Today, I was reading about Google offering to help people who have been accused of posting infringing material on YouTube. So I decided to explain how YouTube handles copyright infringement and its DMCA takedown procedures. 

When YouTube first started, the site was accused of being a tool for infringement, much like VCRs back in the day. People could take videos and images of copyrighted material and repost them online, where others could watch and rewatch for free. 

YouTube was staring down the same barrel as Napster, until YouTube had an idea. YouTube claimed that there are so many posts and people involved in an infringing video, that there is no way to regulate every post. Some of the posts will be infringing and they will never know.

YouTube finally agreed to a system to deal with infringing videos. If someone found a video that infringes their rights, they can notify YouTube and YouTube must take the post down. I’m sure we’ve all been on the site and realized that a video recently watched is no longer available. Unfortunately, the website must take down these videos without determining whether they are infringing or not.

The owner of the accused post does have a chance to counter with a notice that claims the video is fair use or non-infringing. If YouTube agrees that the post was not infringing, and the person that made the claim has no other objections after notice of the counter, the video is reposted. However, most owners of these posts know that the videos are infringing, and never bother to counter. They just repost under another name.

The strike system of the website controls how many claims you can get under one account. The first strike is just a warning, but after two, the user cannot post for two weeks. If the user gets another strike within six months of getting their posting ability back, the user will be kicked off and YouTube cancels their account. Typically, the pros just open new accounts and start all over, and have created multiple accounts that they maintain.

Some people who accuse a user of infringing will follow the take down with a lawsuit to stop the user from using the video again and to get compensation for the unauthorized use. Google has offered to help YouTube users that have been accused of infringing, because Google believes that some of the accused were not actually infringing but can’t necessarily fight the claim in court, due to time and money constraints. It will be interesting to see how these cases work out, now that the regular user has a Daddy Worbucks to fund the case.