Universal Music announces the removal of its songs from TikTok

Taylor Swift and The Weeknd now absent from TikTok. The world’s largest major in the music industry Universal Music Group (UMG) announced on Tuesday January 30 the withdrawal of its songs from the social network TikTok. The existing contract was set to expire on Wednesday and failed negotiations over issues such as artist and songwriter pay led to the deal not being renewed.

In an open letter, Universal accused TikTok of“trying to build a business based on music, without paying fair value for the music”. In response, the social network published a press release in which it judges “sad and disappointing that Universal Music Group has put its own greed ahead of the interests of its artists”. The agreement between the world leader in musical entertainment and the Chinese application launched in 2016 was concluded in February 2021.

Many disagreements

Among the issues raised during the negotiations were “appropriate compensation” for artists and songwriters, online security for users as well as the protection of artists against the harms of artificial intelligence, adds the UMG letter. But as the negotiations progressed, “TikTok tried to intimidate us into accepting a deal worth less than the previous deal, well below fair market value and not reflecting their exponential growth”underlined the record company.

Although TikTok has a large number of users, it only represents around 1% of Universal’s total revenue, UMG further denounced in its letter. Characterizing these statements as “false”TikTok believes that the record company has “chose to turn away from the powerful support of a platform that has over a billion users and serves as a free promotion and discovery vehicle for their talents”.