Hey gang!
Drex here from drexfactor.com and I wanted to talk a little bit about copyright strikes
and video on Facebook and Instagram.
I’ve been flagged a lot of times on both platforms for uploading videos with copyrighted
music, most often from uploading flow sessions that feature a popular song.
It hasn’t just been me, either.
I’ve talked to a lot of other flow artists and glovers who’ve gotten flagged for using
copyrighted music and it really sucks because Facebook will block you from uploading.
That block can last anywhere between two days and a month--apparently you can even get permanently
blocked if you receive enough strikes.
It’s a difficult process to appeal and the assumption always is that you do not have
the rights to use the music in your video.
And this sucks, right?
The whole reason you get blocked is that you have a piece of music that you truly love
and moving to it is how you show your appreciation.
So how to get around this?
Well, I’ve found three strategies that work.
So let’s take a look at them.
First, you can use music that isn’t under copyright.
There are LOTS of places online that hold archives of copyright free music.
A few of them include the Free Music Archive, Epidemic Sound, and Premium Beat.
Do a Google search for copyright free music and you’ll got LOTS for results.
The benefits of this are that you might find an obscure track that’s got the perfect
vibe to match your video and will give it a unique feel that a better known track wouldn’t.
On the other hand, there’s no guarantee the music you download from one of these archives
will stay copyright free forever.
I’ve totally downloaded tracks and added them to videos only to find them getting flagged
down the road.
Also: the selection for these tracks is really limited.
It can take a lot of time to find a song that works for you.
Second, you can do something pretty sneaky by inserting background noise into your audio.
Wait, what?
Let me explain…
See, when music gets copyrighted, it means that it’s available to people who have a
license to use it.
There are many different types of licenses out there depending upon how prominently the
music is featured in a given work.
For example, choreographing something to a music track that’s going to be a major focal
point of your video is one type of license.
Another is a song that happens to be playing in the background and isn’t a major focal
point.
It’s this latter license that’s important to us.
Think about it: if Facebook and Instagram killed any video that featured any copyrighted
song whatsoever, most of the videos casual users uploaded to their sites would be taken
down.
How often have you taken a quick video in a bar or at an event where there’s music
playing in the background?
If this wasn’t allowed, people would stop sharing and stop using these sites for video
and that’s the last thing they want.
Near as I can tell, Facebook and Instagram more or less have carte blanche to host their
users’ videos provided the music in them is background music.
I put this to the test a week ago by posting a video to my Instagram twice.
The song in it was “Life is a Highway” by Tom Cochrane.
Sure enough, Instagram flagged it.
Then I recorded a minute’s worth of white noise as I rode the metro and superimposed
it over the song.
The result?
The video didn’t get flagged by either Instagram or Facebook.
Success!
The benefits of this method?
You literally get to use absolutely any track under the sun that you could want.
The drawbacks?
Well, your audio isn’t going to be terribly clean.
If you’re going for high production values on your video, this could be a major problem.
There is one final option that is pretty much guaranteed to work.
You can either write the music you intend to use yourself or get a musician to license
the use of one of their songs to you.
The first option is absolutely airtight.
You can’t run afoul of copyright if you own the copyright.
That said, you’ve got to be able to not only write music, but write music other people
will want to listen to.
The second option is actually a really good one!
For many years, the theme music on this channel has been “Drip Drop Hip Hop” by my friend
Conway Jennings.
He goes by Mr. Jennings professionally.
Conway’s a hell of a nice guy who produces amazing music--to be honest, I seriously lucked
out that I have a friend who’s not just really cool and gave me the music for free,
but also creates amazing work.
Seriously...go listen to him on soundcloud.com/mrjennings.
You will not regret it!
A few years ago, he made the move to a label that featured a lot of musicians who were
friends of mine and I was able to extend my deal to all of the music put out on their
label.
So, here’s the drawback to this approach: you need to provide documentation of this
arrangement and the points at which you need to do this can be arbitrary and frustrating.
I was eventually able to get my Facebook Page whitelisted.
Whitelisting, incidentally, is essentially giving my page carte blanche to post anything
from the label.
Getting there, though, was a pain in the ass and eventually required a phone call from
the label directly to the company managing the rights to get it cleared up.
Of course, there is one final option and that’s to not use any music at all.
Let’s face it: by default both Facebook and Instagram don’t include audio in their
playbacks.
I know that’s a drag for those of us who have a pretty intense relationship with the
music we love, but sadly that’s what these platforms are pushing us to.
There is hope, though.
About three years ago YouTube was going through the same kind of growing pains, blocking videos
that featured copyrighted music and preventing them from being viewed.
They eventually moved to a system that allows a lot of popular music to be used, but still
occasionally restricts the country it can be heard in.
It’s not perfect, but it’s better than it was.
Here’s hoping Facebook and Instagram get there, too.
And here’s hoping there’s something in this video that helps those of you out there
who are wrestling with this process right now, too.
Thanks so much for watching and enjoy the flow.
Peace!
Hey gang--couple quick notes!
First: if you got anything out of this video, please leave it a like and subscribe to my
channel.
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