Copyright dispute: 4 million songs on TikTok may be removed

The app had already muted songs by artists signed to the record label, but now it must do the same for songwriters.

Following the expiration of the contract between TikTok and Universal Music Group (UMG) at the beginning of February, no new agreement was signed, and music by artists affiliated with the UMG label, such as Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande, Billie Eilish, and Harry Styles, was removed from TikTok videos due to copyright issues.

Due to the current dispute, TikTok says that nearly 30 percent of what it calls popular songs could be removed from the platform.

THE 'SPLIT COPYRIGHT' PROBLEM

According to a report in Artı Gerçek, some industry estimates suggest that up to 80 percent of all music on TikTok could be muted.

It is stated that split copyrights will cause this situation.

WHAT HAPPENED?

Universal's music was licensed to TikTok until the beginning of this year. However, after failing to reach an agreement on how much the app should pay artists, they allowed the license to expire.

As a result, the record label's recording catalog of approximately three million songs was removed at the beginning of February.

SONGS ARE LEAVING THE PLATFORM

The publishing catalog agreement expires at the end of next week, which means another four million songs are expected to be pulled from the platform.

UMG says that despite having more than a billion users, only 1 percent of their total revenue comes from the platform, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance.

Artists under UMG include the following:

• Drake
• The Beatles
• Blackpink
• Frank Sinatra
• Nirvana
• Queen
• Rammstein
• The Weeknd
• The Rolling Stones
• Elton John
• Eminem
• Lady Gaga
• Billie Eilish
• Justin Bieber
• Ariana Grande
• Kanye West
• Katy Perry
• Shawn Mendes
• Metallica
• Selena Gomez
• Kendrick Lamar
• Sam Smith
• Andrea Bocelli
• Rihanna
• Post Malone
• Taylor Swift
• Amy Winehouse