"an email". You're lucky.
I got a couple of videos with Creative Commons music. I also contacted the original author and copyright holder about this. Apparently CDBaby just took his songs and files copyright claims on all YouTube videos with his music. He's a poor guy from Australia and has no resources to go against them. So, now, every time I get a copyright claim, I have to challenge it. After giving the evidence, they just let me have it, wait a couple of weeks and submit the same claim again.
What's funny is that if you go to that album's page on CD Baby, you can see that the Creative Commons license and original author's name and copyright are right there next to the option to listen to the songs.
After numerous claims, I finally gave up and just removed the audio track on all the videos myself.
If you read the thing carefully, YouTube doesn't even review the case. Whatever you write there goes directly to people claiming to be the "copyright holder".
YouTube should really have an option "The claimant doesn't have copyright on this material". If you give enough evidence, and if they release the claim on video after that was checked, the claimant should lose the right to claim copyright on that audio match for all videos.
Google seems incapable of admitting that humans are still a necessary component in these sorts of things. You see the same thing play out in many other Google services.
The solution that I'm proposing does not. At least, not YouTube employees. It would work like this:
1. Offer "the claimant doesn't have copyright for that audio" as one of the options.
2. You supply the proof of this (as it already works)
3. The claimant reviews this proof (as it already works) In my case, it's going to their own website and seeing that they are claiming rights on a public domain music.
4. The claimant releases the claim
5. YouTube marks that the claimant has no rights over that audio and they cannot pester anyone else with that. This would only work if I select that they don't own the copyright in the first step, and they acknowledge it themselves in step 4.
Basically, all it changes is adding one more checkbox when fighting a claim and aftermath that the claimant has confirmed themselves that they don't actually own copyright to that work.
How my video with 47 million views was stolen on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4AeoAWGJBw
ContentID.
But I feel like that's good. It means that the audio is already in YouTube database, so YouTube could simply remove that audio from that claimant's "library" of protected works.
Tos is meaningless. You can break it. There is pretty much never going to be any real consequence for doing so.
And I, too, am angered that there's no option in the contact from YouTube for "this is a fraudulent or false claim. I own this material."
YouTube should tell BMI, Sony, DG, to be more careful when flagging amateur performances of classical works.
Basically, at some point this conversation happened:
Label: We don't want to upload our music to YouTube because we're afraid of piracy.
YouTube: We promise that won't be a problem. We'll work with you to ensure you'll be happy with the state of things on YouTube.
The current system was born of that and nobody gives a hoot about the small/medium players who get screwed over by the insanity.
No surprise there. Encouraging small creators may have been necessary at some point, to increase user base, but at this point it's the creators that are compelled to be on YouTube, because that's where the audience is. Meanwhile, as long as the big labels upload their official music videos to YouTube, the userbase is pretty much guaranteed.
False negatives are a problem, because big content rights holders get upset. False positives rarely matter.
Not to ignore cases of manual copyright flagging abuse, but that's usually done for vindictive or careless reasons; there shouldn't be any reason for anyone to flag a video of someone performing an old classical piece.
Neither users nor even copyright holders really have that power (at least against automated system). Consequently, it seems like there's nobody in the room pushing for better outcomes for false positives.
Edit: also fascinating that scams call out other scams, such as this: https://www.binaryoptions-sentinel.com/the-trader-app-scam-t...
I do career coaching and occasionally get clients who have worked for incredibly scammy outfits. It's sad but these businesses can easily grow on the backs of (often really low-paid) employees who are just treading water in their careers, and the employees typically hear similar career-related promises from the principals. "You'll be off the ground floor in no time," etc.
The only reason I put anything on YouTube is because it's the most convenient video hosting platform. If archive.org can host videos, that is perfect.
I recently got an email saying they had received a claim from the copyright holder, which seems strange as it is unlikely that the copyright holder would wish to identify themself.
The so-called "copyright holder" was actually a music publisher, and there was music in the video at various points, so I assumed it must be about that.
But I looked at the identified time section, and there was no music at all. It was just a guy talking. I have no idea why it matched.
I submitted an appeal. It gives you several options for why you want to appeal, but notably absent is "the video does not contain any of the claimant's material", so my "appeal" had to be submitted on the grounds that my (non-)usage of the claimant's audio is fair use...
YouTube's copyright system is laughable.
[0] If you're interested, this is one of my favourites: https://youtube.com/watch?v=BeeUXNF1H8s