Taylor Swift, Drake, and More Music May Exit TikTok as UMG Licensing Deal Nears End

UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP — the recording giant for superstar artists including Taylor Swift, Drake, Olivia Rodrigo, Kendrick Lamar, and Billie Eilish — has issued a stern warning that it will yank its music from TikTok if the companies can’t reach agreement on a new licensing deal.

In an open letter posted online Tuesday evening, the world’s largest music company said its current contract with TikTok was set to expire Wednesday and that the social media platform owned by Chinese company ByteDance was responding with “indifference” or “intimidation” on three important issues: “appropriate compensation for our artists and songwriters, protecting human artists from the harmful effects of AI, and online safety for TikTok’s users.” UMG said that without a new deal in place after Jan. 31, it will cease licensing content to TikTok and TikTok Music services.

“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,” the open letter read.