Ronan Parke’s Music Blocked in the U.S. by Sony Music – Dumb Move Sony

Sony Music has always been on the cutting edge of protecting their content from copyright violations, but when does that protection cut into the promoting of their own artists?

Many of you have heard about the young singing sensation Ronan Parke who wowed audiences as he came in second place last year on Britain’s Got Talent.

But how much of his music have you listened to? How many videos of him have you watched?

If you live in the United States the answer is probably “Not Much”.

You see, Sony has blocked most of Ronan’s music from IP addresses originating in the United States.

Just visit Ronan’s Official YouTube Channel and you’re met with the cryptic message,

"Ronan Parke - Ronan Parke Sings: Make You Feel My Love.

The uploader has not made this video available in your country.”

Okay, for us in the United States it looks like there are only two possible videos to watch on his official YouTube channel.

Really?

Just read a few pages of the YouTube comments from Ronan’s adoring fans and you can see that they are not happy with Sony. Good marketing?

This week, Ronan released an acoustic cover version of Adele’s “Make You Feel My Love” on his Facebook page – that’s the song that got him to second place on Britain’s Got Talent.

But if you live in the United States and click on the link you get a message from Sony and Vevo saying,

“Sorry, this video is not available in your region”

And to add insult to injury just go the Britain’s Got Talent website and try to watch a Ronan Parke video and you get the message,

“This Video is not available in your location”

Okay Sony – listen up.

The whole idea of using the internet to promote your artists is to build a fan base and gain as wide an audience as possible.

When you filter out entire countries from listening to your new stars then you should not be surprised when we don’t buy their albums or merchandise.

Related: Ronan Parke covers Lady Gaga “Edge of Glory” - Video

There is nothing worse than visiting an artist’s official Facebook or YouTube page and not being able to view the content that they are trying to promote.

It makes Sony look a the big bad corporate music label more interested in making money off young artists than the interaction between the fans and their favorite musician.

Take a tip from Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, Usher, Rihanna, Greyson Chance, Cody Simpson, and virtually every NON Sony artist - they provide access to a vast amount of their material and encourage the linking and embedding of their music and videos everywhere they can.

And guess what?

We buy their albums, t-shirts, calendars, lunch boxes, posters, perfumes, and concert tickets.

When fans can’t get the access to a new artist then they quickly move on and find another one.

And when you actively promote them in the social media and my inbox but then block me from watching the very video you are promoting – then you look like a big bad Ogre.

You come across as old grey haired men with a shirt and tie sitting in big offices sporting mahogany furniture drinking martinis and counting your money.

And when you ask a musician to post a new video on their official Facebook page and then restrict who can watch - it makes you look like a dick of a company.

If you don’t want fans in the United States to see any of Ronan’s work than fine – we won’t buy his albums.

But what we don’t understand is why you can’t give Parke the same level of exposure you have given another Sony artist – Jackie Evancho?

Her first album went gold in two months and she is already getting Grammy nods.

Related: Young Jackie Evancho Goes Gold! Takes the World by Storm

Anyway, enough ranting.

I guess we’ll just have to wait for Ronan’s first album to come out to know what his new musical journey is all about.

But then again, maybe we’ll just forget about him and move on to another artist – “Kings of Leon” really has me excited these days.

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