• by Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, August 31, 2007

Paving the way for the next British invasion on YouTube, the video-sharing site has reached an agreement with U.K. organizations that collect royalties for some 50,000 composers, songwriters and publishers.

The MCPS-PRS Alliance, which represents creators of more than 10 million pieces of music, announced the deal at a London press conference late Wednesday. As a result, YouTube users can now safely incorporate music in videos including popular acts like Amy Winehouse and Cliff Richard.

The deal is a significant win for the Google-owned YouTube, which has been fending off challenges by major media companies that portray it as a tool to commit copyright crime.

In February, Viacom launched a $1 billion lawsuit against YouTube. And around the globe, parties suing YouTube for copyright violation include the English Premier League, music publisher Bourne & Co., the National Music Publishers' Association, England's Rugby Football League, the Finnish Football League and author Daniel Quinn.

The Google-owned YouTube has agreed to pay a flat fee in exchange for licensing the library of music represented by the MCPS-PRS Alliance, while the alliance will decide how to distribute the revenues to its members based on an estimate of what music has been played on YouTube.

The licensing organization is working with YouTube on how to identify the high-profile songs that are most often used as background in both professional and user-generated videos posted to the site.