deal comes soon after the copyright lawsuits filed by media companies that accused YouTube of allowing its users to pirate their programmes on the popular video-sharing site.