YT channel copyright-claimed for using YT audio library song

[Syfes]

YouTube creator Matt Lowne is a relatively popular Youtuber in the Kerbal Space Program community. Very recently, pretty much all of his channel's video's have received copyright claims by SonyATV, referring to a song he uses in many of his channel's intros.

 

According to Matt Lowne, this song called "Dreams" was originally listed in the YouTube Audio Library and could be used under creative commons license, but it seems that the rights for this song may have recently been acquired by SonyATV. Following this, it seems that SonyATV has issued corresponding copyright claims for videos on his channel dating back years.

 

Quote

Matt Lowne on Twitter:

Sony is claiming a song I got from the *OFFICIAL YOUTUBE AUDIO LIBRARY* is theirs and has claimed all of my videos. Can we no longer trust the official audio library that you provide for creators? The song is "Dreams" by Joakim Karud.

 

https://twitter.com/Matt_Lowne/status/1195373518415945728

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcjVJ3Cznec

 

I have no knowledge of something similar happening previously, but this could set a concerning precedent? How many other creators may have this song on their videos? What happens when other songs receive the same treatment?

[Faisal A]

You could reset the audio and choose new music if you used the yt video editot

[Syfes]

Just now, Faisal A said:

You could reset the audio and choose new music if you used the yt video editot

True, but consider how long that would take for literally hundreds of claimed videos.

 

Also, who's to say that the song he replaces it with might not get claimed in another few years?

[DildorTheDecent]

>Sony

 

Surprise, surprise! /s

[SolarNova]

While Sony cannot claim compensation for past earnings from the Song, having now acquired the rights to it, any future use, and thus continued use on the videos currently available, is subject to copyright laws.

So while its a crappy move by Sony, they have the right. That is UNLESS the song in use was used under contractual agreement that allows full use for set period, including 'forever', prior to sale to Sony. In which case Sony is required to honor the previous agreement.

[Murasaki]

When in doubt, 009 Sound System - Dreamscape

[Thaldor]

4 minutes ago, SolarNova said:

While Sony cannot claim compensation for past earnings from the Song, having now acquired the rights to it, any future use, and thus continued use on the videos currently available, is subject to copyright laws.

So while its a crappy move by Sony, they have the right. That is UNLESS the song in use was used under contractual agreement that allows full use for set period, including 'forever', prior to sale to Sony. In which case Sony is required to honor the previous agreement.

True.

This is one of those parts of the copyright laws that make the whole laws morally worth less than toilet paper (actually really crappy toilet paper because printing paper usually isn't good for your butt). Anywhere else, if you have licensed something under certain agreement at one time and that original patent/whatever is sold to somebody else later, that somebody else must respect your license to the letter. Like you had licensed to make EpiPens somewhere in the 90's or very early 00's and you had complete freedom in your pricing, Mylan in the 2007 couldn't do shit against you pricing your EpiPens 40$ for two and basicly saying "Fuck You, Mylan!" when they hiked the price from 100$ to 600$ (in US). But with copyright laws, nope, the new owner of the parent rights doesn't need to respect your license a shit but can extort you legally with their "rights" and usually that somebody else is in position where you have no chances to take the case to the court without getting some really big guns behind you.

[Curufinwe_wins]

I really hate this aspect of copyright laws.

[mr moose]

21 minutes ago, SolarNova said:

While Sony cannot claim compensation for past earnings from the Song, having now acquired the rights to it, any future use, and thus continued use on the videos currently available, is subject to copyright laws.

So while its a crappy move by Sony, they have the right. That is UNLESS the song in use was used under contractual agreement that allows full use for set period, including 'forever', prior to sale to Sony. In which case Sony is required to honor the previous agreement.

Does that mean if I buy the rights to led's stairway to heaven I can demand all royalties from all air time and record sales from that point on?

 

I think the issue here is that the youtuber is losing all royalties when in reality a original terms of the license probably should be honored until legal precedent is set or causes a change.  Taking royalties from the youtuber in this specific case amounts to theft in my book.   

 

Again, these are issues with youtube and not copyright law. 

[mr moose]

2 minutes ago, Curufinwe_wins said:

I really hate this aspect of copyright laws.

I don't think CR law gives sony the right to do what they have.  The issue here is either a precedent hasn't been set (continued income from part use of media after that media has been sold) or that sony aren't honoring license agreements regarding content they have bought.    As illustrated above, If I buy stairway to heaven do I get to demand all movies made with the song in it under previous license pay me full royalties from that movie?  The problem here is more how youtube deal with it than anything else.

[SolarNova]

19 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Does that mean if I buy the rights to led's stairway to heaven I can demand all royalties from all air time and record sales from that point on?

 

I think the issue here is that the youtuber is losing all royalties when in reality a original terms of the license probably should be honored until legal precedent is set or causes a change.  Taking royalties from the youtuber in this specific case amounts to theft in my book.   

 

Again, these are issues with youtube and not copyright law. 

 

If u bought rights to 'Stairway to haven' u can demand royalties from all future use of the track. If som1 or some company was using it prior to ur purchase, if their contractual agreement gives them rights to use it for a given amount of it, which it should do in a legit agreement, You as the new owner must comply with said contract, as the contract is with the rights holder. Purchasing the rights to a track means accepting all currently obligated contracts with other parties.

 

If however a person or company is using the track without an agreed contract, then if you so choose, u may then say "ok time to start paying up or u stop using it" .

 

So in this case with Youtube. Youtube had the rights, and was letting people use it for free outside of any contractual agreement (as far as im ware). Now they sold the rights, the new owner can now claim royalties for future use, and since people have made vids using said song and they are still online and being monetized, the new owner can claim royalties from any views (use) after the transition period.

 

i dont know what Youtube legal contracts are with creators, so i cant comment on whether the creator can object to the claims, but since its just a database of free songs i would bet no legally binding contract was digitally signed. So as annoying as it may be, and as morally wrong it may seem, Sony is within their rights ot do what they are doing.

[Guest]

Honestly at this point it’s just a little frustrating all these YouTubers complaining of all these changes. It’s a very volatile platform. Get a second job if you want job security. These things have been happening for years.

 

Hate on YouTube and Google all you want, it’s their platform, they pay the ad revenue, you are receiving money from them. 

[RejZoR]

Youtube copyrights are such a shitshow I'm surprised this platform still even exists and people want to use it. Seems only reason for that to be the case is absolute and total monopoly it holds...

[jiyeon]

This sounds extremely similar to TBJZL's issue, he's been using the same intro music for a large majority of his videos and had the license for it, but there was a video he posted recently regarding how all his videos that included that particular video intro music have been claimed, and he's unable to do anything about it as YouTube have basically just said "Piss off, it's not yours anymore and we don't care if you have proof."

 

 

TL:DW; Some company claimed the music he has been using for years in his intro even though he is able to prove he has the rights to it. Mirror image of what Matt Lowne is going through?

[mr moose]

1 hour ago, SolarNova said:

 

If u bought rights to 'Stairway to haven' u can demand royalties from all future use of the track. If som1 or some company was using it prior to ur purchase, if their contractual agreement gives them rights to use it for a given amount of it, which it should do in a legit agreement, You as the new owner must comply with said contract, as the contract is with the rights holder. Purchasing the rights to a track means accepting all currently obligated contracts with other parties.

Which is what I said, however the implication here is that sony can demand royalties from content made under previous contracts.

 

Quote

If however a person or company is using the track without an agreed contract, then if you so choose, u may then say "ok time to start paying up or u stop using it" .

 

So in this case with Youtube. Youtube had the rights, and was letting people use it for free outside of any contractual agreement (as far as im ware). Now they sold the rights, the new owner can now claim royalties for future use, and since people have made vids using said song and they are still online and being monetized, the new owner can claim royalties from any views (use) after the transition period.

 

I think you will find that youtube permitting use of music under commons license stands as a contract that cannot retrospectively be changed by a new usage agreement.   Only new content moving forward.  Having said that, with youtube being an ongoing revenue stream, we run into precedent troubles that copyright laws do not succinctly cover.  The biggest being that content made under old licensees are generating new income from views post a change content ownership. 

 

Quote

i dont know what Youtube legal contracts are with creators, so i cant comment on whether the creator can object to the claims, but since its just a database of free songs i would bet no legally binding contract was digitally signed. So as annoying as it may be, and as morally wrong it may seem, Sony is within their rights ot do what they are doing.

No they are not,  Current CR law does not grant sony the right to take all revenue from a video just because they bought the rights to a song.  Again that would be like me taking all royalties from a movie for simply buying the rights  a single song used in said movie.  

 

You'll note that all these issue with copyright and royalties being snuffed are mainly happening on youtube and nowhere else in the industry without a court case, that is because the issue is how youtube deal with it, they stop paying the youtuber and start paying the the complainant as soon as they lodge a complaint.  If the complainant had to go through the courts in order to get that revenue or financial compensation like they have to everywhere else,  I can guarantee a lot of the CR trolling would cease immediately and only the genuine cases would go to court.   That is why this is a youtube problem and not so much a CR law issue.

 

 

[Sakkura]

The composer gave a license for anyone to use the music on youtube videos. Sony has no claim whatsoever.

 

See the pinned comment on this video:

 

 

[PlayStation 2]

Ah yes, Sony Music Entertainment. The quality copyright claiming system of YouTube is showing again.

[Thaldor]

50 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Which is what I said, however the implication here is that sony can demand royalties from content made under previous contracts.

 

 

I think you will find that youtube permitting use of music under commons license stands as a contract that cannot retrospectively be changed by a new usage agreement.   Only new content moving forward.  Having said that, with youtube being an ongoing revenue stream, we run into precedent troubles that copyright laws do not succinctly cover.  The biggest being that content made under old licensees are generating new income from views post a change content ownership. 

 

No they are not,  Current CR law does not grant sony the right to take all revenue from a video just because they bought the rights to a song.  Again that would be like me taking all royalties from a movie for simply buying the rights  a single song used in said movie.  

 

You'll note that all these issue with copyright and royalties being snuffed are mainly happening on youtube and nowhere else in the industry without a court case, that is because the issue is how youtube deal with it, they stop paying the youtuber and start paying the the complainant as soon as they lodge a complaint.  If the complainant had to go through the courts in order to get that revenue or financial compensation like they have to everywhere else,  I can guarantee a lot of the CR trolling would cease immediately and only the genuine cases would go to court.   That is why this is a youtube problem and not so much a CR law issue.

No, the problem is the CR laws because they are the only laws that doesn't make a difference between distributing and manufacturing. As in a company making engine parts with Toyotas license for aftermarket and then Toyota sells those patents to GM and that company has a year until the closure of their license, that company can boost the hell out of their machines and generate a huge stock lasting a decade of those parts during that year and sell them afterwards under the same old Toyota license because they were manufactured under it. With CR laws, nope, you make a movie with Ledz song that was licensed with CC (fat chance for that but for example) (you don't need to sign any contracts, just respect the Ledz and give them the credits) and you make in direct-to-DVD or something and couple years later someone buys the rights for that song and take it out of CC-license, now you find a box of those DVDs and decide to sell them... They are no longer under CC-license and the current right holder can demand their royalties and even sue you for CR infringement or even CR crime. And at this point, not YT, but the whole concept of streaming comes to play because basicly every nanosecond your movie/video is online you are distributing it and that means a second earlier you have a video with CC-licensed music on it (which you can use however you like as long as you credit the artist) and second later you have Sonys lawyers on your ass and all because the CR laws don't care when something was made (E: or in this case made publicly available) but when something was "sold".

This is also why the whole Article 13 shit happened. EU tried to fix this for archiving and public sector in general to harmonize things like some book or song or whatever is licensed for the use of education for free and BOOM second later having that thing publicly usable in something like national archive would cost the archive 1,000,000€/month and all because that things rights were moved and the new owner didn't like that someone could use it without paying. And that actually is the biggest part of that bill, the whole Article 13 is minor thing in it. More specifically Eu wants to change things so that if someone hasn't cared for their thing for a long time, it becomes basicly free to use for archives and they can make it publicly accessible without a fear that the one owning the rights suddenly decides that they actually still care for that thing so much that they want money out of it from archive usage.

[mr moose]

13 minutes ago, Thaldor said:

No, the problem is the CR laws because they are the only laws that doesn't make a difference between distributing and manufacturing. As in a company making engine parts with Toyotas license for aftermarket and then Toyota sells those patents to GM and that company has a year until the closure of their license, that company can boost the hell out of their machines and generate a huge stock lasting a decade of those parts during that year and sell them afterwards under the same old Toyota license because they were manufactured under it. With CR laws, nope, you make a movie with Ledz song that was licensed with CC (fat chance for that but for example) (you don't need to sign any contracts, just respect the Ledz and give them the credits) and you make in direct-to-DVD or something and couple years later someone buys the rights for that song and take it out of CC-license, now you find a box of those DVDs and decide to sell them... They are no longer under CC-license and the current right holder can demand their royalties and even sue you for CR infringement or even CR crime. And at this point, not YT, but the whole concept of streaming comes to play because basicly every nanosecond your movie/video is online you are distributing it and that means a second earlier you have a video with CC-licensed music on it (which you can use however you like as long as you credit the artist) and second later you have Sonys lawyers on your ass and all because the CR laws don't care when something was made (E: or in this case made publicly available) but when something was "sold".

 

I think you are conflating too many possibilities as being the direct result of CR laws.  It seems your Toyota example contradicts your music/dvd example.  Perhaps you have a link to a court case that explains what you are trying to say?  

 

13 minutes ago, Thaldor said:

This is also why the whole Article 13 shit happened. EU tried to fix this for archiving and public sector in general to harmonize things like some book or song or whatever is licensed for the use of education for free and BOOM second later having that thing publicly usable in something like national archive would cost the archive 1,000,000€/month and all because that things rights were moved and the new owner didn't like that someone could use it without paying. And that actually is the biggest part of that bill, the whole Article 13 is minor thing in it. More specifically Eu wants to change things so that if someone hasn't cared for their thing for a long time, it becomes basicly free to use for archives and they can make it publicly accessible without a fear that the one owning the rights suddenly decides that they actually still care for that thing so much that they want money out of it from archive usage.

 

Article 13 was written to address websites that catalogue and distribute content they don't own the rights to. I am not sure how it is relevant to this issue.

[xAcid9]

If the copyright just recently changed hand then it should only effect all content after that change. What a shit law. 

[Thaldor]

33 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I think you are conflating too many possibilities as being the direct result of CR laws.  It seems your Toyota example contradicts your music/dvd example.  Perhaps you have a link to a court case that explains what you are trying to say? 

I choose the examples just because they are contradicting. CR laws only know distribution rights which don't take account when something was made but only when something is sold. More cencrete example of this is probably GTA IV (if I remember right it was either IV, San Andreas or Vice City) which if you download today from Steam doesn't have its full soundtrack any more because Rockstar (and so Valve also) don't have the license for some of the songs featured, this also concerns any physical copies Rockstar or its distributors have, so if Rockstar was to find a box full of GTA IV DVDs with original soundtracks, they can't sell, give or any other way distribute them without renewing the licenses for the songs (as side note the game was also patched so that those songs were even removed from already installed Steam copies).

With streaming this becomes a real problem because you are constantly distributing your work. If we would go with patent laws, if you put out into YT a video which included a song that was available to be licensed under CC-license, that video would probably always have the song licensed with CC even if the licesing scheme of the song was changed and the change would only concern new videos using that song. But with CR laws, which don't take into account when something was made available, when the licesing of the song is changed it concerns every single video in every streaming service that uses the song no matter when they were uploaded and published.

And as YT mentioned, I need to clarify that it isn't a problem in YT, more or less in this case it's "god bless, we have YT"-thing. Because in YT they are only claims of income and with more asshat legal teams CR strikes. Instead of those the right holders could take real legal actions and that would make things really dirty really fast just because CR laws don't make any exceptions with streaming. Yes, if you have a video you made and it features one song that while making that video was under CC-license and you host that video on your website and someone buys the rights for that song and doesn't allow it to be CC-licensed anymore, theoretically they can sue you for copyright violation for a shit ton of money (in reality every rights holder with even a bit more PR-sense than seacucumber has will first ask you to take the video down, mostly because it usually works with people whos sole purpose is not to break CR laws and taking these things to the courts might also cause the opposite effect where todays openly written laws are read differently and they actually might loose some part of control over their rights).

[Founders]

3 hours ago, RejZoR said:

Youtube copyrights are such a shitshow I'm surprised this platform still even exists and people want to use it. Seems only reason for that to be the case is absolute and total monopoly it holds...

Even if we get a viable alternative It'll most likely turn into just as big of a 'shit show' as you called it. Any type of public online forum can become a mess when it's open to anyone for free. 

 

20 minutes ago, xAcid9 said:

If the copyright just recently changed hand then it should only effect all content after that change. What a shit law. 

Agreed, if the content was used under a free license and the licensing rights change hands for any reason, fair use under the aforementioned license should be exempt.  

[NumLock21]

So Matt Lowne had permission to use the song way before Sony acquired it, and now they did, they're going after him and everyone else for copyright. Screw both YouTube and Sony for this nonsense. It's sad what the digital age has come to, and since he's a small YouTuber compare to some of the others out there, his case will most likely be ignored.

 

[mr moose]

3 hours ago, Thaldor said:

I choose the examples just because they are contradicting. CR laws only know distribution rights which don't take account when something was made but only when something is sold. More cencrete example of this is probably GTA IV (if I remember right it was either IV, San Andreas or Vice City) which if you download today from Steam doesn't have its full soundtrack any more because Rockstar (and so Valve also) don't have the license for some of the songs featured, this also concerns any physical copies Rockstar or its distributors have, so if Rockstar was to find a box full of GTA IV DVDs with original soundtracks, they can't sell, give or any other way distribute them without renewing the licenses for the songs (as side note the game was also patched so that those songs were even removed from already installed Steam copies).

Citation.  Which law (or court) says they can't sell a product made with a content fully licensed for the purpose?

 

EDIT: for clarification, when I say product I mean an already manufactured physical product like a dvd or cd, not a digital product that can be altered under condition of pre agreed licensing terms.

 

Quote

With streaming this becomes a real problem because you are constantly distributing your work. If we would go with patent laws, if you put out into YT a video which included a song that was available to be licensed under CC-license, that video would probably always have the song licensed with CC even if the licesing scheme of the song was changed and the change would only concern new videos using that song. But with CR laws, which don't take into account when something was made available, when the licesing of the song is changed it concerns every single video in every streaming service that uses the song no matter when they were uploaded and published.

And as YT mentioned, I need to clarify that it isn't a problem in YT, more or less in this case it's "god bless, we have YT"-thing. Because in YT they are only claims of income and with more asshat legal teams CR strikes. Instead of those the right holders could take real legal actions and that would make things really dirty really fast just because CR laws don't make any exceptions with streaming. Yes, if you have a video you made and it features one song that while making that video was under CC-license and you host that video on your website and someone buys the rights for that song and doesn't allow it to be CC-licensed anymore, theoretically they can sue you for copyright violation for a shit ton of money (in reality every rights holder with even a bit more PR-sense than seacucumber has will first ask you to take the video down, mostly because it usually works with people whos sole purpose is not to break CR laws and taking these things to the courts might also cause the opposite effect where todays openly written laws are read differently and they actually might loose some part of control over their rights).

 

As I said, it gets tricky with youtube and ongoing revenue being raised from content that can be turned off,  but as far as I know no precedent has been set in regards to whether that can demanded by a new CR owner and the fact that it does not happen elsewhere in the industry reflects on youtube's policies being the problem not CR law.

 

 

[jagdtigger]

I have a sinking feeling that we are going to see a lot of this in the future. Buy up freely available content then extort money out from anyone using it. Next level of copyright trolling....

Edited November 16, 2019 by jagdtigger