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>[YouTube] entirely disregard[s] key aspects and intents of the law, leaving fair use and fair process as a joke. I make my living from YouTube, and I am very
by trogdor 3y ago
>[YouTube] entirely disregard[s] key aspects and intents of the law, leaving fair use and fair process as a joke.
I make my living from YouTube, and I am very familiar with their policies surrounding copyright. I think your characterization of YouTube in relation to copyright is totally off base.
YouTube is covered by the DMCA, and YouTube responds to DMCA takedowns because if they don’t, they could be liable for contributory copyright infringement.
The DMCA provides safe harbor to online service providers (OSPs) who follow its notice-and-takedown procedures. Those procedures don’t allow OSPs to make subjective decisions about whether fair use might apply in relation to a copyright claim.
Nevertheless, YouTube sometimes does exactly that. YouTube responds to some DMCA takedowns by, instead of promptly taking the video down, requesting additional information from the claimant in support of their claim. As I understand the DMCA, that is YouTube going well-beyond their legal obligations - to their potential (albeit unlikely) detriment.
So that’s the DMCA takedown process.
Now let’s talk about Content ID.
When a creator receives a Content ID claim, that’s the beginning of a process, not the end. Content ID claims can be disputed, and during the dispute, all revenue from the video is held in escrow, eventually going to whomever prevails in the dispute.
The first level of the dispute process is essentially the uploader asking the claimant to reconsider, with the option to provide a brief explanation of why the uploader believes the claim is invalid.
If the dispute is rejected, that’s still not the end of the story. The uploader can press the dispute further. Doing so forces the claimant to either abandon their claim, or ‘upgrade’ it to a formal DMCA takedown. If a takedown is issued and the uploader believes their work is not infringing, they can respond with a counter-notification, which forces the claimant to either (a) sue the uploader within ten days, or (b) lose the dispute. In the latter case, the video goes back up and any escrow revenue - along with all future revenue - goes to the uploader instead of the copyright claimant.
I am making two main points here:
(1) I believe that YouTube does try to comply with the law. Whether they do so out of civic duty or “to avoid expensive litigation” is irrelevant.
(2) Although the DMCA’s safe harbor provisions don’t allow OSPs to make subjective evaluations regarding fair use (while retaining their safe harbor), YouTube often does exactly that, when they feel it may be relevant.
In fairness, I think part of that is because of they were emboldened by the recent-ish decision in Business Casual v. YouTube, but whatever the reason, it happens. And YouTube was doing that long before the decision in Business Casual. (Which held, in part, that YouTube can’t be liable for infringing the copyright of any content that is uploaded on YouTube, since their TOS include a provision that essentially grants YouTube a license to do whatever they want with the work. Crazy stuff.)
There is more to copyright on YouTube, and I like to think that I am very familiar with how it all works. If you think I’m wrong about anything I wrote above, I am interested in hearing why. Similarly, if you have any questions I’ll do my best to answer them.
- KHRZ 3y agoYouTube themselves built Content ID for companies to allow registering their "works" to aid them in automatically detecting copyright infringements. If YouTube's content ID entries doesn't include their creation date, which is one of the most basic pieces of metadata you could attach to a work, which not only is required information to determine when the copyright is valid, but would also make automatic copyright expiration trivial to implement and avoid sending false infringement notices to copyright holders, then it's fair to call YouTube Content ID a joke.
- jsjohnst 3y agoYou do realize “copyright law” and “DMCA” are distinct concepts, right? Related for sure, but also very distinct.
- arghwhat 3y agoYour positive opinion on their copyright stance does not seem to align with other YouTube creators - in particular, their complaints about aggressive automatic content ID application, that successful appeal often lead to the video being up but with redirected monitization to the claimant, the poor appeal process for the blind legal requests made using it, and the associated "copyright strike" system where third parties can basically terminate your source of income as a result of a few blind, incorrect takedown requests. Perhaps your type of content is less likely to get incorrect matches, or does not use fair-use or expired works often, or maybe you have access to better YouTube representatives than the average (semi-succesful or better) YouTuber.
- trogdor 3y agoI appreciate your reply. A few things: 1. Controversy sells. Content that riles people up attracts views. I have firsthand personal knowledge of a famous YouTuber, on one occasion, complaining publicly - to enormous audience response - about a Content ID claim that I know - with certainty - had already been resolved in his favor. I know that because I helped him through the process. 2. A successful appeal can never lead to the video being up, but with revenue redirected to the claimant. That is not possible. 3. The copyright strike system exists because of an act of Congress, not because of YouTube. The DMCA only shields online service providers from liability if they implement policies for terminating users who are “repeat infringers.” That’s the reason for the existence of “copyright strikes” and YouTube’s three strikes policy. I am not saying that I love Content ID or that it doesn’t have problems - even abuses. It does. But it’s also wildly misunderstood, and its faults are often overstated, even made up.