Chris Albrecht, cross-posting on Business Week, wonders Will Viral Video Kill the Music Video?
Historically, music videos were promotional vehicles that ran on outlets such as MTV. Big budgets were spent on lavish productions meant to captivate watchers, prodding them into buying the single or album the song was on. But while music videos have proven enormously popular on YouTube, earlier this year the video-sharing giant got embroiled in skirmishes with the record labels and rights holders over costs. The result of all that bickering is Vevo, a forthcoming satellite site founded by YouTube and Universal Music that will showcase—and monetize—music-video traffic.
But what if plain ol’ users prove more adept than the pros?
For examples of adept users he points to the JK Wedding Entrance Dance and Jon Rawlinson’s visit to the Kuroshio Sea (the main tank at the Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium) set to Barcelona’s Please Don’t Go (above). Both videos are credited with a jump in advertising click-through and a boost in sales for the artists.
Says Albrecht:
The lesson here is that if the labels release their iron grip on copyright claims and let the music play, there’s gold (records) in them viral hills.
Of course, if the labels were to learn that lesson, some would say the folks making the videos should get a cut of the music sales profits.