Universal Music, a record label holding company, accuses TikTok of intimidation during negotiations to extend its license agreement for artists. The company announced this in an open letter.

The current contract between the companies expires on January 31, and in order to extend it, Universal Music has put forward three requirements: adequate compensation for performers and songwriters, protection of performers from the harmful effects of artificial intelligence, and security for users on the social network.

The letter says that TikTok’s success was built on music, among other things, and that it is one of the key factors in creating content for the social network. Nevertheless, the company refuses to pay artists appropriate compensation.

“With respect to the issue of artist and songwriter compensation, TikTok proposed paying our artists and songwriters at a rate that is a fraction of the rate that similarly situated major social platforms pay. Today, as an indication of how little TikTok compensates artists and songwriters, despite its massive and growing user base, rapidly rising advertising revenue and increasing reliance on music-based content, TikTok accounts for only about 1% of our total revenue,” they wrote in a letter.

Universal Music also noted that the company is not doing anything to combat the content created with the help of artificial intelligence, but rather promotes it in algorithms, which harms performers and songwriters.

The social media platform also selectively removes music by some young artists, while leaving music by world stars that attract an audience on the platform. In this way, the company is trying to harm vulnerable artists who are still developing and gaining popularity.