YouTube's Unspoken Linking Policy For Copyright Infringers

Hackajar writes "Valleywag has an interesting post detailing YouTube's new way to deal with copyrighted music videos, removing embed tags and linking it to the official content on site. What's significant here is the lack of video removal by YouTube staff. From the post, "Uploads of music videos from the band by non-official sources now carry a link reading "Contains content from [insert studio here]"". They use a Modest Mouse music video from a third party to illustrate the new change."

YouTube's unspoken policy for fair users

[iamacat]

Recording your own music video to a popular tune and for non-commercial use should be considered fair use. It's unlikely that you are competing with any official distribution of the song or its derivative products. On the other hand, such use is essential for a society to have any kind of culture. If you can not record a video of your 1 year old son dancing to a well-known song, your ability to participate in the society and extended family is seriously curtailed.

Re:YouTube's unspoken policy for fair users

[vux984]

If you can not record a video of your 1 year old son dancing to a well-known song, your ability to participate in the society and extended family is seriously curtailed.

What if you can do it provided you license that well-known song for the purpose for which you intend to use it?

I'm not saying I agree with this at all... but its basically the RIAA's position. They are more than happy to whore out their content.

Re:Don't forget...

[Rei]

Well, sometimes it's about making videos that are not about the music. For example, I once made a vid to poke fun of Man vs. Wild, the "Desert Island" episode (back when they were still pretending the show was legit), where I mixed clips of the show with clips of videos found on YouTube that people shot from the same locations on Maui that he pretended were "deserted" (the low res of YouTube makes the comparison not as good, unfortunately; on the hires you can see that every rock and tree matches down to the last pixel). Naturally, the song I set it to was "Loser" by Beck. ;)

Just a couple weeks ago, I got a notice from YouTube stating that the label had made a copyright claim on the audio to my vids. YouTube said that they would remain up, but that the copyright holder would have the right to advertise on my vid pages. I didn't contest it because while the video aspects were clearly within my rights (parody and criticism), I wasn't parodying or criticizing the music, so it wouldn't be as likely to be covered by Fair Use.

Re:YouTube's unspoken policy for fair users

[iamacat]

What if you can do it provided you license that well-known song for the purpose for which you intend to use it?

If such a license was practically feasible for an average citizen (who can afford perhaps $20 for perpetual right to distribute the video to interested audience, which is likely to be family and friends), it would remove my objections to make such licensing mandatory rather than allowing license-free fair use.

This licensing would have to be neutral to opinions/cultural values/etc expressed in the non-commercial derived work and encapsulate all cases in one fee. If I distribute a home video of my dance performance to 5 songs, I do not expect to pay $100.

Re:YouTube's unspoken policy for fair users

[RareButSeriousSideEf]

Alternatively, how about we define a standard set of metadata to describe Copyright Status Assertions, and use those those in place of the current (lame) DMCA takedown -> counter-notice process?

The point is to give the uploader a chance to assert a Fair Use claim *beforehand*, and subsequently have the conflict automatically transferred to him/her instead of automatically taking the content down. This would still be imperfect, of course, but it would prevent some of the suppression-oriented DMCA abuse that the current setup facilitates.

In the case of Item 1 below, the clip would stay up, and the person filing the complaint would be referred to the uploader to haggle over the Fair Use claim. Item 2 would be rejected up-front, and Item 3 would get taken down and possibly land the uploader in hot water as well.

Uploaded Item 1 - item from TFA:
+ Track 1: Video
        Copyright: 2008, Joe's Hillarious Parodies LLC
        Disposition: Poster's Original Work
+ Track 2: Audio Track
        Copyright: Third Party
        Disposition: Fair Use
        Assertion: Used for Parody Purposes

Uploaded Item 2 - Ripped/transcoded SNL clip, poster describes honestly:
+ Track 1: Video
        Copyright: Third Party
        Disposition: Totally Ripped Off
        Assertion: Ha Ha, Try and Catch Me
+ Track 2: Audio Track
        Copyright: Third Party
        Disposition: Totally Ripped Off
        Assertion: Ha Ha, Try and Catch Me

Uploaded Item 3 - same SNL video clip, uploader used bald-faced lies:
+ Track 1: Video
        Copyright: 2008, Me
        Disposition: Original Work
+ Track 2: Audio Track
        Copyright: 2008, Third Party
        Disposition: Licensed, Used By Permission

Re:No Embed? Fixed that for ya...

[EmperorKagato]

Leave it up to slashdot readers to crack a system within minutes.

That's one way...

[themushroom]

...to get videos and songs online that the labels linked to haven't bothered to make available for sale. Call it win-win. People get to see/hear this stuff, and the labels get interest expressed in something they'd presumed there was no further profit in offering.

Re:YouTube's unspoken policy for fair users

[colmore]

You are aware that recording eventually put the majority of musicians out of business.

Every fancy restaurant in the country, not to mention every hotel, every dance, every social gathering that wanted to have music HIRED a full band.

Before the movies and TV, every town had multiple Vaudeville and Theater houses.

People used to go to school for music because it was a *smart career move*

If things changed and the people creators sell their 'rights' to no longer had monopoly control - society would adapt. The current models for profiting off of works would mostly fail (though not small performers, they by and large sell their recordings & films at cost to generate attention for live performance) you're not allowing yourself to imagine our society becoming something very different from what it is.

Which it of course has been doing continuously.

Also you don't know what you're talking about re: Saudi Arabia and you're full of crap.

Re:YouTube's unspoken policy for fair users

[packeteer]

What if they considered licensing the songs out to users in that way and decided against it? What if they calculated it out and found it is not a good business decision? Should the government then force them to distribute their media in a way that harms their business?