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YouTube comments

There are some real twits on YouTube (take me for instance…)

… or the latest commenter on my All Along the Watchtower video: someone called Multishades complains about my hair movement, & the guitar – which s/he says is totally wrong … but says I sound great … but that I should “move on”.

I don’t really know what this person actually means. Really truly I don’t. Leaving aside the weirdness of commenting on my hair moving … the guitar is wrong, but sounds great, but I should “move on”?

No idea – so I thought I’d share with you all.

YouTube Plays Both Sides of Copyright

1 November, 2013 Raphael Fraser Reply

I’m annoyed. I’m annoyed with YouTube, and I’m annoyed with Warner-Chappell, and I’m annoyed with a music industry made up of frakking corporate troglodytes.

A while back I got a message from YouTube telling me that a couple of my videos had been flagged by their clever-dick system as containing copyright material. On those two videos advertisements appeared. Now while I don’t like having ads on my videos (because I know I hate them when I’m watching someone else’s video with ads), I realise that was fair enough: the copyright holder wants a bit of ad revenue from the few hundred (maybe) people watching me play a song to which they hold the copyright, so they can put ads on the video. Fine. No worries.

Last night I noticed that at some point between then and now, Warner Chappell, the copyright holder for Hotel California, by The Eagles, has muted the audio to my video of me playing the solo from Hotel California.

So I look a right twat in that video.

My first thought was to dispute it. After all, it’s a cover, and one can play covers, right?

… Riiiiiiight??

Turns out the answer to that is no. I’m not the first person to wonder about this, and some have asked the queyion online. Answer is that covers are not “fair use” under copyright law, and therefore remain subject to copyright requirements. What about cover bands??!! They’re playing in a bar or a club which pays licensing fees to ASCAP (I think), the copyright administering jobby, so composers get paid when their songs are played. All good, don’t get me wrong. They should indeed get those royalties.

However, all the aforegoing leads inescapably to one conclusion: Google/YouTube are a bunch of bloody stingey-arse cheapskates who are avoiding paying licensing fees to ASCAP. Consider: if they paid said licensing fees, we’d be able to play covers, and composers/copyright holders would get a share of any resulting revenue. We’re not allowed to play covers, ergo, YouTube do not pay a licensing fee.

Thy know damn well there are a lot of covers on YouTube. I figure they’re hoping that a few take-downs and mutings will keep the copyright holders happy, while they sit quietly back enjoying the fruits of having umpty-million cover videos (not to mention actual songs with slideshows) attracting lots of views.

So that’s why I’m annoyed with Google/YouTube. What about Warner-Chappell? Yes they’re the copyright holder, and yes they were perfectly entitled to put ads on my video. Hey, legally they were entitled to mute it as they have as well. The point is, first they tried the ads. Because I’m small fry with few views, they probably made no money from it. Instead of thinking “oh well that’s completely irrelevant then. We’ll leave the ads there in case, though”, they decided to mute it. Out of what? Spite? What do they gain? In a material sense what do I lose? They would get any ad revenue, not me. It’s just annoying and frustrating; no-one’s any better off.

Bloody troglodytes.

Especially Google/YouTube, who are playing both sides: denying copyright holders their proper revenue by not paying licensing fees (i admit this is an assumption, but it follows logically: if they do pay licensing fees, surely they would not have to remove or mute videos), and they crap on users like me who just want to share and interact with others playing songs we love.

Troglodytes all.

Ninja Monkey Jam

25 October, 2013 Raphael Fraser 1 comment

No, not jam made with monkeys specialising in deadly unseen martial arts … or maybe it is; just not on toast. I was visited recently by half of the excellent New Zealand band Ninja Monkeys. While they were here (and in-between drinking coffee) Owen Vickers and I recorded a quick “jam”. I use the scare quotes because I only have one input, so we had to do it with Owen recording his solo, then me mine, and splicing together the video. Was fun all the same:

I always find it interesting to hear someone else playing on my gear; it always sounds so different. Good different, in this case.

For more Owen – and the other Ninja Monkeys – check them out in the studio:

(which by the way can be found at the awesome short url of http://met.al/ninja 8) )

Also check out their YouTube, Twitter, FaceBook – and even MySpace pages.

Copyright Clever-dicks

28 September, 2013 Raphael Fraser 3 comments

I’m faintly put out. Google have a new clever-dick system on YouTube that analyses your videos and compares them to reference recordings to try to determine whether you’ve uploaded something copyright. Now, all I upload are videos of me playing guitar. Some of those are cover versions, true, but I’m certainly not uploading other people’s music videos or songs or whatever.

Imagine then my annoyance when into my inbox popped a notice that my latest video might be copyrighted material O_o And then another. Further annoyance followed when they stuck popup ads onto those two videos

I suppose that google has to pay royalties to the songwriters’ wossname – just like a radio station or a bar or something. And I suppose it’s fair enough they would want then to get a bit of money from videos for which they might have to pay said royalties. But I hate having ads on my videos.

So that’s really the point of this little ramble: the ads aren’t my fault, and I do apologise dreadfully for their presence.

Iron Maiden are legends – a few reasons why

13 September, 2013 Raphael Fraser Reply

I’ve been on a massive Iron Maiden kick for the last few days. So much so that I came very close to making a damn fool of myself on the train on the way home today; it was well-nigh impossible to keep from headbanging and singing along with my iPod – which I don’t think would have gone down all that well It became patently obvious why Maiden is such a heavy metal icon. I thought therefore I’d present for easy reference a few of the reasons why.