Over the past five years the viewing of online music videos has become more popular now than in the previous 30 years of music television. With artist constantly pushing boundaries when it comes to violence, sexual content and nudity, is it time for music videos to have an age rating system like they do in the films?
During an interview with BBC, Rio Caraeff, CEO of Vevo, expressed that he does not think that music videos should have a rating system because it would not work. “I don’t think it’s necessary and I hope it doesn’t come to that. It would just create a significant burden for the user, for the artist and the service provider. People would consume less music, discover less content and watch less videos which is ultimately bad for revenue, commerce and royalties for artists. It’d be bad for business.”
While Caraeff feels that a rating system would be bad for business, chief executive of Mothers’ Union, Reg Bailey, feels the opposite. “I believe that the good will of the music industry is with us and that it will be better to work together towards the goals of online age verification than for the government to go down the route of legislation, which will just make life more difficult for everyone.”
With YouTube being the predominate website for viewing music videos, the company has already taken measures to assure that under age viewers do not view inappropriate videos by implementation of an age restriction. With the age restriction, viewers must be signed into their YouTube accounts to prove that they are over the age of 18 in order to view a video that has been flagged as mature.
Do you think there should be a rating system for music videos or not?
