Asperges Me Copyright? (Spurious copyright claims on YouTube)
  • htac
    Posts: 2
    First of all my sincere apologies if this is not the right forum to ask this question.

    Due to the pandemic we have been live-streaming our Mass. On the Solemn High Mass days we have the Asperges in English. Unfortunately, we get copyright claims (content id) on youtube for this. Just curious, how can someone claim the copyright on an ancient liturgical gregorian chant? Any advice would be most appreciated.

    Thanks
    HTAC.

    [Admin note: edited the thread title to reflect the topic more specifically.]
  • htac
    Posts: 2
    For reference see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60YSIW7ZXIA from about 9:37 onwards
  • Schönbergian
    Posts: 1,063
    If you genuinely believe the content you're using to be public domain, fight the copyright claim through YouTube. I've had Mendelssohn organ pieces claimed under Content ID, and the claim usually goes away after you dispute it.
    Thanked by 1Choirparts
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    HTAC,

    Did you, just by chance, use some particular you-tube recording's arrangement of it?

    Something as old as the Asperges has long since fallen from copyright, if it ever could have made such a claim. A printer sometimes claims copyright for otherwise unknown-author pieces, but that would (in this case) be a thin sauce indeed.

  • Nathan_the_Organist
    Posts: 434
    The old Latin Asperges would definitely be public domain. If you are doing it in English, it's possible that version could be copyrighted. I think we would need to know who did the English adaptation you sing to be able to give you a better answer.
  • bhcordovabhcordova
    Posts: 1,152
    Translations of ancient works can be copyrighted. Music publishers use this fact to change some of the words to old hymns to copyright the music.
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,157
    YouTube's copyright claim system is based on automation that can't tell the difference between your performance of a piece and some classical label's recording. Very likely no human being was involved in the process.
    Thanked by 6Chris Garton-Zavesky Elmar bhcordova barreltone Choirparts MatthewRoth
  • Jenny Donelson
    Posts: 243
    @chonak - I had thought that would usually be the case, but the videos we make for our children's schola and that are privately listed on YouTube continuously get flagged for copyright violations. Usually I dispute it and the copyright is cleared.

    Just this week I had someone reject a justification of the originality of a recording of Jesu Dulcis Memoria and had to file another justification, sending along documentation that the melody and text are ancient, that the visual was from a creative-commons-licensed score (the PBC), and the recording was original. YouTube accompanied the filing of this justification with the requirement that I give my legal name and address, and that a rejection of it would count as a copyright strike.

    The problem seems to be the automated nature of the whole thing. If someone decides to keep rejecting a legitimate defense of a recording I made, what's my recourse? And if this happens 3 times, my channel is deleted? How is that fair? There's no real weighing of evidence here, and whomever makes the copyright claim seems to have all the power to be accuser and judge.

    I'd be really interested to hear what others are doing to combat this, esp. when it comes to sacred music that's originally recorded and obviously in the public domain.
    Thanked by 1mattebery
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    Jenny, this is indeed a problem. I get strikes on both my channels too. I once had a strike of a video I took of a live performance for a friend of one of her DMA recitals. It is indeed the automation that causes the problem. This was clearly a live-performance and not improper use of someone else's recording.

    What I find more infuriating isn't even necessarily that things get tagged (including unlisted videos...) but the fact that they have all the time in the world to sit on your claim (30 days) all the while you're demonetized for it. This isn't a huge issue for me, but it really irks me that they can just yank your rights away without even sending you an email notification, and then they get a month to make up their minds whether or not you get your rights back. I have also had claims rejected and it baffles my mind. They don't own the copyright to medieval chant. It's ridiculous. But if Sony, or whomever, thinks they do, you are plain out of luck, even if you didn't use their recording. It's ridiculous.
    Thanked by 1MatthewRoth
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    I'd be really interested to hear what others are doing to combat this


    Jenny,

    I don't (for the most part) participate in the You-Tube universe, so I think the answer must be "set up a new platform".
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,370
    This is not a world in which I move, so maybe I am mistaken. But given the odium which mega internet companies are currently encountering, perhaps it is opportune to write to your legislators.
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    Considering the number of times in the very recent past that many of the owners/CEO's of big tech / social media giants have been hauled in front of congress without any improvement to the situation, I'm not sure that will do all that much good.
  • Jenny Donelson
    Posts: 243
    @Serviam - ugh. I was hoping to hear that there was some way of appealing before, or even after, the strike was issued. Is there anyone in the megagooglopolis one can write to?

    @chonak - maybe this issue deserves a new thread title? The post author, Serviam, and I can't be the only ones encountering this problem which is not particular to the Asperges.

    [Edited the thread title to reflect the topic more specifically.--chonak]
    Thanked by 1ServiamScores
  • Andrew_Malton
    Posts: 1,156
    Ooh, I love the word megagooglopolis.
    Thanked by 2barreltone Carol
  • MichaelRaney
    Posts: 28
    Our last Gregorian Chant Mass got flagged for copyright on the Missa De Angelis and the Pater Noster by youtube. Said Hexacorp (a copyright claims bot) owns the melody to the Pater Noster chant.
    Thanked by 2chonak ServiamScores
  • SalieriSalieri
    Posts: 3,177
    Said Hexacorp (a copyright claims bot) owns the melody to the Pater Noster chant.

    Wow. If anyone did own the Pater chant it would be Solesmes or the Vatican. Maybe the pious monks should sue them.
  • Earl_GreyEarl_Grey
    Posts: 890
    Ooh, I love the word megagooglopolis.


    You'd better get permission before you use it! :)

    Public Domain Chants are constantly flagged on our channel as well, but we simply ignore them and so far nothing has happened. The channel is not monetized however, so perhaps that makes a difference?
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,370
    Just came across this
    Colin Buchanan, an evangelical, liturgical Anglican bishop once put a copyright notice on the Our Father noting that its author was still living.
    Thanked by 6Jeffrey Quick Nathan_the_Organist CHGiffen Elmar ServiamScores Carol
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    I had one claim denied and I went to re-appeal and youtube even reminded me, "Your previous claim reason: "public domain"). Yep—I appealed a piece in the public domain, was denied, and had to do it again, on a recording I made. I'm also fighting a claim on our own CHGiffen's Down Ampney edition which he shared here. I've provided evidence that both the hymn tune and the text are in the public domain, I am the one playing, and the edition I'm playing from was shared with me by the arranger. Still no dice. It's maddening. Now I get to wait a month for them to [not] respond again.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • ViolaViola
    Posts: 392
    We were hit by some spammer from somewhere like Bulgaria, I seem to remember, who claimed that my recording of a JSB organ piece was recorded by him. We were able to contest it successfully. I think they rely on people not having the time to contest it. I was prepared to identify the odd wrong note, but happily that wasn't necessary.
  • Gustavo Zayas
    Posts: 87
    Fight it. And have some kind of documentation that can back you up. I got hit with a copyright claim for chanting Lauda Sion salvatorem in a video. It cleared up after I explained that all Gregorian chant is property of the Catholic Church, it is liturgical music, and that no one can claim it as their own.
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,148
    Since I am the composer/arranger and copyright holder of the edition of "Come down, O Love divine"(Down Ampney) that you are using, Serviam, maybe the claimant should contact me, since my score gives explicit permission to use it (copy it, distribute it, perform it, record it).
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    The problem is that the claim is that they own the rights to the DOWN AMPNEY melody which they clearly do not.
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,148
    They (who?) likely do not hold the copyright to DOWN AMPNEY, which was first published in 1906 in The English Hymnal, copyright Oxford University Press. United Kingdom copyright convention stipulates life plus 70 years. RVW died in 1958. Unless otherwise exempted, his works will fall into the Public Domain at the end of 2028 - at least in the UK. I'm not sure what the status of the OUP copyright is/was. The tune may well be public domain in the USA.
    Thanked by 1Elmar
  • SalieriSalieri
    Posts: 3,177
    I am no expert in Copyright law, nor technology, but it may well be worth someone (an organization, perhaps) contacting OUP, Solesmes, and other publishers which are the [presumed] copyright holders, or former copyright holders, about bots claiming copyright.

    E.g., DOWN AMPNEY might be public domain in the U.S., since it was first published prior to Jan. 1, 1926; if it is still under copyright protection, is OUP notified by the "copyright bots" of potential infringement? If a video is monetized for alleged copyright infringement by these things, is the money actually going to the legitimate copyright holder, or is it really going into the Swiss Bank account of the Nigerian Prince who needs $2,000 that I got an e-mail from yesterday?
    Thanked by 1Elmar
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    Charles, that's precisely my point: they don't own the copyright to it. They may own the rights to a particular recording in their catalogue, but they don't own the melody itself. It is public domain in the US. I think the bots presume that I'm stealing one of their recordings (or at least infringing their intellectual "property", or they are assuming since that melody is a part of one of the recordings they are scanning for, that I must have stolen it, not realizing that the melody in question is public domain.
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen Choirparts
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