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Vampire Frog Music

Piracy Update - Taking them of iTunes. Can it be Done?

4/22/2014

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In a word, yes. 

I googled "iTunes copyright infringement" or something like that, and came up with this link:

http://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/itunesstorenotices/

So I filled out the forms and all, and sent the following explanation along with it:

These individuals have used MY cover performance of the song She Sells Sanctuary by the Cult and represented it as their own. I did not grant them permission to do so. My performance, which predates theirs by two years, is available here without the vocals they later added: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8ZjJzB33ZQ Clearly, mine is dated in September, 2011, and clearly it is the exact same performance that they have only added vocals to. Thank you for your prompt action on this matter.

I can't remember when I exactly sent that, but Apple Internet Services Legal replied to me quite quickly, a matter of a day or two, on April 12. They said they'd contact the provider (Routenote distribution service) and give them 5 business days to respond. If Routenote confirmed my claim, they continued, they'd remove the song, but if Routenote stood up for their thieves, they'd leave it up to me and Routenote to figure things out.

Lo and behold, five business days later, I received a message from iTunes legal telling me that they had removed all of the content from the iTunes store.  I checked - Not only did they remove the song that I asked them to, but they also removed the whole album it was on! Nifty! This is progress. But clearly I still have to go after Routenote, who appear to have distributed the song in the first place, if I wish to eradicate it completely. But I'm feeling lazy. I'll rest on my laurels and give it a rest for a few days.

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Piracy Update - Getting my Youtube video back

4/21/2014

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So, step one in testing out my rights (?), if I actually have any - trying to get rid of the content match that Routenote has slapped on my cover song/video. I disputed the content match via the "dispute" button (curiously enough) on the "Copyright Notices" page of one of my YouTube channels (CrummyMusician, https://www.youtube.com/user/CrummyMusician).  This eventually took me to a form, where I had to tick a bunch of boxes, and so on. It also insisted that I cite the copyright law that these guys were violating. Since I have no clue, I wrote "I don't know," and it let me proceed anyway. Here's what I wrote to them, on April 8:

country: (my country)
fulllegalname: (my name) 
yourusername: http://www.youtube.com/user/ CrummyMusician 
email_prefill_req: (my e-mail address)
otherurls: http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=8CwoRxV6WwI 
otheruser: OfficialPlayMeMusic 
specific_law: I don't know
specific_law_text: 
violating_law: On September 3, 2011, I posted the following cover of She 
Sells Sanctuary by the Cult: http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=O8ZjJzB33ZQ 

Subsequent to that, I received permission from YouTube and the music rights 
organization through YouTube to monetize the cover, and did. This week, I 
received a copyright claim from Routenote on the video. I investigated and 
discovered that YouTube user OfficialPlayMeMusic had used the cover and 
represented it as their own on YouTube (August, 2013, nearly two years 
after my performance), ReverbNation, Itunes, Amazon, etc, etc. 

I am not sure what specific law, if any, this breaks, but it is certainly 
the use of my performance without my permission, and I would be grateful if 
you could take it down, reinstate my monetization, and take whatever other 
steps you deem necessary against this user. 

Thank you very much. 


I rather expected to wait a million years for anything to happen, if it ever did, but to my pleasant surprise, YouTube got back to me only three days later:



Hi CrummyMusician,

Good news! Your dispute wasn’t reviewed within 30 days, so the copyright claim on your YouTube video has now been released by routenote.

Video title: "The Cult - She Sells Sanctuary full instrumental cover"Your video's monetization settings have now been restored. View monetization settings.

- The YouTube Team

So this is a good result. My video is back in my control, and monetized by me again as it was before this Routenote business began. Something funny though - the stock message says it wasn't reviewed within 30 days. Clearly it WAS, since I got the reply in three days. My guess is someone at Routenote had a listen and though "oh crap, the guy has a point!" Or maybe someone at YouTube found it similarly obvious that my cover had been ripped off. Score one for the good guys, right?


Sort of. The rip off cover is still up on YouTube. And just for fun, I uploaded my original video again to another one of my channels and.....it got slapped with a copyright notice by Routenote immediately. So there is more work to be done, obviously. Maybe, just maybe, the fact that this is a cover performance of a song I have limited, if any, rights to, means that I have no legal protection at all here?


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Piracy on the high...umm...web!

4/18/2014

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So finally I have something to blog about on my vanity record label website. A coupla years back, I recorded a cover of She Sells Sanctuary by The Cult in which I play all the instruments but, those of you who have a low tolerance for crappy voices will be glad to hear, do not sing. Here's the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8ZjJzB33ZQ Some months back, YouTube allowed me to monetize this cover with the approval of the writers (Thanks guys!). In the three or four months since monetization, I have made a whopping 45 cents off the video. Hurray! I'm a professional musician! Sort of!
 
All good, right? Wrong. About 10 days ago, I got a notice from YouTube saying that monetization had been disabled since there was a copyright notice for content match filed by Routenote, an online music distributor, which claimed the sound recording was owned by them. Umm, not so much. I make no claim to have written the song, although the authors were kind enough to let me use it on YouTube and even make that massive 45 cents (and counting) from it. The performance and sound recording thereof, however, are totally and utterly and completely me. There is absolutely nothing of the original song or any other song in the video. All me. So WTF???? In the past, a few people have asked permission to use my covers for various purposes  none of which made them any money, so like sure, why not, give me credit and let's all have a bit of fun with this music and YouTube thing. Anyway, here's the notice I received from YouTube:


Hi CrummyMusician,

Due to a copyright claim, you are no longer monetizing the following YouTube video. It is still playable on YouTube, but the copyright owner could choose to show ads on it.

Video title: The Cult - She Sells Sanctuary full instrumental cover 
Copyrighted song: She Sell's Sanctuary 
Claimed by: routenote


Why this can happen
  • Your video might contain copyrighted content.
  • A copyright claim on a video can prevent you from monetizing it.
- The YouTube Team

I dug around a bit, and discovered that some guys I have never heard of in London, UK, had used my instrumental cover, sung vocals on top of it, represented it as entirely their own performance, and PUT IT UP FOR SALE on Itunes, Amazon, etc, etc. Bastards. The offending perps are a "band" (I use the term loosely, since apparently they DON'T play at least some of their own music, although they claim to) called "Play Me" which has an album called 80's Rock Legends out, on which there was a track called She Sell's (sic.) Sanctuary. And, as you may have guessed by now, in addition to having problems with grammar and spelling, these guys had outright stolen my performance and represented it as their own in an album released September 18, 2013, just over two years after I posted my cover to YouTube. I won't put the link to them here, since I don't want to drive traffic to them, but Google will show you that these guys are all over the web with this theft. 

Anyway, this really pissed me off. They didn't ask, they claimed it as their own performance, and they were making money off it. I posted some nasty comments on their offending YouTube video and their twitter feed. No reply. Then just for fun, I decided to test a copyright grey area. What rights, exactly, do I have to a performance of a cover that I have been granted permission to use on one platform (YouTube) for one purpose (shared monetization)? And what can I do to get the plagiarized song off the internet? 

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