NEW YORK (CelebrityAccess) – Kobalt Music Publishing, home to over 700,000 songs announced Sunday (July 24) that they are pulling its entire catalog from Facebook and Instagram due to its license expiring.
In a memo sent by Kobalt, it states its licensing agreement with Meta expired and the two parties have failed to reach a favorable agreement to renew. Kobalt holds songs for artists such as Billie Eilish, her brother FINNEAS, Beck, Childish Gambino, Foo Fighters, and many others.
According to MBW, Kobalt sent an email to its songwriters apprising them of the current situation, “Over the course of several months, we’ve worked diligently and in good faith to come to an agreement covering a new license for Kobalt’s repertoire. “Unfortunately, fundamental differences remained that we were not able to resolve in your best interests, and as a result, Kobalt’s repertoire is in the process of being removed from Meta’s services, including Facebook and Instagram.”
It’s the perfect storm for Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta as this news comes on the heels of Epidemic Sound launching an aggressive lawsuit against Meta. That lawsuit claims that the ‘unauthorized’ use of its works across Facebook and Instagram is commonplace.
“Meta has refused to enter into a license with Epidemic, even though Meta has done so with many other rights holders,” Epidemic Sound noted in its lawsuit. That lawsuit alleges that more than 80,000 instances of theft occur per day on the platform.
“Perhaps Meta is hoping to get away with it for as long as possible. Perhaps Meta is hoping that it will intimidate a company like Epidemic into bowing to Meta rather than incurring the disruption and expense of a lawsuit. Meta is wrong.”
