Converting Youtube video to Mp3 - moral question?

[BFD]

Originally Posted by Riverwolf

No, maybe 1-2. I have CRS issues. Not funny anymore. The multiple versions that I download are to hear all the slightly different beats, lyrics, etc... to pound it in my head on my long walks.

Not to imply that I don't get ideas & tunes from Youtube, I definitely do. Much more often than not, it's from live concert footage, videos of bluegrass & old-time jams, demos (Robert Bowlin @ Carter Vintage Guitar, Kenny Smith playing a Collings, etc).

Also, I do have a monthly budget (eMusic subscription) for buying music. I derive a ton of inspiration from all kinds of recording artists and feel strongly about supporting them in an ongoing way. I also often collect multiple versions of tunes I'm learning.

[bitraker]

I feel that converting a YouTube clip to MP3 for continued use is a form of piracy that robs the artist of any revenue he/she is entitled to.

agree - my books are pirated and illegally published all over the world and I have no legal recourse to stop it.

And yes, I have heard all the self-serving, moral-quandary, pro-stealing arguments (fair use, too expensive for those from poor countries, good free advertising, victimless crime, etc) and I reject them all.

Only when you are a producer of an intellectual product with real value will you realize the injustice.

[ukejon]

Originally Posted by kkfan

I feel that converting a YouTube clip to MP3 for continued use is a form of piracy that robs the artist of any revenue he/she is entitled to.

Watching a YouTube clip that is legally posted is fine. More often than not, one watches something on YouTube simply as a reference. I do this all the time to sample songs. Then, I buy the stuff that I want to keep listening to. If I were to convert that YouTube clip to MP3 instead of actually buying the song, I'd be depriving the artist of revenue that rightfully belongs to him/her for their product that I am using for my continued enjoyment.

The key phrase, IMO, that constitutes piracy is "continued use."

My guess is that in this digital age many of us are inadvertent semi-pirates of one sort or another.

[BRISTOL86]

Presumably everyone taking the morally righteous viewpoint here have never

- recorded the radio to a cassette (remember them?!)
- copied a piece of sheet music
- borrowed a CD/book/DVD from a friend to have a listen/read/watch
- cooked a recipe they've seen in a cookery book that they didn't buy

[T Texas]

As an aside, when I was a broke college kid and playing acoustic shows to eat, Blockbuster Music would let you listen to any cd you wanted. I'd go in and get a CD with a song I wanted to add to my set and tell them I wanted to listen to it. I would sit there and repeat the song 5 to 10 times until I had a good enough grasp of the lyrics to rush home and write them down. Never felt bad about it. Ususally they weren't songs I really wanted to own/listen to but rather songs I figured would go over well at an acoustic gig.

[Clemson_John]

Unless the actual artist/creator/rights holder posted the video, I don't see how watching the video on YouTube is any more ethical than downloading the audio. Napster was child's play compared to YouTube. A notable exception would be the few artists who allow/encourage fans to record and distribute their shows.

That said, I'm not trying to preach, as I often watch videos on YouTube. I've also bought albums, concert tickets and t-shirts from artists that I "discovered" through the site.

[fishstick_kitty]

Youtube has a very sophisticated way of detecting copyrighted music and video. If a random person uploads a Neil Young song, Neil Young can get a cut of the ad revenue for that every time its viewed. And obviously, if Neil Young himself uploads a song, he gets all the ad revenue.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/ne...utube-20130919

[devellis]

Originally Posted by bitraker

agree - my books are pirated and illegally published all over the world and I have no legal recourse to stop it.

And yes, I have heard all the self-serving, moral-quandary, pro-stealing arguments (fair use, too expensive for those from poor countries, good free advertising, victimless crime, etc) and I reject them all.

Only when you are a producer of an intellectual product with real value will you realize the injustice.

If you reject the notion of fair use out of hand, then you're simply incorrect. To quote the U.S. Copyright office, "Fair use is a longstanding and vital aspect of American copyright law." Now, whether it applies in a particular case is open to question but the concept is established law. Your denying it is pretty much the same as when someone illegally copies your work. In either case, someone is being denied something to which they are legally entitled.

I'm also an author and I've had my work copied and distributed illegally. I assume that my work has "real value," as in one instance, the publisher has chosen to keep a book I authored in print for a quarter century (and pay me royalties for all of that time), with a new fourth edition to appear in a few months. The inappropriateness of illegal copying doesn't change the fact that there are legitimate instances of fair use. Of course, there are also abuses.

[tadol]

So where do you set the limit? 5 times? 20 times? 100 times? 1000 times?

If you put your work out there for the general public to enjoy, you should expect that they will enjoy it. If that includes listening to you play your song 1000 times in a row, then thats that. And if your fan/customer wants to enjoy your efforts in a different way - without selling it or making a profit off of it - then that should be completely legal. The medium of distruibution and creation has to be considered as part of the piece - so my biggest gripe is that the distribution companies are the ones truly raking in the money thru their advertising and charges to access the content, and they don't pay the artists a penny. So if someone wants to move the content to a different device, so they can enjoy that work, tell their friends about it, and in general help promote and support the artists thru their fan-dom but without supporting the internet providers and Youtube company and cell phone companies that get away with charging outrageous sums to use data - more power to them -

And do support your favorite artists - buy CDs, attend house concerts, and let all your friends know when you find people with talent -

[Sprikitik]

Originally Posted by Riverwolf

If Napster was shutdown how can this action be legal?

LOL Napster. That was more than 15 years ago. That's ancient history in today's tech world.

[fishstick_kitty]

Originally Posted by Sprikitik

LOL Napster. That was more than 15 years ago. That's ancient history in today's tech world.

Napster was knowingly allowing copyrighted material to be stored on their servers and allowing people to download it for free.

Youtube on the other hand can correlate copyrighted material with the owner and take any number of actions based on that...including taking the content down, or paying the copyright owner a cut of ad revenues.

I would say youtube is doing much more and it is better than it was in the Napster days.

[kkfan]

Originally Posted by tadol

So where do you set the limit? 5 times? 20 times? 100 times? 1000 times?

Let me put it another way: if YouTube or any other FREE service where the artist is not compensated is one's ONLY means of enjoying a particular song, then the continued use of that free service for the enjoyment of that song, IMO, constitutes piracy. One is basically robbing the artist of his/her income.

The formula is pretty much common sense, IMO. No one likes to be robbed. Treat the artists the way you like to be treated.

[capefisherman]

How about making an MP3 of a You Tube of an artist performing a song that they may or may not have paid performance rights for? I have saved (bookmarked) a You Tube of an arrangement of a jazz tune by a talented young guitarist and I would like to make it into an MP3, then apply Amazing Slow downer or a similar app to learn his exact arrangement. Am I pirating the song?

[el_kabong]

IMHO -

When the marginal cost for (re)production of recorded music went to $0.00, so too did the value, or nearly so....regardless of who's making the copy or how. In that vein, you don't really pay Pandora all that much for the music, more so for the convenience of their service.

The supposed "golden age" of high-dollar album sales (and income for a select minority of musicians) was an historical aberration in which the live performance was devalued as a promotional cost to boost such sales.

As NY once said, "live music is better, bumper stickers should be issued". That was always the real truth. I was happy to grow up in that era...couldn't afford to buy that many albums, but I saw some great concerts for cheeeeeap.

So, I don't really have a moral issue, per se, but rather a "quality issue". I'm not specifically referring to low-res compression algorithms on Youtube (though that's true enough), but rather that a recording is, inherently, a static snapshot of "music", and maybe not actually music itself.

All that being said, I do occasionally enjoy the "convenience" of recorded music and don't mind paying for it....I just happen to believe the value of it is way closer to $0.00 than others might.