Which tunes are we paying homage to online?

Sing-a-long songs

12 August 2008 15:57 GMT / By Katie Scott

An organisation that collects and pays royalties to composers and songwriters, today reveals what the most successful songs on licensed websites were during 2007.

And it's not pretty.

The MCPS-PRS Alliance analysed 60 million downloads and streams of music on licensed websites such as YouTube, iTunes and Bebo, in order to pay royalties accurately to its 60,000 members.

And the song that we have not only sung our souls out to, but also recorded ourselves in full flow AND posted the results online is....

Leona Lewis' Bleeding Love.

And it gets worse.

Sales of Crank Dat Soulja were boosted by postings of self-made videos – often of fans performing the songs themselves to camera.

Also in the list are Britney Spears, The Sugababes and Sean Kingston, with his masterpiece Beautiful Girl.

And then, of course, there is You are the Music in Me by the High School Musical brats.

Andrew Shaw, managing director of broadcast and online at the Alliance, said: "The trend for posting self-made videos is driving the number of performances on the websites we license.

"Hairbrush divas are not only helping to generate royalties for the writers of their favourite music but could also prove to have the X Factor themselves and be our stars of tomorrow" (or not!)