Negotiations between Universal Media Group and TikTok have fallen through — and UMG said it will stop licensing content by its artists to the platform.
TikTok users are accustomed to watching and creating videos set to music from their favorite artists — but that could change starting Jan. 31.
After contract negotiations fell through between the social media platform and Universal Music Group, which produces and distributes music by many top artists, UMG has said it will stop licensing content to TikTok services.
What does that mean for the TikTok user experience? We’re breaking down everything you need to know.
UMG, a company that represents a plethora of mainstream musical artists including Taylor Swift, said in an open letter to the music community published Jan. 30 that its existing agreement with TikTok is expiring Jan. 31 and that contract negotiations had fallen through. It said new negotiations have “three critical issues”:
On the subject of compensation, UMG said “TikTok proposed paying our artists and songwriters at a rate that is a fraction of the rate that similarly situated major social platforms pay.”
“Despite its massive and growing user base, rapidly rising advertising revenue and increasing reliance on music-based content, TikTok accounts for only about 1% of our total revenue,” UMG said.
On the topic of AI, UMG said AI-generated recordings “massively dilute the royalty pool for human artists.” On the safety front, UMG said TikTok has “no meaningful solutions to the rising tide of content adjacency issues, let alone the tidal wave of hate speech, bigotry, bullying and harassment on the platform.” UMG also pointed to other “problematic content,” such as “pornographic deepfakes of artists,” that it said TikTok handles in a “monumentally cumbersome and inefficient process.”
UMG claimed that TikTok “attempted to bully us into accepting a deal worth less than the previous deal, far less than fair market value and not reflective of their exponential growth.”
“How did it try to intimidate us? By selectively removing the music of certain of our developing artists, while keeping on the platform our audience-driving global stars,” the open letter said.
A spokesperson for UMG told NBC News that TikTok is now obligated to delete or mute all UMG music and music associated with Universal Music Publishing Group by end of day on Jan. 31 since no agreement was reached.
