I Got a Copyright Claim! Do I Dispute?

[Sarah Frost]

I just got four copyright claims on the same video. It's a Sims 4 Let's Play and features my sim spending time at the Romance Festival and the music that plays during the festival is audible (but with crappy quality due to only using the microphone built into my laptop, so the audio comes out really choppy). Am I not allowed to have the music from the game playing? Surely that's not right? All my favourite YouTube simmers have the game music playing in their videos, why is this happening to me? Thanks for any help you can offer.

 

[Cephus]

If you do not have the legal right or legal permission to post that content, then you can't do it. Even if someone else is getting away with it, and you don't know if they are, that doesn't mean you get to.

 

[cbpayne]

You can't dispute it as you have no legal rights to the music!

If other have the music playing, then that means they either:
1. Have permission from the copyright holder
2. Have not been caught yet
3. Have been caught and the copyright holder decided not to make a claim

 

[Sarah Frost]

If you do not have the legal right or legal permission to post that content, then you can't do it. Even if someone else is getting away with it, and you don't know if they are, that doesn't mean you get to.

I don't know that I'm 'trying to get away' with anything (that's a little harsh). I was just under the impression that the ingame music from the Sims 4 was not copyright protected in terms of being used in a YouTube let's play (obviously I know I can't upload it as music over a video that has nothing to do with the game, i.e. as background music over vlog).

I forgot to add that I'm not monetised.

 

[Cephus]

I don't know that I'm 'trying to get away' with anything (that's a little harsh). I was just under the impression that the ingame music from the Sims 4 was not copyright protected in terms of being used in a YouTube let's play (obviously I know I can't upload it as music over a video that has nothing to do with the game, i.e. as background music over vlog).

I forgot to add that I'm not monetised.

It doesn't matter if you're monetized or not, you still can't post anything that you do not personally have a right to use. I don't know if it's the case with Sims, but a lot of music is licensed to the game studio, not owned by them. So the game has the right to use it, but the music is still owned by someone else. Even if the studio allows people to play their games on YouTube, that doesn't mean the owners of the music do. You need to get permission from the rights owner regardless of whether you're making money or not, otherwise they can claim or strike your channel.

 

[Sarah Frost]

Thank you. I've decided to mute the music through YouTube's music erasing tool. And in the future I will mute the music to start with while I play.