NEW YORK, NY. (Top40 Charts/ Last.fm) - Universal
Music Group, the world's leading music company, and Last.fm, the fast-growing free global music Web site, today announced a new partnership that will make UMG's music video catalogue available for free-on-demand streaming to users of Last.fm. The deal, which marks Last.fm's first major video partnership, will bring thousands of high-quality music videos to the Last.fm community. As part of this agreement, Universal
Music and its artists will receive revenue for every UMG video streamed.
Starting today, Last.fm users will be able to view thousands of full-length music videos from UMG's market-leading catalogue of chart-topping artists, which includes Jay-Z, Nirvana, Amy Winehouse, The Killers, Duffy, Snow Patrol and Kanye West, among many others. The latest UMG videos can be found on Last.fm at https://www.last.fm/music/+charts/video.
The addition of UMG content provides a massive boost to Last.fm's unrivaled online music video offering which launched last year. Additionally, Last.fm's scrobbling technology will help users engage with the UMG content in a more personalised manner by recommending new videos according to users' individual music taste.
Martin Stiksel, Last.fm co-founder, said: "This is a hugely empowering partnership that really takes Last.fm to the next level. We want to offer a video library that rivals our unparalleled music catalogue, as we work towards Last.fm becoming the only place you need to go to for all music-related content, and this deal marks the first step towards that goal. Universal Music has the richest and most extensive music video collection in the world, and the addition of that content to Last.fm brings us closer to being able to offer the most rewarding personalised music video experience for music fans anywhere."
Rob Wells, Senior Vice President, Digital, Universal Music Group International, commented, "Our relationship with Last.fm is evolving. The use of Universal Music videos on the Last.fm platform is a great opportunity for both consumers and artists, with the latter earning revenues from every video played on the service. Video streaming services are an increasingly important source of income, and it's great to have another new partner on board, tapping into this rich revenue stream."
The Universal video content will be ad-supported, in the same manner as Last.fm's pioneering free-on-demand service which launched in January. As part of the FOD offering, artists, labels and copyright holders receive a share of revenue from the ads displayed next to their content. In its first month offering UMG videos, Last.fm will be marking the partnership by highlighting the Universal video catalogue exclusively on the site.
