Can we have a talk about video games music, youtube, and piracy?

[Kaivan]

This place condemn piracy, but when it comes to video games music, it's always been justified. Why?

From what I've seen, people don't seem to grasp the concept of music piracy on Youtube either.

The rule is simple: Is the video uploaded by the official channel of the publisher or artist? y/n

If yes > not piracy
If no > piracy

Here's a quick comparison to simplify it even further:

Official upload

Unofficial upload

So by listening to illegal music uploads, you're only supporting the uploader (more views, more revenue). But how about the artist?

I know, in a lot of cases, the music aren't available for purchase or streaming anywhere. So what are our options? Are we entitled to listening video games music for free? I believe it's comparable to downloading roms of games that aren't available for purchase anymore. Some probably think it's fine to do that, while some other would rather not play the games at all than having to resote piracy. So in the end, it's your choice.

 

[nsilvias]

you do know that the copyright owners can choose to make money off third party uploads if they really want to right? they just choose not to sometimes. the music industry does this. it all goes thru youtubes system. i dont feel bad for companies not using whats availible to them

 

[Jaded Alyx]

I've encountered quite a few people who feel strongly about videogame piracy, but don't care one bit about pirating music or movies.

 

[Skittles]

2 things
Most OSTs arent available to buy easily and even less are on streaming
the artists have already been paid by the company

 

[inner-G]

you do know that the copyright owners can choose to make money off third party uploads if they really want to right? they just choose not to sometimes. the music industry does this.

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Yeah for some reason every major artist I can think of (besides Jay Z) puts their stuff on YouTube with ads. (YouTube premium ftw)

 

[nsilvias]

2 things
Most OSTs arent available to buy easily and even less are on streaming
the artists have already been paid by the company

Click to shrink...

and alot of ost releases arent even the full soundtrack!

 

[Dest]

Really a means of accessibility. Most people aren't going to pay $30-40 to import a CD of a game OST that they enjoy and will therefore go and listen to it on YouTube. Some companies have taken note and upload stuff themselves, and some have even taken to Spotify. Do note that artist can put claims on these uploads and take the revenue stream away from them as well.

But this would be a non-issue if accessibility wasn't a huge stop for most.

 

[Kaivan]

2 things
Most OSTs arent available to buy easily and even less are on streaming
the artists have already been paid by the company

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Are you saying that developers aren't being paid by the company until the games they made are selling well in the market?

 

[BDS]

The vast majority of games do not have official soundtrack releases and when they do, they are almost always heavily abridged and feature only a small selection of tracks. The tracks also only loop once or twice at most.

 

[hikarutilmitt]

2 things
Most OSTs arent available to buy easily and even less are on streaming
the artists have already been paid by the company

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1) this isn't a justification for piracy
2) not always or completely, as they may be making royalties on copies sold or any reproductions of the music
EX) copyright protection is a thing

 

[Skittles]

Are you saying that developers aren't being paid by the company until the games they made are selling well in the market?

Click to shrink...

Most musicians are already paid before the game is released and arent dependent on the sales of the game for their livelihood

 

[Hektor]

Uploading and sharing music without a license on youtube is piracy just like any other form.
The only difference here is that music piracy on youtube is so mainstream and widespread that most people don't even think about it.
Not like that matters tho, because plenty of the people who vocally oppose piracy often have no logical, consistent baseline to base their feelings upon anyways and are just perfomatively attempting to feel morally virtuos on the innanet.

Musicians are already paid before the game is released and arent dependent on the sales of the game for their livelihood

Click to shrink...

So a videogame developers.

 

[Sabretooth]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this bit mean that the video is automatically licensed and the money goes to the licensor?

 

[DanteMenethil]

Youtube has a whole monetization system for copyrights and revenu. It is not as simple as "unofficial channel = piracy"

 

[hey it's that dog]

If something is on youtube and hasn't been taken down, I'm gonna listen and not give it a second thought. If it's a problem for someone, they can take it up with the platform. I'm not going to do the legwork of distinguishing between what's approved by the musician and what isn't. If that's piracy, oh well.

 

[Tiggleton]

I believe if you purchased a video game or film you are entitled to a copy of the soundtrack for free. You already got the music in some form. It's just capitalism trying to milk more cash out of you.
So I don't feel bad about listening to stuff on YT.

 

[Skittles]

1) this isn't a justification for piracy
2) not always or completely, as they may be making royalties on copies sold or any reproductions of the music
EX) copyright protection is a thing

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Accessibility is the number 1 cause of piracy. If you fail to provide your product in a given country or have poor distribution methods. Then it's on you if people decide to pirate your shit

 

[Captain of Outer Space]

I'm sure not every publisher is obsessive or aggressive about it, but I've seen so many of the videos I've put on Youtube get hit my Content ID claims over music that I can't imagine that they're not doing the same for these sorts of uploads unless they're maybe small indies or composers. Even sound effects get dinged over the dumbest things. Then again, the way the music industry behaves in general in the digital age is so ass backwards. Youtube vids with music in them should be able to embed links to buying official versions of that song, album, soundtrack, etc with all of the data that Youtube/Google has at their disposal.

It would also help if game soundtracks were easier to find on streaming services, as I believe Amazon Music mixes them in with movie and TV show soundtracks, so I remember trying to wade through thousands of soundtracks for the few game soundtracks they had a few years ago for my Prime library.

 

[SturokBGD]

This is entirely an issue with accessibility. Thankfully more companies are starting to get it and put out their soundtracks on Spotify and suchlike. I'm direct-to-artist for the things I love whenever possible... but it's not always possible.

The YouTube Music service has changed the game too, since YT Music is essentially a slice of regular YT and a lot of discographies are automatically being added (in general, not just for video games) as a result of whatever streaming deals record companies have, and also with proper credit being added automatically to content that would previously result in a copyright strike.

EDIT: what Sabretooth posted above is what I'm talking about. It's all automated now.

 

[KillLaCam]

If I already bought the game and you aren't selling the soundtrack or if it's not on Spotify, then I'll listen to it on whatever the first channel I find it on. they still get money on most unofficial YouTube channels

 

[pdog128]

I was browsing the thread on FE: Three Houses music, and was pretty surprised.

I don't really care about video game soundtracks. Like, at all. But it's still Nintendo's intellectual property to do with as they wish. If they want to package it and sell it to consumers, they can. If they don't want to make it available, they don't have to. It seems like they're leaving a lot of money on the table, but Nintendo's gonna Nintendo.

No one is entitled to listen to game soundtracks. No one is entitled to digital versions of movies. No one is entitled to physical copies of games. That's just the way the world works. You can complain if you want, and that's your right. But that's not a justification of copyright infringement.

 

[ann3nova.]

Sounds like someone at Google has heard this complaint and has fixed the piracy issue for you years ago.

 

[StallionDan]

If you can't buy it new there is no loss to the owners, so morally there shouldn't be a problem. Youtube also lets them autoclaim anyone who uploads their music should they choose, so if they aren't doing that then they basically allowing it.

 

[Komo]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this bit mean that the video is automatically licensed and the money goes to the licensor?

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Yes almost every single video game track or unofficial upload of any song out there has been usually licensed by the original creator or someone doing it on their behalf.

 

[Lunaray]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this bit mean that the video is automatically licensed and the money goes to the licensor?

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One and done. This should be the first post. Most video game music on youtube is already copyright claimed regardless of who uploaded it, so the royalties already go to the creators. The concerns voiced by the OP are a total non-issue these days.

 

[overnightnocturne]

Where else are you supposed to listen to the music?

 

[hikarutilmitt]

Accessibility is the number 1 cause of piracy. If you fail to provide your product in a given country or have poor distribution methods. Then it's on you if people decide to pirate your shit

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I'd like to see legit numbers on this claim, because I see it all the time as an excuse to pirate. I've seen a number of studies from different groups coming to the same conclusions, but they are typically biased and spin their data. It's much more common for people to simply not want to pay for something or do it just because it's easier, as availability with most things can be done very easily due to globalization.

And, again, it's still not legal just because you cannot easily get a local version or copy of something.

 

[Dyle]

Youtube automatically licensed these videos and sent any proceeds to the license holder, so they still get paid for it. Is it official? No, but if the copyright holder is still getting funded and is not actively pursuing channels like it, I struggle to find value in describing the practice as piracy.

 

[Hieroph]

Where else are you supposed to listen to the music?

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In the game itself, duh. And if you want to highlight a particular track from a soundtrack that might contain 100 tracks or more, you just ask everybody to buy the game, play it up to that point in the game, and listen to the track. Completely hassle free and piracy free commentary of the game's music, duh.

 

[LiQuid!]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this bit mean that the video is automatically licensed and the money goes to the licensor?

Click to shrink...

This is correct. Not sure what OP is on to be honest but this isn't a legitimate concern for most uploads.

Also youtube is good for finding super old/obscure rips of games that it's literally impossible to find any kind of official OST for, unless OP wants to provide link for a store I can import the OST for Battle Bull for the Gameboy. Til then I'll stick to Youtube and be appreciative of uploaders

 

[Giever]

I think it's fine, but it would be nice if people would at least admit it's hypocritical lol

 

[Force_XXI]

Maybe op should have done some research before making this thread

 

[Hu3]

This is correct. Not sure what OP is on to be honest but this isn't a legitimate concern for most uploads.

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You know very well what is the op about. That corporative defense force. Making threads without informing themselves. Pretty sure he is coming from that Nintendo thread, with the fucking bullshit that Nintendo pulls and its penny pinching behavior, but hey every company needs it's apologist.

 

[Hate]

Can you even buy some of these music?

Are they available in your country?

Printed in limited quality?

 

[Vitet]

Yep, not true. Even covers most of the times can't be monetized, and the original tracks almost always are detected by Youtube algorhythm, so no: unofficial channel doesn't mean piracy.

In fact, we have some videos with license agreements with the owners, and even being covers most of them are automatically demonetized for our channel and monetized for the rights owner in some countries, like this one:

 

[Nanashrew]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this bit mean that the video is automatically licensed and the money goes to the licensor?

Click to shrink...

I'm still impressed that DeoxysPrime somehow got past all the takedowns for Xenoblade X. Xenoblade X's soundtrack is sold and licensed under Sony Music IIRC, and Sony Music is highly protective of their stuff, from muting, to takedowns, strikes, even region locking the content.

 

[Ohri-Jin]

lol Music Management groups, music labels and any entity that holds music licenses can opt to monetize anything they own.

This allows fans to still upload their music and OST's etc. without infringing and it even makes THEM a revenue stream. Free marketing mouth to mouth etc.

However the reason everyone is doubling down on Copyright infringing as it seems has to do with Europe and Article 13. Well at least that is what I am thinking of..

I think they are preemptively removing it for the entire EU region in general..

 

[MegaXZero]

Good (overall) point OP. A lot of video game music on YouTube would be piracy. Your example may not be since it's licensed (is it approved by all the appropriate companies though?) but someone has already posted one of the many examples of unlicensed game music.

The mods should probably have a ruling for unofficial YouTube music.

 

[closer]

I wrote a whole post but I was kind of shifting gears when it comes to OP's topic and talking about the music industry at large + the tenuousness and arbitrary nature of copyright law + the idea that our current biggest games are literally riffs on existing games (dota2/league -> defense of the ancients mod, fortnite -> arma mod, autochess -> autochess mod)

so I'll just say, yeah I have little love for copyright law, and mainly see it as a way to keep rich people rich.

 

[Weebos]

I don't really get the anger when companies pull down unofficial uploads. Being disappointed makes sense, but it's not like the music is suddenly legally uploaded because the tracks aren't on Spotify or something.

 

[Zacmortar]

Video game soundtracks are often not even full

The Silent Hill soundtracks, for instance, lack several HOURS of ambient and background tracks that only youtube had until the full album was taken down. Now all those tracks are effectively lost for me, and its infuriating.

 

[dodo]

let's cut to the chase of what this thread is obviously about: nintendo should make it easier to buy their game soundtracks. they don't need anyone defending them

 

[eddy]

The rule is simple: Is the video uploaded by the official channel of the publisher or artist? y/n

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Certainly a simple rule if you believe all laws are just.

What if you don't though? Is it okay to break laws you feel are unjust?

 

[Hate]

let's cut to the chase of what this thread is obviously about: nintendo should make it easier to buy their game soundtracks. they don't need anyone defending them

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.

 

[Komo]

let's cut to the chase of what this thread is obviously about: nintendo should make it easier to buy their game soundtracks. they don't need anyone defending them

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Yes and streaming services.

 

[Deleted member 679]

I do agree that it's piracy, but I don't personally care about it because the tools are largely in favor of publishers in this case. They can easily claim their content as theirs whenever they want. So if it's available there, they're either already getting paid or they don't care. So why would I?

 

[JaxiPup]

Not condoning music piracy here, but it is one of those normalized things. Its youtube; you're not visiting an illicit 3rd party site, so it has an air of acceptability to it, regardless of the connotations.

The bigger argument here is for more companies to introduce more (and convenient) methods of obtaining their soundtracks. We're the spotify/youtube generation, its honestly driven more by convenience than money.

As a side note, I'd make arguments for fan made extended tracks if extended versions don't exist.

 

[HotHamBoy]

Most musicians are already paid before the game is released and arent dependent on the sales of the game for their livelihood

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I mean, Era doesn't condone piracy of NES ROMs, either...

 

[LiQuid!]

I was sent a physical copy of an OST from a developer of an obscure video game years ago and I uploaded it to Youtube with emailed permission from the dev that sent it. My channel is not official. The physical OST I was given wasn't even an official release, it was just a custom CD made by the dev team that they distributed to themselves internally because they liked the music. According to OP I'm a filthy pirate...

 

[HotHamBoy]

I was sent a physical copy of an OST from a developer of an obscure video game years ago and I uploaded it to Youtube with emailed permission from the dev that sent it. My channel is not official. The physical OST I was given wasn't even an official release, it was just a custom CD made by the dev team that they distributed to themselves internally because they liked the music. According to OP I'm a filthy pirate...

Click to shrink...

Is the developer able to give that permission per their arrangement with the composer?