There has been an interesting new development regarding music on YouTube in Germany where, of course, the Google-owned video website recently withdrew premium music video content after failing to renew its license with song royalty collecting society GEMA in a dispute that mirrors that with PRS For Music over here.
Sarah Brightman collaborator and composer Frank Peterson, who owns, publishes and releases much of his own music, has confirmed he is taking his own legal action over the presence of his content on the video site, issuing a cease and desist and claiming damages via the Higher District Court in Hamburg. The action seems to focus in particular on the use of his music in user generated content, ie soundtracking home made videos.
As a result, this action is unrelated to the YouTube/GEMA dispute because, while Peterson is a member of the collecting society, they don't represent him with regard to syncronisation and adaptation rights, which are the rights infringed when DIY video makers use his content as a soundtrack, or cover one of his pieces. So even if YouTube do secure a new licensing deal with GEMA, it wouldn't cover the use of Peterson's music in UCG.
There are parallels between this case and the YouTube/MTV litigation still working its way through the US legal system.
Google haven't as yet responded to Peterson's lawsuit, but will presumably point out that if a content owner with whom YouTube has no licensing arrangement alerts them to the unlicensed use of their content in a video on their site then they will remove it.
Google claim that, under US copyright law, that means they are acting legally, even if they are actively hosting infringing content for a time, though there is much disagreement in US legal circles as to whether or not that is a correct interpretation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
MTV argue that it is unfair that they should have to cover the potentially considerable cost of monitoring YouTube uploads to spot infringement of their content, when its Google who financially benefit for the presence of infringing content between upload and takedown (from ad revenues the content may or may not generate).
Similar cases already heard in the US courts generally suggest judges may well side with Google's interpretation of US copyright laws, though YouTube v MTV could still prove to be a landmark case either way.
None of which informs us as to whether Peterson has a case under German copyright law, but his legal reps say that other songwriters are currently talking to them about taking similar action, so if he has it could open the floodgates in Germany that at the very least would force Google to introduce much stricter upload restrictions for user generated content in the country.
Billboard spoke to the owner of a Hamburg-based publishing company, Progressive Musikverlag's Rudy Holzhauer, who says he shares Peterson's concerns. He told the trade mag: "It is simply not acceptable that the user alone decides and Google/YouTube is tolerating everybody can use any kind of music without asking. Some producers requested to make cover versions of our songs, but refrained to do so after realizing how many videos of the songs already existed for free on YouTube. We stopped those versions, but you just cannot stop hundreds of YouTube ".