GEMA loses lawsuit against YouTube

German performing rights association GEMA has lost its lawsuit against YouTube today.

GEMA sought royalties from the video-streaming juggernaut on their artists’ music videos, on a per-play basis.

The Munich District Court rejected GEMA’s demand that YouTube pay 0.375 euro cents ($0.004) each time users viewed music videos represented by the German company. In their claim, GEMA selected a sample of 1,000 videos amounting to approximately 1.6 million euros in royalties. YouTube responded by stating that the site had over 1 billion users worldwide, with 300 hours of content uploaded per minute. Based on this argument, the judges ruled that YouTube is not directly responsible for its user-generated content and is therefore not liable for any copyright infringement by its users.

Both parties have differing views on how royalties ought to be calculated. While GEMA insists on a pay-per-play royalty basis, YouTube wants to draw focus on the potential of advertising income.

While YouTube has secured agreements with several European music sectors, negotiations with GEMA have remained unsuccessful. As a result, many videos on YouTube are blocked for German users, as they contain content owned by GEMA.

Last February, YouTube was ordered to remove the blocking messages that were worded in a way that blamed GEMA for the thousands of videos made unavailable due to copyright grounds.

GEMA and YouTube have been in legal disputes since 2009, after both parties were unable to negotiate the renewal of an existing license agreement. In May 2010, GEMA announced that they were seeking compensation and the matter would be going to court. YouTube and GEMA are still in the midst of several legal battles in various courthouses, with a ruling from Hamburg’s Higher Regional Court expected this Thursday.

Founded in 1933, GEMA administers the rights of over 65,000 composers, recording artists, songwriters and publishers. In September 2014, GEMA launched a pan-European licensing shop with Sony/ATV and PRS.