Copyright, Copyfight

One of my favorite tags on BoingBoing.net is "copyfight". I religiously follow all BoingBoing blog posts tagged with this. It's a topic I care about passionately, even if I don't always fully understand it and always feel like I'm playing catch-up.

As much as the Aggie Librarian hates to admit it, he stumbled into a copyright boo-boo when enthusiastically digitizing and uploading an old video yeabook project done by his High School graduating class of 1989. Being silly kids, of course they just added whatever audio content they wanted, mostly popular music of the reining Zeitgeist. It was a video made by friends, for friends, it was never intended for world-wide distribution. Enter the Internet, and the digital conversion of raw VHS footage into editible and uploadable .mwv format, and throw in social networking sites like YouTube and Facebook.

Long story short, my offending videos got yanked--eventually. MySpace is far and above the most rigorous; Facebook found the offending content eventually, and found it again when I tried using a non-descript title and vague caption description. YouTube took by far the longest to locate and disable the same video. MySpace notified me of my error immediately, as did Facebook, when they finally took action. YouTube, most distressingly, disable the video without so much as a peep...not an email, not a comment, nothing. It took me awhile to realize that video wasn't showing up on my channel and go digging for it and find out what the issue was (well, I kinda figured what it would be, but...); Anyway, I found it--this takedown must have been awhile back because current YouTube practice has been modified; now, YouTube will merely disable the audio, leaving you with a silent movie. This was kind of crappy, but at least you could, in theory, record your own voiceover commentary or something.

I had read only in passing about YouTube's "Audio Swap" functionality and assumed it meant you could use it to record a lame-ass voiceover or something and didn't investigate further. When YouTube finally disabled my offending video, I investigated the Audio Swap option because YouTube presented it to me as the only way I could get my video reposted again on my channel. Fine, I said, and clicked on the button.

I was surprised how sophisticated the choices were for Audio Swap. In short order I found a peppy Pop tune that I could use legally as a substitute audio for my video. Since the video contained lots of images of senior prom, I chose a song called "Beautiful People", since this seemed apt; a lot of the girls who went to my High School and were featured in the video were indeed hot. It wasn't the 80s classic tune that was our Class/Prom Theme song, but since that was under copyright and since the licensing fees to use it were outrageously expensive, the generic pop tune was the best compromise I could reach.

I soon realized that the "Audio Swap" functionality could be used for ANY video I had uploaded, not just my one posting with a copyright violation. I had a lot of content that was long and frankly not very interesting from an audio standpoint. I was involved in NJROTC in High School, and my mom videotaped a lot of our events, which I have subsequently digitized. Basically it is of our Male Armed Drill Team marching around doing Exhibition Drill, different meet after meet. If you can hear the commander at all (assuming he's not drowned out by construction equipment, or high winds), all you here is standard military cadence, and the relevant commands given to execute each move. It's interesting maybe the first 2 times you watch, but after you've seen one and enjoyed its nostalgia value, that's about it by way of interest.

I realized I needed to kick these videos up a notch, as the Cajun chefs say. I decided I needed music with a driving beat; I experimented with both Heavy Metal and Dance Electronica/Techno samples from YouTube's vast generic music files. YouTube lets you preview and sample various selections before finally picking on your ideal choice, so you can pick just the right music to synch up with the on-screen action. Once you've made your match, you click on a button to swap out the original audio for the music, and within an hour or so the audio conversion is done and you've got your newly minted music video...your image content happily married to YouTube-kosher audio content.

Of course, the coolest aspect of all this is the fact that of course none of this audio content was just created ex nihilo. No, these are pieces of music composed and performed by small, up-and-coming indy bands. They clearly enter into a special contract with YouTube to grant limited license use of their material for its customers; In return, YouTube supplies an automatic link to iTunes for viewers of the video to go and purchase the song if they like what they hear. YouTube does this automatically and the owner of the video content doesn't have to do anything, it's an automatic (required) feature of the "Swap Audio" feature.

What is hilarious about this is that newer bands are reaping the benefits of a new market that older, "established" musicians and mainstream record labels have stupidly priced themselves out of completely. This generic music isn't famous, but I'll tell you, it's not bad either...it's actually reasonable quality stuff and I really have enjoyed sampling the various tracks trying to find that perfect fit between my visual content and the audio content on offer. I feel like a professional videographer doing this sh*t. It's way cool. It gives the new band lots of exposure, and lets them "go viral" easily. If a lot of YouTube users like their stuff and use their music over and over in their home movies, the tunes will prove catchy and people will buy their downloads and CDs and forget about/bypass the major record labels with their old business models built on traditional, highly restrictive copyright. It's a win-win, it's a beautiful free market solution to a stupid situation that warms the heart even of this crusty old socialist.

Maybe someday the big stupid dinosaurs like the RIAA will catch on and start offering their content for limited online use at something like a reasonable rate...say twice the cost of a regular internet download on iTunes for limited exclusive use of their audio content on 1 social networking site at a time, just click a little paypal-type button and you're done. Hell, I ended up buying a digital copy of that mainstream tune that got yanked from my original video because I remembered how much I loved the song.

Some progressive recording artists are surrendering to the inevitable and creating their own free YouTube channels, like Billy Joel. He knows people want his content, so fine, he just puts it out there on his channel...not everything, but enough to hook you in.

The Audio Swap option, created as a lawsuit dodge alternative by YouTube is a compromise; You don't get the stuff you hear on the radio that everyone knows and has known for the past 30-40 years...but in exchange you get new and innovative stuff that NOBODY knows about but will positively LOVE once they hear it. I'm serious! My "view" counters on ALL my videos with "swapped" music audio have spiked since I successfully completed the swaps. People love this! It makes my videos more interesting and watchable, and it gives the bands in question great viral exposure to a wider audience that would otherwise not have been possible through more traditional means. It runs counterintuitively to the way copyright is supposed to work and protect artists and I absolutely love that.

Don't get me wrong, even these generic bands should have the right to sue the pants off of other bands that pirate their stuff and pass it off as their own. That's just not cool...unless they improve on it and do it better than you then hey, sucks to be you. Like people complaining about how Maldroid ripped off from Joy Division to do "He Said, She Said". And I'm like, so frickin' what? Maldroid did it better, end of story. Their song is just plain a better song, more listenable, etc. Joy Division has street cred, they've been around way longer and became the basis for New Order, yada yada, but on that one song, I'm sorry dude, but Maldroid wins it.

There is still a place and a role for copyright. I hate that the Japanese anime industry is suffering because of hacker fansubs that undercut their product; it also takes money from dedicated English dub actors, who are very cool people--definitely a bummer and not a cool thing to do. The Japanese studios should sue the crap out of the unscrupulous pirates. I love that they're doing more adult/mature content these days but maybe they need to re-diversify and capture back some of the kid market as well, to have solid footing. We adult Otaku love our stuff alright, but they need to keep their audience base wide and diverse to stay viable. Catering exclusively to Geekdom is a path to ruin, I'm sad to say.

Anyway, I've been eager to blog about this since last night; finally to commit this to writing.