British recording artists took a record share of global music sales in 2015, but industry body the British Polyphonic Institute (BPI) is calling on the government to do more to sustain success.
Figures from the BPI's Music Market Review of 2016 show that last year one in every six albums sold around the world, and five of the top ten albums overall, were by British artists, with Adele taking the top spot. In total, UK performers accounted for a record 17.1 per cent of total market share.
The BPI said growth had largely come from audio streaming. The number of plays increased 82 per cent to 27 billion, which was reflected by a 69 per cent rise in income to £146.1 million. Although CD sales are still falling, the rate of decline "softened" to 3.9 per cent. Vinyl sales increased for the eighth consecutive year, passing two million units for the first time since 1994.
The biggest overall growth in music consumption was in video streaming. The number of people getting music from services such as YouTube spiked 88 per cent year-on-year, but this didn't translate to more money for artists.
While the music industry's total revenue grew by 0.6 per cent, the overall amount paid to artists dipped by 0.9 per cent, falling to £688m. The BPI blamed this on "pure ad-supported platforms, in which YouTube is the dominant player". Compared to vinyl, which despite its resurgence still represents less than two per cent of the UK's music consumption, content streamed on YouTube made less money - £24.4m from online video versus £25.1m for the resurgent physical format.
It is, perhaps, easy to see why users are flocking to YouTube for music. Albums and singles not available on the likes of Spotify - such as Adele's all-conquering 25 - are often officially available on YouTube. Even if they're not, as a user-generated content platform, chances are someone has unofficially uploaded them, making YouTube a convenient alternative to piracy via downloading. The BPI claimed user-generated content sites used "loopholes" in EU legislation to create a "value gap" in music – and called on the UK government to intervene.
"The fact that sales revenues dipped in a record year for British music shows clearly that something is fundamentally broken in the music market, so that artists and the labels that invest in them no longer benefit fairly from growing demand," said Geoff Taylor, chief executive of the BPI and BRIT Awards. "Instead, dominant tech platforms like YouTube are able to abuse liability protections as royalty havens, dictating terms so they can grab the value from music for themselves, at the expense of artists." "The long-term consequences of this will be serious, reducing investment in new music, making it difficult for most artists to earn a living, and undermining the growth of more innovative services like Spotify and Apple Music that pay more fairly for the music they use," Taylor warned. "In 2015, UK fans streamed almost twice as many music videos as the year before; tens of billions more views. Yet artists and labels did not benefit from the increased demand for what they created. This is wrong. Music is precious – it's not a commodity to be strip-mined for big data. And as we’ve seen time and again in the digital market, where music goes first, the rest of the content sector will follow. This problem requires urgent action by the EU, and our Government needs to take the lead in making sure it is tackled."
YouTube launched its subscription-based YouTube Red service last October, but is currently only available in the US, Australia and New Zealand. It includes ad-free streaming of music, as well as the ability to download videos for offline viewing. A greater roll-out of the paid service could potentially see revenue paid to artists whose music is available on YouTube increase.
Update, 20/05/2016 @ 18:10:
The BPI has responded to WIRED, with chief executive Geoff Taylor further detailing what the government could do to support British artists. "Government should press the EU to clarify that hosting safe harbours do not apply to services which, like YouTube, curate and market copyright content instead of acting as purely passive hosting platforms," Taylor explains. "This would create a more level playing field for content owners to negotiate fairer royalties. It should also establish a new duty of care on online intermediaries to take reasonable steps to reduce online piracy, so that legitimate online service providers do not continue to provide assistance to the online black market."
Update, 20/05/2015 @ 21:46:
YouTube disputes the BPI's claims, with a spokesperson telling WIRED: "Claims that the DMCA safe harbors are responsible for a 'value gap' for music on YouTube are simply false. For years, the music industry lost millions of dollars as piracy rates soared. Thanks to our rights management system, Content ID, rightsholders have complete control of their music on YouTube and can easily decide whether to have content taken down, or profit from it. Today, revenue from Content ID represents 50 per cent of what we pay out annually. In fact, ad-supported music streaming enables revenue from an audience that has never before paid for music. As more advertising money comes online, this will grow to match consumption. Comparisons to other audio-only, subscription music services are apples to oranges."
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
