I'chiliad a large YouTube fan.

We can thank YouTube for cutting the gordian knot of video codecs. Instead of futzing around with codecs and media players, YouTube'due south universal, Wink-based spider web video "but works". Afterward all this time, it turns out the killer app for Flash wasn't advertising or spider web games. It was video. Information technology's a cross-platform model Microsoft is aping with Silverlight, and for skillful reason.

YouTube feels like a web establishment already, fifty-fifty though the site is less than 2 years old. I love the fact that (about) any video ephemera I can think of can exist plant on YouTube, and instantly shared with anyone in the world using zilch more than than a web browser and a hyperlink. Information technology's a beautiful thing.

But i affair bugs me about YouTube. On their upload page, you lot'll detect this disclaimer:

Do not upload any Television shows, music videos, music concerts, or commercials without permission unless they consist entirely of content you created yourself. Delight refer to our Copyright Tips page for some guidelines and links to help you lot make up one's mind whether your video infringes someone else's copyright.

Take a minute to read YouTube'southward copyright tips page. I'm serious. Read it. It's full of gems like this:

  • It doesn't thing how long or brusk the prune is, or exactly how it got to YouTube. If y'all taped it off cable, videotaped your TV screen, or downloaded it from another website, it is still copyrighted, and requires the copyright owner'due south permission to distribute.
  • It doesn't matter whether or not you give credit to the possessor/author/songwriter -- information technology is still copyrighted.
  • It doesn't thing that you are not selling the video for coin -- it is nonetheless copyrighted.
  • It doesn't matter whether or non the video contains a copyright notice -- it is still copyrighted.
  • It doesn't affair whether other like videos appear on our site -- it is still copyrighted.
  • It doesn't matter if you created a video made of short clips of copyrighted content -- even though you edited information technology together, the content is nonetheless copyrighted.

Now think back through all the videos y'all've watched on YouTube. How many of them contained any original content? Let'south see. Recently I've linked to the faux Machete trailer from Grindhouse, a classic Kids in the Hall skit (and some other ane), a surreal computer animated skit called Bingo the Clown-O, and the Writer'due south Award intro from the 2007 Emmys. Discover annihilation in common here? That's right. Well-nigh everything of interest on YouTube is copyrighted content.

Information technology's perhaps the ultimate case of cognitive dissonance: by YouTube's ain rules, YouTube cannot exist. And yet it does.

YouTube: f**k copyright(tm)

How do we reconcile YouTube's official hard-line position on copyright with the reality that 90% of the content on their site is clearly copyrighted and conspicuously used without permission? Information technology seems YouTube has an awfully convenient "don't enquire, don't tell" policy-- they make no effort to verify that the uploaded content is either original content or fair use. The copyrighted content stays upwardly until the copyright possessor complains. Then, and only then, is it removed.

Anytime we become aware that a video or whatsoever part of a video on our site infringes the copyrights of a tertiary party, nosotros volition take it down from the site. Nosotros are required to do so by law. If yous believe that a video on the site infringes your copyright, transport us a copyright observe and nosotros volition have it down.

Information technology'due south completely glossed over on the YouTube copyright page in favor of 100% original content, but the loophole in copyright is off-white utilise. Under the imprint of fair use, yous could legally upload a video without the copyright holder's permission. Anyone who contributes anything to the web should have the four factors of fair use commited to retentiveness by at present:

  1. the purpose of the use
  2. the nature of the copyrighted piece of work
  3. the relative corporeality of the portion used
  4. the market consequence of the use on the copyrighted work

These are the four factors courts use to determine if something is fair apply. It's worth digging a footling deeper to come across how these could potentially apply to a typical YouTube video clip.

fair use factors

1. Was information technology transformative? Uploading a two minute clip from Kids in the Hall isn't transformative in the least. Zippo new was added. No context was provided. It'southward not a parody, it's not enquiry, it's non commentary. It's a minor segment of the original content, transplanted to the web. It'southward only "transformative" in the sense that it'due south much more readily bachelor to the public.

2. What is the nature of the source fabric? The majority of clips on YouTube are there to charm; they describe their source material from works of entertainment. Amusement is an enjoyable pastime, only it's not a public good. Dissemenation of facts or information benefits the public; video clips of man getting hit in the groin with football game.. not so much.

iii. How much was taken? YouTube instituted a 10 infinitesimal length limit, probably to prevent excessive use claims from taking root. Information technology's a policy that seems to work. Most clips tend to be adequately small, even after factoring in the ten infinitesimal limit.

4. What's the market effect? I find it very difficult to believe that the brusk, grainy, low-resolution clips on YouTube could have any kind of measurable negative financial effect on content providers. This is 1 case where YouTube's below-the-bottom-of-the-barrel video quality works in their favor.

The typical YouTube clip does well on the last ii factors of the fair employ examination, but utterly fails the first two. This is not good, because the factors are listed in order of importance; the transformative and nature tests are considered the virtually significant factors past courts. It is not possible to brand a supportable fair utilise case for near video clips using copyrighted textile on YouTube.

I'grand not attacking YouTube hither. I think having access to all this copyrighted content in bite-size embeddable form is ultimately a net good for both consumers and creators. What I don't understand is why YouTube continues to get away with the big copyright prevarication they've perpetuated from 24-hour interval i. They pay lip service to copyright, while building their business on an empire of unauthorized, copyrighted content. It's so brazen-- so blatant.

You can argue that copyright law is broken. I won't disagree with you. But I still dislike YouTube's massive hypocrisy in this surface area, and I wonder why other people and companies don't get the costless ride from the hyper-litigious amusement industry that YouTube seems to bask.