Forum › Off-Topic › YouTube copyright claim when using ingame sound - FC, please respond
- You have to be logged in to reply to this thread.
Chris K
06-04-2014, 09:44 CET
Pledger
Total Posts: 69
YouTube copyright claim when using ingame sound - FC, please respond
I uploaded the first sector of my playthrough of the alpha on YouTube and was greeted with a copyright claim.
I didn't use any music, but the ingame-music was at some point recognized as "Heavy Machinery" by "Marc Rosenberger ". I didn't find any such title anywhere, buit since it recognizes only part of the video, I guess that is just a mistake.
I don't want a (wrong at that) message about the song on my video, so I definitely want to object to the claim, but what do I answer? YouTube gives me the following options (translated from german):
1. "I own the cd/dvd or bought the video online"
2. "I don't sell the video and don't earn money with it"
3. "I mentioned the owner in the video"
4. "it is an original video of mine, I own all the rights"
5. "I got a license or a written permission ..."
6. "my usage falls under fair use"
7. "the content is copyright free"
1, 3, 4, 5, 7 seem to be completely off the table, so 2 and 6 remain
I don't make money from the video, so I could just choose
2. "I don't sell the video and don't earn money with it",
but in case I want to change that somewhere in the future, I'd rather handle it differently.
When using
6. fair use,
however, there is the problem that there is no fair use law in germany.
So how do I respond correctly to the claim?
Anybody got any experience with those kinds of claims?
I have no past experience with Youtube claims, but I would go with option 6 and some text explanation. I am not sure under which country's law Youtube works.
Thanks for your answer.
After checking that I needed to confirm my selection, I clicked on
2. "I don't sell the video..."
and got the explaination from YouTube that it doesn't matter whether I make money or not. That begs the question why they give you that option anyway.
Same goes for 1. 3,4,5 and 7 definitely don't apply, since the claim is completely wrong, so only 6 is possible anyways.
I just noticed that 2 other songs by "Marc Rosenberger" got claimed on a BIA-test video I did (where only JA-music was playing). Some of those songs seem to be very similar to JA-music.
Could someone from Full Control confirm, that the mentioned song
"Heavy Machinery" by "Marc Rosenberger "
or any other song by that artist
is NOT part of the JAF-soundtrack?
I am fairly certain of this, but I don't want to make a wrong claim or rather response to the claim.
I've done further research on who this guy is and found this:
http://www.dynamedion.com/team/marcrosenberger/
He might or might have not worked on JA2 since he is doing game music, but what he did was register the JA2 soundtracks with Audiam.com, a company that monetizes music for artists. That's where we got the copyright infringement claim.
Now we clearly need bitComposer here, they're they ultimate copyright owners.
It's a huge issue for streamers and this will land us on Youtube's blacklist asap, so please clarify.
The only Marc Rosenberger I found seems to do Jazz music. I didn't find any of the titles, though, and they wouldn't fit Jazz music in the slightest. I agree that this is most likely a scam.
However, I don't see any way to fight this guy except for objecting to every single claim. Maybe whoever has the rights to the Jagged Alliance music would have to try to do something permanent because he cashes in on their music.
Good job finding this. So he did compose the music for BIA.
The question is what that means for videos for Flashback. Seems like they used JA2-music, not BIA-music which means that the claims should be justified for BIA, but not for Flashback?
In any case this should fall under fair use (though I'm still not sure what that means for me here in germany and overall outside the US).
Maybe we should wait for Full Control to (hopefully) give us some info about this.
As I suspected, it's all in the credits. I check BIA manual and look what I've found:
Seems these guys did music for BIA then went and registered it with Audiam.com so nobody can use their music on Youtube. How idiotic is that? I've contacted bitComposer, they clearly need a sit-down with their lawyers and Dynamedion cause otherwise streaming and posting videos for JA:F has just been kicked in the nuts.
PS: I have no clue where the "original" music is. The most they did for BIA is remaster the old JA2 songs then claim they' own it. In the meantime I've removed all the music from my uploaded videos. I don't want to fight Youtube on a battle that's clearly not mine to fight.
Yes, this sounds ridiculous... Youtube generates publicity for the game, and the people they commissioned to make music for the game are trying to stifle it?
Please post any answers you get from bitComposer. It would be a shame if this would keep people from posting stuff on Flashback. Every bit of publicity is important for a rather small project like this.
I'd probably still post videos on it, but I might use different music or something like this which would be a shame.
Using the stock Youtube DRM free music is out of the question because you would only mislead and confuse your viewers. When you're streaming a game, the music is an integral part of the gameplay and you can't "fake" it in such a lame manner. Even worse, when streaming live on Twitch.TV, you can't turn off JA:F music unless you kill the whole sound. And if someone idiot reports your stream as a DMCA infrigement, Twitch.TV will kill your account in the blink of an eye.
It's an issue for lawyers, not for us, the end-users.
PS: If anyone has old JA2 vids on Youtube with music in the background, could you please check if those were flagged too? I asked Slax from BP (who recenly uploaded a v1.13 walkthrough), but wouldn't hurt to get this checked from various sources.
Thanks a lot Roman for tuning in.
Please give us any information you can get.
@Shanga:
I just talked to someone who does a 1.13 LP and he ran into the same problem, as well as someone else he talked to. Definitely seems to affect all JA (at least JA2 and BIA) content.
On YouTube it doesn't seem to be that big of a deal as long as you don't try to monetize the video yourself, since the only problem seems to be ads that make money for the license holder, but if I don't want to monetize my videos myself, I also don't want anyone else to do it.
I wouldn't mind if it was Full Control or the creators of JA1+2 because it is their game(s), but I don't like it to be bitComposer or whoever cashes in on this who didn't contribute in any way to the game I play.
When Kevin Manthei was writting the JA2 music, this dude (Marc whatever) was touring Germany as a backing vocalist of an obscure band. Now he has the nerve to claim he wrote the soundtrack? Wtf... I wonder how Manthei feels about this?!
The JA2 music is owned my Kevin Mathei and sold as such. I've found this reproduction on Youtube of his Wizardry/JA2 music CD. There's no doubt we're listening to the same stuff.
As part of the license deal with bC for making a JA game, bC has purchased the rights for us to use the assets for the old games and given us free use.
I dont know anything about their deal with the original authors indiviually etc - but between FC and bC the deal is very clear. We are allowed to use all assets (VO, music, assets, code etc) for Flashback.
I am not a lawyer, but that should put you guys in "fair use" as fans.
Will poke the bC guys Monday and bring this up. I think that Youtube has some automated scanners that do this stupid stuff, so its not a manual person I think. But point them to us, we will point them to bC as the IP owner.
Thank you Thomas for commenting on this.
Thanks a lot to you and also Roman for doing this on the weekend and while I'm at it thanks a lot for your hard work on the game. Great start so far.
Yes, it is definitely an automated system. As soon as it gets uploaded, the claim is there. Please ask them if there is anything that can be done about this. After all it is in their interest as well when the franchise gets promoted (even though I don't have the amounts of viewers that I really count for that, but luckily I'm not the only one).
Please give us feedback about what resulted from your talk with bC. I am going to wait to do anything about it untill I hear back from you.
To make this clear, it's not bC who's reporting our videos. It's that stupid bot from Audiam.com, that makes off Youtube banners and gives a portion to copyright owner. As any automated system, is prone to be retarded at some point.
Now, who submitted JA2/BIA music to Audiam.com for a quick buck, that's another question and it's for bitComposer to handle it.
EDIT: I hear another JA2 streamer got flagged for JA2 music, but this time by the company representing Kevin Manthei. So the question that's raised here is just how to deal with Youtube on this matter so they don't blacklist the channels. I honestly do not care to monetize Youtube videos on my own, I have no problems running banners if the revenues go to the original authors. But I would go ballistic if I'd lose my work due to a stupid Youtube script.
Shanga: Replied to your mail yesterday evening. For the rest: We have taken notice of the problem. Please note that we, as bitComposer, didn't put any music on any filter and we'd usually never do this (there might be some weird cases where we'd have to go that way but I cannot even imagine such a siutation currently). It seems that this is related to the recent activation of a new algorythm at Youtube. You can read more about that here:
It wouldn't even make sense for us to block things. Not even those who try to monetize their videos taken with our games and / or IPs. I mean, that's press for us and we see Let's Plays as one major pillar of the future in terms of gaming journalism. Feel free to monetize your videos.
Regarding the current problem: I'm on this and trying to solve this. I am pretty sure that I can solve the problem with Dynamedion. Regarding Kevin Manthei: Anyone knows if he worked as a freelancer on the music for JA2 or was he employeed by Sir-Tech? That might be important as we own the complete IP and every content created commercially for it besides some really minor stuff. And if the music (which I currently cannot tell) was created under the flag of Sir-Tech we own it as well. And from what I know, we actually do. The only thing which could MAYBE be a workaround for that would be that the music was buyed in for the game. But even that should be a solveable problem.
We appreciate your help Michael and the quick response. The issue with all of us isn't the fact that we cannot monetize our videos (might be in the future, when we have 2 million viewers and JA:F is the best game of the year :P), but the strikes Youtube ContentID puts on the account automatically when it finds copyrighted music.
I had no idea what crap bomb they dropped and how widespread the damage was until I read that article. Thanks for the link and hopefully, at least where JA music is concerned, something can be done. Regarding Manthei, I am pretty sure Ian Currie should remember those kind of details.
PS: Google seems keen to dive into the toilet more and deeper with every new update they make. Seems like "don't be evil" is nowdays "don't (forget to) be evil".
Thank you very much, Michael, for your quick reply.
Any help you can provide would be very welcome.
The YouTubers I talked to didn't notice any real repercussions on their accounts apart from someone elses monetization of their videos, but it is still very unsettling not knowing whether something like that might occur in the future.
Short update: A colleague of mine just had a short call with Dynamedion and they'll try to remove the filter for the mentioned music parts (although not sure how long this will take or how easy it is. No idea how complicated that stuff is, music related stuff has become a real pain in the arse lately).
Speaking of retarded filters, I've tried to use the Youtube in-built function to remove the copyrighted audio and that failed miserably. Funny enough, now my vids are in a limbo - they're not contested nor clear so I can't even dispute the claim. I reverted 1 or 2 of them just to be able to dispute, but I expect a nice fat error there too. Hats off to the brightest and best programmers in the world.
That is great news, Michael. Thanks a lot for your efforts on this.
I don't mind if it takes a while as long as the copyright claims disappear.
Does that account for all JA-related music (except for Mr. Manthei's claims of course)?
It would be very annoying to all of us having to check back with you guys every once in a while because a new claim about a different song appears.
@Shanga:
I tried that as well and the audio is a mess after that.
Seems like the messed up audio was only after the cut, so in theory if the claim was all the way at the end, you could cut it out without too much of a problem.
There is, however, an option to "save as" that keeps the original video. I would suggest to always use that.
Update: I've reverted two of the vids and disputed them, just for the sake of it. I claimed fair use policy and even pointed them to this topic. I am very very curious how this goes.
PS: I already loathe the thought of going through this when JA:F will have a full working radio station. Just imagine how many copyrights you have to dispute there in 2-3 hours of stream.
If I remember correctly, it was already said that they are going to create the music for those radio stations themselves, so this shouldn't become an issue in that case, as long as the wrong party doesn't claim the songs to be their own.
However, make sure not to dispute more than 2 claims. If you get a negative answer for 3 disputes, apparently your account can be closed. This shouldn't be a problem since they said they were gonna remove the claims, but better be safe than sorry.
First, thank you all for taking such an interest in this, and quick action, too. And thanks for bringing it up in the first place, Chris K.
Just to confirm, I'm getting 'Kevin Manthei' hits on almost all of my JA2 videos. In the beginning, I tried disputing them on grounds of 'fair use', but all of those were turned down within a few hours, without comment or explanation.
I must've disputed around 20 or so claims, without any impact on my YouTube account; I'm still 'in good standing' in all categories.
However, I only took the first step in disputing the claims; once turned down the first time, you have the option of disputing the claim again. Doing so unsuccessfully might have repercussions.
And I fully agree, Shanga, the music is an important part of the game. Turning it off would take away too much.
@bcMichael - I have asked Ian about Kevin Manthei and the answer was that Kevin did work as a freelancer for Sir-tech; he was not an employee.
I have been trying to forward you the email directly but seems your spam guard has just blacklisted Gmail and mails get turned down.
UPDATE: Same here, I disputed 2 claims on the videos, linking them to this topic as proof but today I got a message saying both disputes were rejected. Oh well...
Moerges - could you post a few links to a few JA2 recordings that have been hit by Content ID and the details of the claim? Preferably examples of different claims.
That goes for anyone else who's been affected.
I hear Kevin Manthei has promised to look into the issue, but needs to sends samples of videos to the company that handles the rights for him.
On JA:BIA and JA:F apparently the system tags the music as owned by Dynamedion, which is fine, because it's an issue handled directly by bitComposer and should be solved soon.
We need samples of JA2 (v1.13 is ok) videos tagged by Youtube with Kevin Manthei copyright, too.
On a side note, this is absolutely a personal choice. If the revenues indeed go to the proper copyright owner, I for one am perfectly OK with it. In the end, as someone suggested on FB, you can always turn off the music (hopefully JA:F alpha will have the option soon) and do your thing. And I do think that if you forego monetization and just accept the banners, your account will still be in good standing.
So I think we should take this one step at a time:
Step 1) List a few samples of every claim
Step 2) Get a confirmation those listed as intermediary are legit
Step 3) Each on his own decide if they want to dispute the claim or just let it be.
Note that while most of the music identified is 'war of the worlds' and 'swarm of the killer bees', there are two different tracks on example 4: 'marching alone' and 'the hunt'.
If you need more examples or any additional info, please let me know.
Finally, allow me to say that I do not mind Kevin getting some revenue (not that it's in any way a significant amount) out of these videos—as long as it (or rather, part of it) actually goes to him. Still, I don't like being at the mercy of YouTube concerning the future of my uploaded videos. After all, YT reserves the right to 'monetise [for a third party], block or track' any videos with a content ID match. (source)
I'm curious to see how this matter plays out. A sincere Thank You to all of you who sacrifice their time on dealing with this.
(Excuse the double posting, but seeing that our messages overlapped, I think it's less confusing this way.)
Quoted Shanga@BP:
On a side note, this is absolutely a personal choice. If the revenues indeed go to the proper copyright owner, I for one am perfectly OK with it. In the end, as someone suggested on FB, you can always turn off the music (hopefully JA:F alpha will have the option soon) and do your thing. And I do think that if you forego monetization and just accept the banners, your account will still be in good standing.
I fully agree: If the proper copyright owner benefits from the matched videos, that's fine by me. I'd just like clarity so I know my videos are safe and won't be taken down in the future due to the content ID matches (as much clarity and safety one can ever have with anything concerning YT, of course. ;)).
And just to confirm, yes, my account is 'in good standing' despite a total of 29 content ID matches, around 10 of which I've disputed. I should add that I've never tried monetizing any of my videos, though (nor do I plan to).
