Some time ago I wrote a blog post about this matter.
It’s interesting that the Italian Authority for artistic intellectual property (SIAE) reached a deal for sharing part of the revenues coming from copyrighted contents with artists, making it more affordable for them to give free uploadability on YouTube.
I think this idea is great.
Here is my blog post: http://www.iubenda.com/blog/2010/07/29/youtube-copyright-and-italian-authority-siae/
Andrea Giannangelo