COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT ON YOUTUBE

Very good post, I think many times it just takes someone stating that the copyright is wrong.  Many thanks, important information

Copyright infringement can be simplified in a couple of ways:

1. If you didn't write, create, produce or record the music...then it isn't yours. Period. Anything created by someone else it theirs and you may not use it unless you get permission and/or pay for it. If you need music, check out royalty-free services.

2. Use car theft as an example. If you steal someone's car, it is still a crime even if you credit the driver from whom you stole it, only used it yourself or didn't make a profit.

If there is music, images from TV, or movie clips in your YouTube videos, then you must remove them and/or blur them out.

Just ask yourself a question on all your posts: "Is there any image or audio that isn't mine in it?" If so, it's not yours to use. 

Fred #18. Those same senators stand behind the contract laws that protect your commission...same as they protect the rights of performers who create music.

Downloading music from iTunes gives you the right to play it on your own devices. You do not own the music. The statement "All rights reserved" pertains to the creator of the music and/or the owner of the rights to it. I wanted to use 20 seconds of "Takin' Care of Business" by Bachman Turner Overdrive. I paid BTO $10,000 and Sony $10,000. I could use it on a fixed quantity of DVDs.

Paddy 19. We REALTORS® are fanatical about protecting our commission should a listed seller attempt to sell directly to a buyer and cut us out. A copyright is like a listing agreement.

Regarding music in the background: someone else's music is IN the video and only the copyright owner has the right to determne in which video the music is played. We've recorded agents in the field and if the radio is on during an interview we can't use it. We're very careful to avoid having radio, TV and/or music in the background.

Imagine if you created a beautiful song then found it playing on an offensive video.

I've had paid royalty free music get tagged by YT. I got it released through the challenge but even the challenge form warns you that "misusing" it may result in severe actions. Not fair to end users. Yes, YouTube needs to clean up their system.

It's annoying.

Almost makes you start thinking about posting anything online anymore.

Jill - I use my own recorded music that I myself have recorded as well as my own photos that I myself took and You Tube still gives me those messages on occasion...Then I go through the motions you described and I still get their adds on my videos.... go figure.. Just my two cents

I've never gotten involved with using YouTube, and this post makes me glad I haven't!

One of the reasons my video music is soooooo banal is the copyright issues that I'm afraid of.  I always use what is provided by Animoto and  proshow web just to avoid this issue, but let's face it....they are boooooorrrrrrring. 

However, I had a very bad experience with Animoto on this.  Several videos flagged even though I picked from  their approved list of composers.  For about a month, it just kept happening.  Byt the time I got the notices,  I had cancelled my animoto account because their customer service was nothing short of appalling.  I was wondering whether that meant that I had somehow lost the rights to to the music I had downloaded while I had the account. It sounded remote and it didn't make any sense.  If you have to take down all your videos when you change vendors, no one would ever be able to change.

At the end of the day I clicked the link that said I had permission to use the music and the problem resolved itself - for all the videos (I think there were 4-5).  As for your daughter's chorus, I can't imagine that any composer would not expect the music to be performed or put on YouTube. You certainly aren't making money from that, its a family thing.  Don't know the answer to that one or why it was even flagged.   

I didn't realize that re-posting or forwarding a You Tube video via email was that easy, so thanks for the information. 

Fred Knox is right.  I especially applaud his response to Fred #18.  But folks, don't throw the baby out with the bath water: use YouTube for your creations.  If some part of your creation wasn't created by you, get permission to use from the creator before you publish what's not yours. Simple.  

Note that the high school needed permission to sing the songs in the first place.  Thus, videotaping that performance is also covered by copyright.  If that isn't clear, then YT needs to make it clear to their users unless they want to be liable for what people illegally post.

While no one wants YouTube to be overzealous, this is an alpha-error (over-inclusive) vs. beta-error (under-inclusive) problem that applies to millions of videos.  The high school example is an excellent example of why YouTube is justified in doing what is really their only legitimate option; they need to be over-inclusive while they work out the technological and public-education methodology of properly enforcing copyrights.  

Unfortunately for them, YouTube makes money when other people are ripped off, and they are the only ones in a position to mitigate, and eventually eliminate, that misappropriation (read: theft).  Otherwise, republications of copyrighted material without permission from, or payment to, the copyright holders will continue.

If you want to make a video for personal use, it's pretty hard to stop you.  But you bust through all the exceptions to the copyright owner's rights when you put that video up on the internet for all the world to see.  It's not personal use, or fair use, or in any way legal, if you are posting copyrighted materials on YouTube with neither compensation nor permission.

Jill asked:

If anyone has any experience with this sort of thing, I'd very much appreciate your advice

with regard to her story that:

The 2nd copyright claim is for a video I made of my daughter's high school choir singing at their Winter Performance. I'm still awaiting a decision. I have no personal contact information on this video and have not made any money off it. Perhaps, it will help if I include the composers of each number that was represented in this concert. I was unaware that this was necessary.

The answer is that copyright protection does not turn on whether you make money off the publication, whether or not you have personal contact information on the publication, or whether you acknowledge the composers.  None of those facts creates an exception to the copyright owner's rights.

While there are limited exceptions that allow people to use copyrighted materials without compensation or permission, for example, personal use (e.g., publications you've purchased and are using personally on your headphones), and fair use, they are the exceptions, and you would do best to err on the side of caution and respect for others' rights by not relying on them.

What you need to republish someone else's composition in any public forum -- when you haven't paid them for the right to do so -- is permission, just as the high school needed permission to sing the songs in the first place.  

Why bother posting anything online.  Someone will always complain about it even if you are all original with your own material.

Thanks Jill for very important information! Great post!

I remember one time I took some video from my phone while drive down the beach and posted it to Youtube. It only took a couple of days before I got a message that my vdeio was blocked bacause There was an Allan Jackson song playing over the readio in my jeep.  :)

Lesson learned.

In my circle, lots of people are going to other video hosting sites to avoid dealing with YouTube so wondering what others here are doing?

Copyright is something we need to be aware of  thanks for the post.