Hot: Lady Gaga's YouTube Account Suspended
Lady Gaga has long been the Queen of YouTube. Her videos have racked up more than a billion views on the site and fans have flocked to it in droves to post their home-brewed takes on her outfits, fashion, music and videos.
But little monsters who were looking for their daily fix of Gaga on Thursday (July 14) were likely disappointed when they went to Mother Monster's YouTube account and found the following message, "This account has been suspended due to multiple or severe violations of YouTube's Copyright Policy."
What gives?
According to Time Out Tokyo, Gaga's official YouTube account was suspended because she posted footage from her recent appearance on the Japanese show "SMAP x SMAP," on the Fuji TV network. The widely-circulated video of the 10-minute performance in which Gaga sang a medley of songs from Born This Way resulted in a takedown request from Media Interactive Inc. on Tuesday.
The video features Gaga performing on a fog-enshrouded set with the popular Japanese boy band SMAP, and the issue appears to involve Gaga's failure to secure the digital rights to display their performance on her YouTube account. In the clip, Gaga emerges from an ornate box wearing a an elaborate black dust mask and sings "The Edge of Glory" before sitting down at a piano housed in a giant bejeweled hand sculpture for a solo take on "You and I" that morphs into the album's title track.
The "Born This Way" performance features the members of SMAP standing and posing behind Gaga, joining her dancers in some high-energy choreography and singing light backup duties on the hit track.
Spokespeople for Gaga and YouTube could not be reached for comment at press time.
On Monday, Gaga tweeted her excitement about the SMAP performance, writing, "My performance+cooking show appearance on SMAP SMAP is airing now in Japan. Kawaii Monsters!" A week earlier, she Twitpic'd a sepia-toned photo of her with the group as well.
