YOUTUBE

[Fanboy Sci-Fi Theater]

YouTube canceled the preview clip I had posted there to promote my iRiff of KING KONG.  Apparently, someone from Universal complained that I was infringing on their copyrighted material.  Is there any other way to post my preview clip so that it can be seen on the RiffTrax website?

[torgosPizza]

You can file a counter-notice and state that your preview falls under Fair Use.

[poobah103]

YouTube canceled the preview clip I had posted there to promote my iRiff of KING KONG.  Apparently, someone from Universal complained that I was infringing on their copyrighted material.  Is there any other way to post my preview clip so that it can be seen on the RiffTrax website?

 Yeah, they did it to us a few times with our Resident Evil clips and our Back to the Future clip. There should be a link in the email they send you (or message on Youtube they send you) that will take you to a page where you can say the clips are legal under Fair Use law. When I did it, I also explained that the full version is audio-only and can't be used without the DVD, so that sales of the audio file actually promote the sale or rental of the DVD.

 YouTube stuck the videos back up almost immediately, and I haven't had any trouble since.

[SJP]

What's ironic about all this, is that the companies have to step in if they think their copyright is violated (as much as it sucks for them to do, if they don't protect it when they know about it, then they lose their copyright status), even though the clip on YouTube would actually increase sales and rentals of their IP.  I was worried about what to do about clips as well, but technically it is Fair Use, as the usage on YouTube falls under the idea that IP can be used by others for the purposes of review and/or parody (well, within reason; you can't put up their entire movie for free along with your commentary, because that just ain't right).  Since you're not allowing access to their entire film, and they have no rights to your audio track since it doesn't contain any of THEIR property, it's a no contest; they could drag you to court, but the court would probably throw it out on its face, and neither you nor the IP owner need the legal cost on their hands.  I'm not a lawyer, but if you weren't allowed to do it, Rifftrax would have been shut down a long time ago.

What's even funnier, even though these companies end up shutting down music videos and clips of their TV shows on YouTube, don't think they aren't checking the number of views; probably more TV shows and movies have been released on DVD because of the number of YouTube video hits than any online petition has the power to affect.

[Fanboy Sci-Fi Theater]

It's been a few weeks and YouTube has yet to restore the KING KONG iRiff clip.  I filed a dispute about their removing the video and gave them all of the arguments everyone suggested (fair use, parody, free publicity for DVD), but I haven't heard back from them yet.  If anyone else has been through this, do you know how long it takes to resolve this type of issue?  I'm wondering if they will bother to contact me one way or another, since they never contacted me to inform me about their removing the video in the first place.

[JoshWay]

I think YouTube (Google, I guess) is good about delivering your dispute quickly, but it's up to the studio to respond. I disputed a violation claim with FOX and it was resolved same day.

[Conor]

These can be very variable.  It's not uncommon to wait a couple of weeks or to have them resolved in a day.  What's important to note is that it's very unlikely there is any actual human interaction going on, aside from your response letter.  Clips are removed from youtube because of an automated content process, not because someone identified your video personally.  Then your dispute is forwarded on, where it likely sits in a giant pile with other ones.  After the studio has ignored it long enough, youtube reinstates it. 

It's happened several times to us, only once has the clip not reappeared eventually.

[Hor-RIFF-ic Productions]

  We have finally been attacked by the evil YouTube monsters!   

Lionsgate doesn't seem to be as forgiving as some other studios mentioned here, and our first attempt at dispute has failed.  We plan to file a counter to that as well, but who knows how that will turn out.

In the mean time, youtube has hijacked clips for 2 of our movies, and won't allow them to be embedded anywhere.  Therefore we can't use the sample popup available on the product page (unfortunately one of these movies is our newly released Monster Squad, which is a huge bummer).

My question to the Mods... is there now or will there be any consideration given to the ability to link to other video sources besides youtube (myspace, etc) on the product page?  Or possibly even a way just to upload a video.  This way those of us who have earned the Wrath of YouTube can still utilize the sample popup.

Please?!   

[ShadowDog]

Do you have a website where you can upload the video clip and let people download it?  You can put the download link in your product page.  It's a pain in the ass but it's better to have any kind of a sample than none.  Hell, if you don't have a website of your own I'll host it on mine, I don't mind.

[Hor-RIFF-ic Productions]

Do you have a website where you can upload the video clip and let people download it?  You can put the download link in your product page.  It's a pain in the ass but it's better to have any kind of a sample than none.  Hell, if you don't have a website of your own I'll host it on mine, I don't mind.

yes, we have links posted on our product pages, and that does work okay.  it's just much simpler and more convenient for them to be available on the sample pop-up.  and frankly, we're rather irritated with youtube right now, and if we were able to embed our myspace videos, we would probably just switch to those for all our tracks.  doesn't hurt to dream, right?

[stansimpson]

[buhleted]

[amityisland]

Youtube earned my wrath many moons ago for reasons I'm still bitter about , but if you're looking for alternative sites to use I'd recommend either www.imeem.com or http://vimeo.com. Not sure if they could be configured for sample pop-ups, but on imeem you could create you own page and have it be a place to house your sample videos. Here's a sample of what it looks like (just ignore all my dorky fan-girl vids )

http://www.imeem.com/people/yTHoDlF/video/

[Moleman]

No matter what I did and how I complained I couldn't get my Wanted sample clips up on Youtube.  They would be deleted immediately upon submission even if I randomized the file name and had no title, describtion, tags, etc whatsoever.

I just said the hell with it and put it on metacafe.  The site works just as well and can be embedded in forums just like Youtube.  It would be nice to use metacafe links when you click "watch sample" on the product page but having it in the description is fine.  Plus this way I can post more than one.

[fireyf]

LIon's Gate huh.  Crap, Highlander 2 is Lion's Gate.  Well, hope I slip under the radar.  So would it help at all if in our video descriptions we specifically stated how it falls under fair use as parody?  You know, save the step of having to explain it later.  I mean really, is a 5 minute clip really taking away from their profits?  Good grief.

[Hor-RIFF-ic Productions]

Yes that saga continues with our struggle with YouTube.  Were awaiting a response from our official letter of protest or whatever it's called.  Since Rifftrax itself has moved on to a stand alone player we'd still like to know if iriffers will ever be given access to that so we can bypass the YouTube overlords all together.  That or offer alternate video sites to provide for the embed (myspace, imeem, etc).