Music Licensing Firm Offers Cheap Licenses For YouTube Videos

from the but,-um,-what-about-free? dept

The New York Times is reporting that music licensing firm Rumblefish is trying to help people making YouTube videos avoid takedowns or the dreaded YouTube ContentID “silencing” by offering music that can be licensed for YouTube videos at $1.99 per song (for non-commercial purposes only). While it’s at least somewhat good to see music licensing firms recognizing that this market isn’t going to buy hugely expensive licenses, and trying to adjust to handle this new market, it sort of ignores the fact that there are still a ton of Creative Commons and similarly licensed (or public domain) music out there that they can use. Since the Rumblefish catalog in this offer doesn’t include any major label music or “big name” artists, it seems like those who might be interested in such a thing could probably find just as good, if not better, Creative Commons-licensed music. On top of that, this is the same Rumblefish who caused some problems last year when it claimed licensing rights over some public domain music, pissing off a bunch of YouTube users.

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Companies: rumblefish

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Comments on “Music Licensing Firm Offers Cheap Licenses For YouTube Videos”

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26 Comments
R. Miles (profile) says:

Re: ok explain time

“or the price that they have to pay to allow everyone to listen to it.”
This one.

I, too, agree the amount of money is too much. Any amount is too much.

What should be done, instead, is those using music in their videos be required to acknowledge the performer, song writer, and the song title.

Content is the ad for the product. If people like the song, then the required acknowledgment has potential to increase sales in other venues if people put the value in the song to want to own a copy of it.

This “license” is nothing more than another attempt at paying far too many people who didn’t write or perform the song to begin with. Insulting, to say the least.

Richard (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:2 ok explain time

You don’t need to subscribe (or pay anything at all) to get access to the MP3s. You can buy individual albums in high quality on a “name your own price” basis – or pay the subscription for an “all you can eat” high quality option.

Plus you can officially share any purchased album with 3 friends.

Plus they have a “No DRM ever” pledge

Plus – they won’t pursue you even if you share more than the official 3x – they say ” we just hope you will feel bad about it”.

R. Miles (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:3 ok explain time

“You don’t need to subscribe”
Yes, you do. Just checked out the site. The second I tried accessing a download, it asks me to be a member.

For $180/year, I’ll pass.

In addition, my opinion doesn’t give a damn about copyright or CC restrictions.

One of these days, artists will realize the only control they have is how to make money. Once in the public domain, they have no control no matter what the hell they think.

Richard (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:4 ok explain time

The download button is for the top quality file that you do have to pay for.

However if you look further down the page for the place where it says:

“Play all tracks as an m3u audio stream (or xspf, ogg, mp3 file” Right click on “mp3” and then “save link” and it will let you download the (lower quality) file for free.

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