Guide to Fair Use Standards
A lot of videographer projects can be considered parodies or remakes of other familiar concepts. Amateurs do the same thing, sometimes producing videos that push the boundary of parody and rip-off. At last, the Center for Internet and Society has released a comprehensive video production guide to Fair Use standards.
If you don’t quite have that much free time on your hands today, the video description is kind enough to provide timestamps for the answers to specific questions. Here are a few examples.
- “I am at an event, restaurant, or other public place and a band or the radio is playing in the background but I do not intentionally record the band or radio. I am filming something else. The music is out of my control. Is this fair use?” – 05:45
- “If I dub over an episode of a cartoon with my own voices and change the dialogue for parody’s sake, am I legally in the clear?” – 10:05
- “If I am uploading YouTube videos of captured video and commentary of video games as I play them am I violating copyright?” – 12:21
- “Can I perform a copyrighted song in a YouTube video? Can I teach how to play it? Can I show guitar tablature or music notation?” – 21:21
- “If I use 2-3 seconds of a video for a mashup but give credit to that video owner, is it fair use?” – 26:04
- “Are there any cases in which posting the uncut entirety of another’s content could be considered fair use? For instance, if commentary is located in the description or annotation fields, and not on the video itself?” – 29:23
When creating your own corporate video production, especially if you will be using it publicly, make sure you are following these fair use guidelines.
