Is It Illegal to Teach Someone How to Play a Copyright Song?
July 14th, 2007
I have been following this story lately about YouTube pulling over 100 videos created by NextLevelGuitar.com that show people how to play portions of copyright songs. Apparently YouTube received a take down request stating that the lessons were a copyright infringement. I first read about it in the post Guitar Lessons Removed from YouTube in Copyright Dispute on Guitar MX Blog.
Reading on the Next Level Guitar forums I found out that the copyright claim was filed by ABKCO Records. If you aren’t familiar with their history read up on the Bitter Sweet Symphony fiasco. After reading that it is pretty obvious why Next Level Guitar isn’t planning on fighting this. Instead the site will release new videos that indirectly teach people how to play copyright songs. We will have to wait and see what kind of shape this takes.
So is it really illegal to teach someone how to play a copywritten song? I don’t really want to get into the logistics of copyright law, but I want to know where exactly the line is drawn? Are the videos infringing on copyright because they are teaching (thus taking away from sheet music sales) or just because they contain a derivative of copyright material in them? Either way it’s common knowledge that if anyone anywhere is making a profit directly or indirectly from a copyright material the record labels wont be very happy about it. There are thousands of videos on YouTube teaching people how to play songs on the guitar. I think the reason the Next Level Guitar guys were targeted was because they were using these videos to promote their guitar lesson website and were indirectly making a profit from the material.
Here’s something interesting though, Next Level Guitar has started a new channel on YouTube housing copyright free material and the channel is the most subscribed this week, most subscribed this month, and #2 most subscribed of all time. Thats pretty freaking impressive.
Justin Sandercoe from justinguitar.com has yet to run into any issues with his YouTube videos. His YouTube account hosts several different lessons for songs like Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here and Cold Play’s Trouble. Justin is less obvious about making a profit from the music. He only asks people for donations to help keep his site running, which is far from a profit. On the other hand, Justin does attract people who are interested in hiring him as a personal guitar instructor. This could make him a target for copyright infringement complaints. I think he knows this though because he has taken some preventative action by moving all of his videos that contain copyright material to their own channel called JustinSandercoeSongs. So if or when YouTube cracks down on him, none of his copyright free videos should be affected.
This is a story that I am going to be paying close attention to over the next little while as I have been considering putting up some videos of my own. I would never look to make a direct profit from the videos, but the copyright holders may not care about that. I’ll have to watch what Next Level Guitar does to sidestep copyright infringement while still teaching people how to play their favorite songs.
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July 16th, 2007 04:45
Nice post, Matt. I’ve noticed the trend as well. I’ve also noticed that a lot of guitar mags these days seem to use language like: “Here is a lesson that can help you play something similar to the riff in XYZ song.” Almost like they don’t want to say that they are providing the ACTUAL tab to that song riff. I wonder if that is a copyright thing too. gb.
July 16th, 2007 04:45
Nice post, Matt. I’ve noticed the trend as well. I’ve also noticed that a lot of guitar mags these days seem to use language like: “Here is a lesson that can help you play something similar to the riff in XYZ song.” Almost like they don’t want to say that they are providing the ACTUAL tab to that song riff. I wonder if that is a copyright thing too. gb.
July 16th, 2007 10:38
Yeah, I would guess they probably have to get licensing rights for all of their tabs, but I never thought about those articles where they show you how to play instead of tabbing it out for you.
I wonder if they have any licensing problems with their videos on the CD?
I really don’t like the way things are going… if I didn’t have so many free resources when I was learning I never would have had the interest that I did. I also don’t really want to have to turn to pirate networks to get tab files.
July 19th, 2007 16:02
Hi.
I’m one of the people that strongly believes the free sharing of guitar information over the web has taught an entire generation of guitarists how to play. I started to learn on tabs from olga and other such places and I just wish I would have had access to video tutorials back then.
There is a fine line between making a living off someone else’s compositions and presenting them with a purely educational purpose in the on-line environment, and I don’t think the latter would cause any financial damage to anybody, so it shouldn’t be blamed, unless the companies are actually selling a similar product.
July 19th, 2007 17:43
Yeah, I agree with the learning aspect. I used to use the tab archive on Harmony Central religiously back in ‘97. I believe it was just a mirror of OLGA. Then tab sites started gaining in popularity, and then I discovered Guitar Pro.
I think that when someone scans a guitar magazine or tab book and uploads that to the internet, yeah, that should be against copyright law. Even if someone reads the tab and transcribes it to text, thats still not good. But when someone listens to the song and writes out their own interpretation of how it should be played, I don’t think anybody should be able to touch that. The same goes for videos and audio files. If you record yourself teaching someone how to play a song, that should be fine.
What I see is the record labels are seeing that this is another area where they can profit from the music they stole from the artists. So what they are doing is using copyright law to crush the competition. Either that or they figure “well if we aren’t making money from it that way, then you wont either”. Also, if it is only going to cost them a few hundred in legal fees to have your lawyer send a take down notice, then why not? right?
July 24th, 2007 18:38
Hey Matt-great post! Very interesting information! I actually found this post more informative than the info on the Next Level site! Anyway, what about the Marcos Farhot vid on YouTube? Are those in trouble too?
July 24th, 2007 20:43
Thanks MG.
I actually didn’t know about Marcos Farhat’s videos before your comment. He has some really good ones.
I would guess that he is just as susceptible as anyone else. He advertises his site www.freeguitarvideolessons.com on his videos and on that site he accepts payment to send you his videos. Since his site is a little… actually a lot less commercial than Next Level I’d say he is less of a target, but still, if he gets in the wrong labels sites it could be the end of his videos on YouTube.
In the meantime I have subscribed to his channel because he has got some pretty great vids. Too bad he has disabled embedding because I would probably post a bunch of them here.
July 25th, 2007 00:04
Yes i really like the MF site a lot! It has a way you can slow down the vid so you can learn a faster riff/solo. He also has all those angles so you can see exactly what he’s doing! He seems pretty accurate too. The drawback is he doesn’t have a whole lot of songs to check out.
I personally think this copyright infringement thing is getting ridiculous! I mean come on, these companies make so much $ off these groups and then they want to pressure a guitarist showing people how to play a certain song? Weird!
I am going to keep coming back here to check on the status of this case. Thanks!
MG
*oops just noticed it says “illigal” for the title of this post!
July 27th, 2007 07:58
I’ve used YouTube to learn guitar songs and far from cheating the record companies out of a profit - learning the songs has prompted me to go to itunes and purchase music I didn’t have!
Records companies should realise that there is a balance to struck between protecting your market and stifling it - afterall musicians are likely to be the very people enthusing about, buying and promoting music.
August 8th, 2007 10:54
I’m in the situation where I’m helping a guitar tutor come up with a blog. At the moment we’re concentrating more on techniques rather than teaching specific songs. Still, it would be good to know exactly where we stand.
I do know that Youtube are having major problems with copyright so I suppose they’re being extra cautious.
October 30th, 2007 10:41
There are several songs out there that have the same notes in the same order. Different lyrics. So if they are not singing lyrics is it really that song.?
This makes me a little upset to read that they are looking for an easy way of the changing world of the music industry. They spend so much time and effort in trying to track down such stupid stuff like this. Why don’t they spend that time and money in to marketing or finding a better way to bring in income. He they could work with these guys to help market the album or song.
I love what RadioHead did with there last record. Its so nice to see the money go to the artist and not some dick in a suit that was just there with a contract.
April 4th, 2008 05:29
these record company guys are sick, this is going too far.