Thom Yorke compares YouTube to Nazi Germany
Thom Yorke has compared YouTube to Nazi Germany in an interview with Italian newspaper, Repubblica. The Radiohead and Atoms For Peace front man is known for his rants against music streaming sites and most recently he shared his thoughts regarding YouTube.
“YouTube has seized control of [art] – it’s like what the nazis did during the second world war. I don’t use YouTube, that’s for sure. They put ads before everything, making big money and artists don’t get paid – or don’t get paid enough – and that’s fine, apparently. [But] if they don’t get profit from [ad-blocking] then no, it’s not fair. They keep saying that this is an era where music is free, where cinema is free. Not true. The makers of these services make money. Google, Youtube; a huge amount of money, trawling like in the ocean, taking everything there is. ‘Oh sorry, was that yours? Now it’s ours. No, no just kidding – it’s still yours’.” Said Thom
He also commented that he uses Boomkat, an online electronica specialist retailer. He claims that YouTube has seized control of art and then he compares music streaming with the actions of the Nazis in world war two. The connection been mass genocide and YouTube is clearly not an apparent one. But it seems as though Yorke was riled up and with that he seemingly made a quick comparison to help prove his point.
While there is some legitimacy to his sentiments, the one thing that this interview makes him out to be is someone holding on a little too tightly to the past. He also shared that the devaluation of digital music gives him a headache.
Thom Yorke carried on… “I pulled out all my vinyl collection recently, with every single vinyl there’s some relationship… [That] doesn’t exist with USB and digital. [Digital] is having a corrosive effect on music. My 14-year-old son read [David] Byrne’s book [on the music industry] and he told me: ‘Why don’t you read this too? It might interest you’. When Byrne [argued] against Spotify, it was a relief. ‘Ah, finally. I’m not the only one to say that it’s not right that it works that way.’”
Nostalgia is a powerful force, however history has proven that future technologies waits for no one, we either get on the bus or get left behind. Maintaining a purist all or nothing attitude to anything whether it be music or other aspects of life could see you miss out on the bright sides that new technology can bring.
While Thom Yorke hates on YouTube, it is still the second most used search engine after Google.
