A couple weeks ago, I made a short Hyperlapse video of clouds (much more fun than the yardwork I was doing), and decided that the video needed music. So I quickly picked a song, added it to my video, and uploaded the video to Instagram (follow me – I’m davidleeking on Instagram!).
And then I received a notification from Instagram saying “Your video may have copyrighted content that belongs to someone else.”
I also received this email:
We’ve removed the video you posted at 12:47 PM on July 15, 2018 because it included the following content:
All Because Of You by Jonny Diaz
If you have permission to share everything in the video including the audio, like the soundtrack or music, you can appeal the removal and have your video re-posted. Remember that people should only post videos they have the right to share.
Ok. That was all definitely true! So I changed the music to something I created, re-edited the video, and re-uploaded it to Instagram. Problem solved!
I’m sharing this for two reasons:
- So you’ll know what to do if Instagram removes your video. Change the song (i.e., an original composition, a song with an appropriate Creative Commons license, or a song that came with your video editing software) and re-upload the video. No biggie.
- As a heads-up that Instagram is starting to notice copyright things, at least where audio is concerned. Here’s an article talking more about that change.
Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube all do this type of automatic monitoring and flagging of potential copyright violations. Not sure with Facebook, but both Instagram and YouTube have an appeals process, just in case they are wrong.
And they can be wrong! With YouTube, I have successfully appealed incorrect copyright warnings in the past: one because it was, in fact, my song (I was using CDBaby as a distributor, which is why that got flagged), and a couple because of more spammy record labels “overclaiming” things. In each of those cases, I was using perfectly legal loop-based music and sounds from video editing software packages. Once that was cleared up, the claims were dropped.
So – want to add music to your videos? Start out my using music you have legal access to. That’s the easiest fix. Then, if the song gets flagged anyway, follow through with the appeals process. Assuming you’re not using music you don’t have permission to use, you’ll probably make a successful appeal.
Something to think about!