Why Does YouTube Flag My Videos?

YouTube was originally an online dating platform designed to allow singles looking to “hook up” the opportunity to put a short video about themselves online. Started in 2005 by three former PayPal employees, it quickly became the place for anyone to share a video on any subject online, get reviews, find followers, and for some, make money.

When Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion after just 18 months in existence, it certainly made money for its founders. The advent of the smartphone with its camera and video capability made it possible for anyone to be a movie producer and almost instantaneously share their product with the world. And now as a Google subsidiary, more than a billion hours of content are watched every day, more than 500 videos are posted every minute, and it generates more than $15 billion for its parent company and many of its users.

So, with all that content, all those users, subscribers, reviewers, all channels on everything from car repair to washing your camel, and all of those music and movie videos, why does YouTube flag your recording of last night’s basketball game?

YouTube’s Community Guidelines are just that – guidelines that every posting member of the YouTube community must follow to have their content accepted. Because of the huge amount of video being posted minute by minute, the job of enforcing those Community Guidelines falls primarily to an automated system. That system flags any video it feels does not meet those guidelines. Further review by humans is what then has the offending video removed or restricted. Flagged videos remain available until that further review is conducted.

The Community Guidelines protect users from videos that contain explicit content, are harassing in some manner, contain hate speech or violence. It is unlikely that any of your school recordings are flagged, restricted or removed for those reasons; however, the guidelines are also in place to enforce the copyright laws currently in effect, and that is where your basketball game video falls out of compliance.

YouTube’s first rule of copyright: “Creators should only upload videos that they have made or that they’re authorized to use. That means they should not upload videos they didn’t make, or use content in their videos for which someone else owns the copyright, such as music tracks, snippets of copyrighted programs, or videos made by other users, without necessary authorizations.”

You certainly made your basketball video. It shows your students, your gym, your game, all captured by your equipment. When you uploaded it to YouTube or even your school’s YouTube channel, it did not seem that much different than any of the millions of other high school, little league, recreational games one can find online. So, what’s so special, or inappropriate, about yours? As the first rule of copyright says, the creator (you) must either make or be authorized to use your content. You made the video, but you did not have the authorization or permission to use the warmup music, the music played during time-outs or any other copyrighted material in your video – thus the red flag leading to a potential restriction or removal.

How does a school’s music program get to put its whole concert video online? How can the local access channel put the games it broadcasts online? What’s special about all of the other “creators” who post copyrighted material in their videos including complete performance or theatre presentations or videos from other sources. Simply put, they have permission. The local access channel and the other channels that include copyrighted material in their videos have received permission.

How do you keep your game videos from being flagged? If removing the offending material is not possible or too elaborate, the other step would be to get permission. And you don’t have to seek individual permission from every composer or performer of every piece of music you share. There are several licensing agencies through which any school can receive blanket permission for a reasonable fee. Your school may already have a basic license that can be updated or upgraded to include more of the materials you are using in your videos.

There are lots of misconceptions about using copyrighted material on YouTube. Some folks believe that if you put the name of the artists in the comments, you are covered, or if you simply say “No copyrights were infringed in this video,” you can use anything. Not so, but luckily YouTube and the U.S. Copyright Office have plenty of online information to help guide you in posting videos that will not be flagged and will stay online for everyone to enjoy.