YT music policies and monetization

[otacon237]

Hi everyone,

I am new to the forum, not new to YT but new to creating and hopefully someday monetizing content. I am slowly growing my new channel and am hoping to make it focused around mostly gaming and other hobbies.

I am a little confused about the descriptions in the YT music policies list. I'd like to use a short sample of a Glitch Mob song as my intro for my World of Tanks videos. I know Wargaming allows monetization so I am good on that front but I am confused about the YT music policies.

It says an ad may appear on my videos if I use the song. Does that mean I am ok to use it? What about monetization? Will they take a percentage of my profits if I monetize the video, or will I need to have more ads and they get money from one and I, the other? Or will I be hit with a copyright strike. Do I still have to contact Glitch Mob directly to get permission to monetize from their songs?

Sorry in advance if this topic has been posted, I found some similar ones but nothing with the specific answers I am looking for.

Thanks everyone

 

[Rails2Revolution]

Hey man, in short, don't bother trying to use "normal" music in your videos. (Music you'd hear on radio, Spotify, etc)

The main reason you tend to never hear people using mainstream music in their videos is because they will lose the ability to monetize the video, rather it gets monetized by the music label that owns the music instead and they will make the money off your video.

Not to mention using some music will get your video blocked in certain or all countries. And it can change from being just monetized by the label to blocked without warning.

You can always approach the artist, but it's very unlikely they'll let you use their music. You have to remember cinema for example pays large money to use an artists song in their film, by comparison a YouTuber asking for its rights for free is laughable in most cases.

If the artist is very small you may have a shot if they're feeling extra generous but especially if they're signed you don't have a chance.

For this reason, youtubers usually seek out what is known as royalty free music, or music licensed with Creative Commons.

Royalty free music is just music you can legally use and make money off in your videos. Creative Commons licenses are similar you just need to give credit based on artist request. Here are some sites you'll find useful:

Incompetech
Freesound
Bensound
FreePD
CCMixter
PacDV
PublicDomain4u

Now on another note, "fair use" allows anyone to use any content including artist music but only short amounts and for certain reasons. For instance, if you make a video about analyzing a song and need to play a snippet, or using an extremely short snippet for comedic effect. The problem with fair use on YouTube is that the policy will be that your video will get monetized by the music as soon as it's picked up by youtubers detection system. Next you'll have the argue a case that the music usage fits in accordingly with fair use laws in the US. The problem is that the judge of that is the music label that made the claim, not a third party. If they decline your case you can then leave it be and lose control of that video, or try again and risk a copyright strike and the video taken down if declined a second time. Stupid system I know, but unfortunately that's the way it is. Luckily they usually won't send the second declination because it means sending an actual DCMA takedown notice to YouTube but that's not to say they won't.

Because of this I'd recommend also not trying to use mainstream music under fair use unless you're a large enough channel YouTube actually cares enough to protect. You have to understand even youtubers who review music such as the needle drop refrain from actually using the songs in the video, even when they do comes under fair use, just because of the pain of a situation it creates.

Anyway,
You seemed new to monetization things and music policies so I added quite a bit of info. Hope it wasn't too much

Good luck

 

[otacon237]

hey thanks man! I definitely appreciate all the info I can get. I have been using some royalty free stuff but actually did wonder how some people get away with using "normal" music in their videos. the biggest offenders of this i see are recordings of twitch streams where the person has music playing in the background, you can easily hear it but i don't know if they receive copyright strikes for it (maybe their video is being monetized by the publishers though). but like you said it does seem that big youtubers get a lot more "leeway" with this.

 

[subversiveasset]

Hi everyone,

I am new to the forum, not new to YT but new to creating and hopefully someday monetizing content. I am slowly growing my new channel and am hoping to make it focused around mostly gaming and other hobbies.

I am a little confused about the descriptions in the YT music policies list. I'd like to use a short sample of a Glitch Mob song as my intro for my World of Tanks videos. I know Wargaming allows monetization so I am good on that front but I am confused about the YT music policies.

It says an ad may appear on my videos if I use the song. Does that mean I am ok to use it? What about monetization? Will they take a percentage of my profits if I monetize the video, or will I need to have more ads and they get money from one and I, the other? Or will I be hit with a copyright strike. Do I still have to contact Glitch Mob directly to get permission to monetize from their songs?

Sorry in advance if this topic has been posted, I found some similar ones but nothing with the specific answers I am looking for.

Thanks everyone

So, as @Rails2Revolution said, whenever Music Policies says "You can't monetize your video," what this means is that if/when the content ID recognizes the use of that song, the original content owner will take ALL monetization for that video. However, this usually means that the content owner will not issue a copyright strike.

In Music Policies, whenever you see "Eligible for revenue sharing" (this usually shows up for covers you might perform), then that means that if/when content ID recognizes the use of that song, the original content owner will take SOME monetization for that video, but you will still get a remainder. But again, this usually means that the content owner will not issue a copyright strike.

You may see that certain videos are not viewable in certain countries. This means that those videos will be blocked in the relevant countries, but again, this usually will not lead to a copyright strike.

However, if you see in Music Policies "This song is not available for use in your YouTube videos." then that means that if/when content ID recognizes the use of that song, then the original content owner will likely issue a copyright strike.

These are general rules. Policyholders can change their policies at any time (so you are never completely "safe"), and you could still be found to infringe for a different reason (often, there are multiple policy holders, so even if one is OK, another might not be.)

So, as a heads up...if you hear someone using "regular" music in their video, then you cannot assume that they are keeping the ad revenue. Chances are it's already been identified in content ID, and the money is going to the original copyright holder.

Plus, for every video you see that is still on youtube, you don't know how many videos may have been taken down. Copyright strikes are manual, so it's possible for some people to slide "under the radar" as it were.