Ben Sisario, New York Times:

On Thursday, YouTube, which is by most estimates the most popular destination for music online, announced that it had reached a settlement with the National Music Publishers’ Association, a trade group, over the complex issue of unpaid songwriting royalties.

And:

In a persistent problem for the online music business, large numbers of songs have missing or incorrect data about their songwriters and which music publishers represent them, leaving what is widely estimated to be millions of dollars unpaid.

And:

The agreement with YouTube, which is owned by Google, will give participating publishers — the companies that traditionally manage songwriting rights, which are separate from those of recordings — access to a list of songs for which YouTube has missing or incomplete rights data. YouTube will then pay any accrued royalties from a fund it has set aside for this purpose.

The best solution would be to get the data right in the first place, to make sure the songwriters who wrote the song that drives YouTube’s music views get paid properly. But this seems a step in the right direction.