The Universal Music Group and TikTok battle: What you need to know

Mar 22

By: Rebecca Sobrevilla

Have you noticed that some of your TikTok posts have been muted? Or that an audio you loved has disappeared? This is due to the fact that Universal Music Group and TikTok recently had a disagreement over the future of their partnership.

Universal Music Group vs TikTok: Why are they in a disagreement?

As Universal Music Group and Tiktok’s licensing agreement was nearing its expiration, negotiations for a renewal were put in place. UMG was dissatisfied with TikTok’s mistreatment towards their artists. Poor compensation, the lack of protecting rights and interests due to the prominence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) were concerns expressed by UMG in hopes that TikTok would help resolve them. According to a statement made by UMG: “As our negotiations continued, TikTok attempted to bully us into accepting a deal worth less than the previous deal, far less than fair market value and not reflective of their exponential growth.”.

On January 30th 2024, Universal Music Group released an open letter to the artist and songwriter community, commenting on why they decided to pull their catalog from TikTok:

“With respect to the issue of artist and songwriter compensation, TikTok proposed paying our artists and songwriters at a rate that is a fraction of the rate that similarly situated major social platforms pay. Today, as an indication of how little TikTok compensates artists and songwriters, despite its massive and growing user base, rapidly rising advertising revenue and increasing reliance on music-based content, TikTok accounts for only about 1% of our total revenue. Ultimately TikTok is trying to build a music-based business, without paying fair value for the music.”.

TikTok also released a statement on January 30th, 2024 expressing their stance on this situation:

“It is sad and disappointing that Universal Music Group has put their own greed above the interests of their artists and songwriters. Despite Universal's false narrative and rhetoric, the fact is they have chosen to walk away from the powerful support of a platform with well over a billion users that serves as a free promotional and discovery vehicle for their talent.”.

UMG officially pulled their catalog from TikTok’s platform on February 1st, 2024. This included 21 out of the 50 tracks on Billboard's Top 50 chart.

To read their full statements, head over to the Universal Music Group and Tik Tok website.

How is this situation negatively impacting artists and fans?

A lot of artists have been affected by the TikTok and UMG battle. Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Drake and Ariana Grande are some of the many musicians whose music has been removed from TikTok’s platform. Artist-songwriters like Harry Styles and Bad Bunny have been affected by this situation as well. Even though their music has been released on a non-UMG label, they are songwriters under Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG) and have also been impacted.

TikTok has over 1 billion monthly users, which helps boost streams and sales for songs that are being posted to their platform. While this doesn’t greatly affect A-list and mainstream musicians, smaller indie-artists under UMG are negatively impacted.

Up and coming artists heavily rely on using TikTok for marketing tactics. Record labels often encourage their artists to post their music to this platform to help gain traction and more popularity. With these artists' music being removed from such a huge platform, they are now facing roadblocks on finding new ways to promote their music. Some artists affected went as far as pushing back releases of their songs because of these circumstances. A few rising artists who have been affected by this situation are Ella Jane, Aidan Bissett and Dylan. These artists, and many more, have posted to TikTok and other social media platforms sharing their frustrations on this issue. Some have even argued that TikTok has done more for their careers than UMG ever had.

Many fans have also been upset with this decision. Fan favorite artists have songs that are used as trending audios and in edits. The use of these songs have been limited and muted on pre-existing videos. When asking some fans how they felt about this situation, several individuals disagreed with UMG’s side. Autumn G from Turlock, CA says: “If I want to look back at videos I posted that used one of my favorite artists' songs/sounds (Taylor & Harry), they are now muted and it’s really sad and frustrating to see after putting in the effort to film and edit the videos”. Daniella G from Yucaipa, CA says: “UMG taking off their artists' music has affected us because we aren’t able to watch or use our favorite songs on videos anymore.”.

Why Universal Music Group made the right decision

Although there are some downsides to this situation, UMG ultimately removed their artists’ music from TikTok for a reason. It is important to advocate for our favorite artists and protect them from harm. Especially with the introduction of AI, TikTok’s platform is encouraging the use of it. Overall, this has challenged user safety and is replacing human-artists’ hard work and interests.

Music is one of the driving forces that keeps platforms like TikTok relevant and popular globally. TikTok is essentially using artists' music to keep their app running, and in return pays them very poorly. While TikTok has called UMG “greedy” because of this case, the artists are ultimately the ones who will now be benefiting the most.

Several other music labels and organizations have supported UMG’s decision and have called for music industry professionals to re-evaluate their engagement with platforms such as TikTok.

There have also been fans who understand UMG’s motives and support them. Abbey S from Modesto, CA says: “I would say TikTok has been complicit in the spread of AI images and video for a few months now, causing discomfort and harm to artists so it’s not surprising that a major record label decided to take action against them”. She adds: “Of course I’m a little sad that my videos with Harry and Taylor songs, etc., are all muted, however artists deserve fair treatment and to feel protected by their label.”

What are your thoughts on the Universal Music Group and TikTok battle?