Jake Shimabukuro and the YouTube effect
Posted on Thursday, February 15th, 2007 at 12:44 am. #
I saw this first last year, but for some reason it’s popped up again on Digg’s front page. Click ‘play’, wait for him to finish wittering, and then continue reading this article to the accompaniment of some fine guitar-playing.
There are a number of things interesting about this. First: this is copyright material (the publisher is Northern Songs, the composer Harrison); and, as of writing, it’s still impossible to buy the original version of this (or the superiour version on the ‘Love’ album) on the internet. So, just like most YouTube videos, this contains a copyrighted work – and a payment is required for this use (just like payments are required if bands perform live cover versions in significant venues). I’m prepared to bet that YouTube has made no such payment.
Secondly, this video was posted by YouTube user ‘strewth’; but also by ‘darkrift97′. So, not only is this music being used illegally, but it’s clear that at least one of these users has copied the video and uploaded a copy of it onto YouTube; and it’s therefore doubtful that this has been done with consent. Indeed, Shimabukuro owns only the rights in his performance but not in the composition, so he has no right to authorise upload anyway. It would appear to actually be taken from this website.
But third: this video has been watched a total of 560,000 times on YouTube – at least – at the time of writing.
It was uploaded exactly a year ago, on February 15th 2006. It’s been watched, on average, 10,769 times every week since it was uploaded.
To put that into context, here are some more numbers…
1. Eric Prydz made #1 in the UK singles chart with less than 2,400 copies sold in a week.
2. British artists get played 8,365 times every week on all German radio stations
3. In the UK, 3.1m albums are sold every week, and 282,000 physical singles are sold every week.
Of course, we’re comparing apples with pears here; but 560,000 views of this video is an incredible number. I suspect you need to pay for a song for it to be in the charts, but however this works, it’s an amazing amount of usage.
The only sad thing is that neither Jake, nor the writers and publishers, have got any monetary benefit from the 560,000 individual uses of this video. The money’s just gone to line YouTube’s pockets. Which apparently is somehow fair…
Not to nit pick but as confirmed by your cited source, the Eric Prydz single famously sold its low point of 24,000 copies to top the charts one week. Still a low figure compared to the past, but slightly more impressive than the 2,400 that you quote. And still less than the audience size for the youtube clip.
On a more relevant note, you can find stuff on youtube that isn’t available in any form anywhere else which is just as valuable. At the weekend my father wanted to know if I could find a copy of the old skiffle track “Freight Train” as sung by Nancy Whiskey and Chas McDevitt. You can’t get the track on any of the legit download services and even the wonderful allofmp3 doesn’t have a copy. Search youtube however and you can find a clip taken from the 1957 movie The Tommy Steele story. To the delight of my father.