Music mogul Irving Azoff has damned YouTube's recently launched video streaming service, threatening to remove music by the artists he manages from the platform over "trampling of writer's rights".

Names including Pharell Williams, The Eagles, Boston, Foreigner, John Lennon and Smokey Robinson represent some 20,000 copyrighted works looked after by Azoff.

The former Live Nation chairman recently launched Global Music Rights, a company aimed at fighting for higher performance royalty rights for songwriters via direct licensing deals with digital ...