subject: YouTube Hinderance [print this page] There is a negative factor that Kenyan singers and others worldwide face when storing music on YouTube: The YouTube video can be stolen by thieves.
The situation is worsened by the fact that YouTube's terms of service puts the responsibility of following copyright law on the users. This means that action cannot be taken on YouTube itself, but on the users channeling content, which is very hard to carry out. What is the solution then, for musicians who would also like to make some money from sales of their music yet still would like to have tracks on the network?
There is one solution being worked out by a company called VEVO. VEVO is an online music promotion company, consisting of a group of the biggest music distributors in the United States of America, backed by Arab investors. Their specialty is YouTube videos. They work in tandem with the YouTube company itself to disregard copies of music videos that have been posted without the artist's consent. For example, Soulja Boy is signed with VEVO, Go do a search for a song like 'Gucci Bandana'. There is only one copy of the 'Gucci Bandana' video on YouTube, and it is the one sponsored by VEVO. This way the traffic for 'Gucci Bandana's video is focused to the VEVO channel, and is not scattered like it would have been with many copies of the video lying around. VEVO then monetizes the videos by placing nicely placed advertisements around them.
Personally I think that every continent needs a company like VEVO the copying of Kenyan music off YouTube. There is a saying amongst techpreneurs, that you only put content on the internet if you are ready to share it. Maybe Kenyan musicians could only put videos that they are comfortable sharing on YouTube, then save the rest of the music for exclusive release on the album.
