Content Creators Coalition Demands Anti-trust Hearings Into YouTube’s ‘Attempts To Censor Artists’

The Content Creators Coalition is demanding anti-trust hearings before the U.S. House and Senate Judiciary Committees in response to recent reports that Google’s YouTube is requiring all artists that it has production and promotion deals with to sign ‘non-disparagement' agreements.

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Non-profit advocacy group, the Content Creators Coalition (C3) today sent a letter to the leaders of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees and related subcommittees demanding anti-trust hearings over reports that t Google’s YouTube is demanding that its production and promotion deals with artists include a ‘non-disparagement' agreement.

In C3's view, YouTube is leveraging its platform monopoly to censor artists from speaking out about the service’s unfair compensation for artists and the need to update the broken DMCA safe harbors.

The full letter:

The Honorable Chuck Grassley, Chairman
Senate Committee on the Judiciary
224 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510

The Honorable Bob Goodlatte, Chairman
House Committee on the Judiciary
2138 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Chairman Grassley and Chairman Goodlatte:
We write to request that the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, as well as the respective subcommittees with jurisdiction over antitrust issues, schedule hearings in response to reports that Google is leveraging its platform monopoly to silence artists.
Google’s actions are clearly aimed at thwarting the Congressional review of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s safe harbors as well as the public debate about the issue. This not only hurts artists, who aren’t receiving fair compensation for their music from the YouTube platform monopoly, but also leaves consumers with less music as the next generation of artists disappear.
As you know, an unprecedented groundswell of artists have called out Google for gaming outdated laws to facilitate YouTube’s profiteering from rampant music piracy on its service. In filings to the United States Copyright Office, a cross section of music creators argue that the DMCA’s safe harbors are actually “safe havens” that allow platform monopolies to use the ubiquity of unlicensed free music on their services as a cudgel in negotiations to drive down their own licensing costs.
We are deeply troubled by recent reports indicating that “(Google’s) YouTube (service) has asked musicians to agree not to disparage the streaming-video service in exchange for promotional support, according to people familiar with the matter, a way to quell persistent criticism by artists.” Simply put, Google has abused its monopoly power to give artists pennies on the dollar and appears to be further abusing that power to buy the silence of artists who might otherwise speak out and draw public scrutiny to these practices.
This is not the first time Google has resorted to underhanded tactics to thwart a full Congressional and public airing of its abuses. When our organization placed ads on YouTube criticizing its treatment of artists, our ads were censored without explanation. Internal emails give the strong appearance that Google’s influence-purchasing machine successfully ousted Google critics, the Open Markets Initiative (now the independent “Open Markets Institute”), from the New America Foundation.
With jurisdiction over copyright and antitrust laws, the Judiciary Committees are uniquely situated to get to the bottom of these apparent abuses. We ask that you do so swiftly.
Thank you for your consideration of our request.

Sincerely,
Melvin Gibbs, President
John McCrea, Vice President
Tommy Manzi, Treasurer
Rosanne Cash, Vice President At Large
Tift Merritt, Vice President At Large
Matthew Montfort, Vice President At Large

CC: The Honorable Jerry Nadler, Ranking Member, House Committee on the Judiciary
The Honorable Tom Marino, Chairman, House Judiciary Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform, Commercial and Antitrust Law
The Honorable David Cicilline, Ranking Member, House Judiciary Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform, Commercial and Antitrust Law

The Honorable Dianne Feinstein, Ranking Member, Senate Committee on the Judiciary
The Honorable Mike Lee, Chairman, Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights
The Honorable Amy Klobuchar, Ranking Member, Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights