Adding Soundtracks to Videos - How Do You Avoid Copyright Problems?

[Chainsaw_Willie]

How the hell do people get away with adding music to their ski videos? Every time I try to upload a video to Youtube or Facebook with some music in it lately it either gets rejected due to copyright infringement or I get a notice that it contains copyrighted material and the owner might come after me yet I see videos posted on here all the time that have music in them that the creator of the video obviously didn't record themselves.

Videos without music are kinda boring. What to do?

[PNWbrit]

Buy a guitar?

[Chainsaw_Willie]

LOL! Then no one would ever watch one of my videos...

Seriously, I don't get it. If I type in the name of the song I wanted to use on Youtube at least 5 videos come up for that song, none of which were posted by the original artist. Is it okay to post a video containing a song if you name the song in the video title?

I'm confused...

[powbmps]

I put up a video on Facebook and it was immediately removed because of copyright issues. I added something at the end listing the song and artist and tried reposting. Same message came up. I filled out the "dispute form" and the video was approved.

No lawsuit yet.

[powdork]

vimeo is your friend

[sftc]

Try jamendo.com

and/or

Jamendo Creative Commons music

There are a lot of options there for free music, even for commercial use. You obviously won't find your favorite big hits, or specific songs, but you can usually find similar stuff in the same genre and often all you have to do is give the artist attribution.

[pointedem]

Ask Nico.

[grskier]

I started using dj's that sample everything.. works sometimes...

[Chainsaw_Willie]

Ask Nico.

Who dat?

[Chainsaw_Willie]

vimeo is your friend

Why yes, yes it is.

[kidwoo]

I don't even have a youtube account, so I can't help you there. My stuff on facebook is the same videos I post here which obviously has copywrited music. I tend to use older songs, and/or stuff that might be a little more off the radar so maybe that's it........doesn't fit some sort of 'list' they maintain or something.

Few options

1. Just use vimeo

2. buy your own web host domain and put them up there. It's not that expensive

3. Quit using Adele and Brittney Spears for your sountracks

[Chainsaw_Willie]

I don't even have a youtube account, so I can't help you there. My stuff on facebook is the same videos I post here which obviously has copywrited music. I tend to use older songs, and/or stuff that might be a little more off the radar so maybe that's it........doesn't fit some sort of 'list' they maintain or something.

Few options

1. Just use vimeo

2. buy your own web host domain and put them up there. It's not that expensive

3. Quit using Adele and Brittney Spears for your sountracks

For now the Vimeo option seems best. Easier embedding than if doing off my own host and being unemployed currently, "free" is the right price.

Britney Spears? Sheesh, that's so early century. Lady Gaga's where it's at now. Seriously though, the song in the above video is an obscure Beastie Boys tune from the mid '90s yet both Facebook and youtube automatically flagged it as copyrighted material. They have that software that can recognize/identify songs automatically and scan your videos as you upload them. Still can't figure out how people are able to post videos with that song in them on Youtube, but maybe it is because it's titled as that song.

[sftc]

This is just an educated guess but it may have to do with when the specific version of the song was released. A few years ago the recording industry began embedding silent (to our ears) digital ID tags into every song released. This was initially done to help ASCAP and BMI monitor radio station broadcasts so that their royalty payments to the music publishers and songwriters were more accurate (and more defensible in court when people sued them for stealing their money, but that's whole other story).

Right now Viacom is in the process of suing youtube for one BILLION dollars in losses due to copyrighted material being posted so they have become super vigilant about complying with the record company's demands. They now have 'bots scanning every new video for the digital tags embedded in copyrighted songs and they quickly pull any videos that use unauthorized music. I'd guess it's not an issue at vimeo since they are so much smaller or maybe the lawyers are waiting to see how Viacom does against youtube before they go after all the other video clip website.

SO no human actually checks every youtube video for the music, it's all done automatically, or just by random chance. Therefore if you used a version of the Stones "Satisfaction" that was recorded to your computer from the original 40-year-old vinyl you may not have an issue, but if you use a version of the same song from a recently produced CD of the same album you'll get nailed.

That's my theory and I'm sticking with it.

BTW, I've heard there are technical ways to scramble, disrupt or block the embedded digital code in a song so that it can't be heard by the scanner 'bots but that seems like a lot of work to do for a video of some fat chick dancing drunk at your brother's wedding.

[kidwoo]

s an obscure Beastie Boys tune

There's no such thing. Seriously. That's about as bad as a gaga tune as far as being recognized.

[sftc]

After putting up my previous post I did a web search to see what was going on in the Viacom vs. youtube case and it looks like yesterday the courts gave youtube a round 1 victory but of course Viacom is going to appeal the ruling. Regardless of the final outcome you still won't be able to use copyrighted music without permission in most situations:

Judge sides with Google, YouTube in Viacom's $1B suit

I also forgot about an interesting precedent-setting "fair use" case from a couple of years ago that went against the recording industry:

Lenz v. Universal Music Corp.

[Chainsaw_Willie]

The version of that song in the video came off a CD I bought back in the '90s (I still have stacks of CDs) so doubt it contains any digital tags if those tags were only implemented recently.

I don't think the software that scans the music needs a special tag...??? My friend's iphone can correctly identify just about any song being played on the radio by just holding the thing up to the speaker. Did radio stations that play older music replace their entire music libraries with encoded songs?

[SB]

vimeo is your friend

yes

1234

[pointedem]

Nico-Owner/ Levitation Project. For his movie " fall of 08" I think he used Metallica and a brand new (at the time) Kanye tune when he released his movie. Everyone was like what the fuck? It was a decent size release/ budget film as far as ski movies go, too... compounding the WTF factor. Never really heard much about it after that.

[BeanDip4All]

AFIK, youtube has an option where you can select various approved tracks, and add them for free to your videos.

I did it for this video of my dog, which subsequently went viral and got 40k views!


you just have to select from their list of tracks, it's easy, there are all different types of genres and options. i think it's from artists looking for exposure, so they put their tracks out there hoping people will hear them.

[Todds]

I don't post videos, but I'd suggest checking out the free music link. Why use copyrighted music? There must be a bunch of new artists that want/need the exposure.

[nikonbaby]

We have Flipagram app, using which we can add music to the videos recorded through a camera or your podcasts. The app is available for iOS and Android. If you are willing to use the feature on your Windows or Mac, Then Android Emulator or iOS Emulator will serve the purpose by helping you install the apps. If in case, Flipagram does not work for you, You can look out for the alternatives here. Thank You.