Yes, you can dispute the claim... and the copyright holder then has a set time frame where they decide to either drop it or to file a claim in court. It is not up to YouTube.
The only way YouTube would get involved is if you can prove you either created the work yourself or if you have written documentation showing you have all of the necessary permissions to use said work.
Right. That's what i actually meant.
I remember watching a video of a film critic where he said he often gets hit with copyright claims and disputes them by claiming fair use. It often works out well for him, it seems.
The reality is that the usage of copyrighted material is a big part of youtube and can add a lot of value to a video. A lot of people do it and a lot of people get away with it. It doesn't work out well for everyone, but it works out well to a lot of people. If you can provide good arguments to why your video falls under fair use, and if the company has the ability to understand that you're actually right, there's a good chance they won't do s**t about it. They can take you to court, assuming you're willing to go forward with this. But let's imagine that you're reviewing a movie and narrate over a few images. Not sure it would be a good idea for a company to go to court over this since, since if you won, which would most likely be the case, they would set a big precedent and only give more power to people who wanna do the same.
Essentially, my point is this: If you've read enough about fair use and if are sure that what you're doing falls under that category, you shouldn't be afraid to go forward with your project just because someone might claim the content you have on your video. Just imagine the amount of videos and great content that would simply not exist if people just decided to never use anything they legally don't own.
Fair use EXISTS. It's a right that you have. You have the right to use other people's work without their permission as long as you're reviewing it, using it to illustrate your point, transforming it in order to create something completely new or making a parody. As long as your video doesn't work as a substitute to the original work, you should be ok with it.
So, don't be afraid of it. Do what you wanna do. Just make sure you educate yourself on the subject. The problem here is that a lot of people don't really know what fair use is. There are a ton of myths about the subject. And if you don't know what fair use actually is, chances are you won't be able to make a good case for yourself.
