The music service offers free tracks for video creators, and then it requires money.
Two almost similar lawsuits on charges of "luring customers and extortion" were filed in the Federal Court of Los Angeles against the music service FreePlay Music . The plaintiffs in the case are companies that own entertainment channels on YouTube, the videos on which use “free” tracks distributed by FreePlay as a sound track.
The business model of the respondents is based on the proposal of 15,000 songs that can be used in their works for free under a non-standard license that allows, for example, free use of the track in one YouTube video without monetization, as well as by subscription. For example, at the time of this writing, among the possible licenses, one can find the option of using the track exclusively for YouTube-video for personal use for a period of 99 years at a price of $ 0.00.
Probably, being tempted by such a proposal, the owners of YouTube channels used “free” tracks in their videos. However, later each of the two plaintiffs received a notice from the service that the channel uses music files for which you need to pay royalties in favor of FreePlay under the threat of a lawsuit. These threats were received without the usual procedures that are used on YouTube: the author may declare that the video uses unlicensed content and request that it be voluntarily removed. In addition, the FreePlay requirement did not even specify which file was considered to be paid. Both claimants called this practice “luring and extortion”.
FreePlay lawyer denied all charges. He believes that his service “zealously protects copyrights and its own reputation” and therefore the accusations addressed to the company are groundless. Each of the plaintiffs is a fairly large company (one of which has 6000 channels on YouTube), and they would not mind paying royalties if the requirement to respect the copyright were legal. In this case, the essence of the accusation is that FreePlay unilaterally changed the agreement with the end users, intentionally making it confusing and contradictory. This is what led to the prohibition of the use of previously “free” tracks for public broadcast on YouTube.
The business model of the respondents is based on the proposal of 15,000 songs that can be used in their works for free under a non-standard license that allows, for example, free use of the track in one YouTube video without monetization, as well as by subscription. For example, at the time of this writing, among the possible licenses, one can find the option of using the track exclusively for YouTube-video for personal use for a period of 99 years at a price of $ 0.00.
Probably, being tempted by such a proposal, the owners of YouTube channels used “free” tracks in their videos. However, later each of the two plaintiffs received a notice from the service that the channel uses music files for which you need to pay royalties in favor of FreePlay under the threat of a lawsuit. These threats were received without the usual procedures that are used on YouTube: the author may declare that the video uses unlicensed content and request that it be voluntarily removed. In addition, the FreePlay requirement did not even specify which file was considered to be paid. Both claimants called this practice “luring and extortion”.
FreePlay lawyer denied all charges. He believes that his service “zealously protects copyrights and its own reputation” and therefore the accusations addressed to the company are groundless. Each of the plaintiffs is a fairly large company (one of which has 6000 channels on YouTube), and they would not mind paying royalties if the requirement to respect the copyright were legal. In this case, the essence of the accusation is that FreePlay unilaterally changed the agreement with the end users, intentionally making it confusing and contradictory. This is what led to the prohibition of the use of previously “free” tracks for public broadcast on YouTube.
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Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/376445/
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