Hmm... Thinking about it more now, I did notice some of the home movie type videos have commercial music in the background. I was thinking that's probably illegal. I wonder if it's legal just to view that then? Who's at fault for breaking copyright law there? The viewer or the person who posted it?
Then I'm wondering who actually posted the video. Even if it appears homemade, maybe someone else got a hold of it and posted it.
I'd still like to know how to capture this stuff. Some of it looks useful for teaching. Play a short clip of someone playing an unusual instrument for a classroom maybe. Much easier if that's on DVD though. Still... then I'd be broadcasting that to a classroom of people. Even forcing them to watch if I'm the teacher. Or as a public school teacher, forcing a group of kids to watch when they're forced to be in school by the state. It's never easy.
Is there a way to buy things then legally that appear on youtube? A service that puts it all together for you maybe?
And then I remember professors in college with the "I'm not supposed to have this recording, but listen to this example..." Or the ones playing clips off tv or from movies. Or all the articles they just photocopied and gave us. That can't be legal either. Who was I to say anything though as a student?
Does anyone know about this? I mean in teaching I've gone searching for copyright info, trying to do the right thing. It just gets nuts. I get responses like, "I'm not a lawyer and this isn't legal advice, but... " or "It's not technically legal, but this is what everyone does anyway..." It's come up in several discussions in the band, choir, and general music worlds I've visited. It never gets resolved either. So frustrating. "If you want to really be on the safe side, just buy individual copies of the material for every student at your school...." Yeah, right. Or you don't buy it at all, but even the composers aren't promoting that idea. I've had several say they would rather have teacher fudge things and get their music out there then have nobody buy due to copyright worries.
Where do you go for solid copyright information?