Rand Paul’s Video Removed From YouTube For Copyright Infringement
San Diego – Rand Paul recently announced his candidacy for the 2016 Presidential Campaign. In doing so he followed in the footsteps of many other White House-hopefuls by using media outlets such as YouTube to draw attention to his campaign.
Paul’s YouTube channel released a video to announce his candidacy. Unfortunately, he received a Digital Millennium Copy Right Act “DMCA” notice to take the video down. The alleged infringement was due to the video’s unathorized use of a country song by John Rich called “Shuttin’ Down Detroit.” The song was used in the video as Rand Paul made his grand entrance to give his candidacy speech.
Paul’s video titled “Stand with Rand: Kentucky” was flagged by Youtube’s “Content ID” system. This system automatically scans videos uploaded for copyright infringement and notifies the owner of any possible infringements. The holder of the rights then gets to decide what to do with the infringing material.
Warner Music Group owns the rights to “Shuttin’ Down Detroit,” and decided to block the video due to copyright infringement. In place of the video a Youtube statement read: “This content contains content from WMG, who has blocked it in your country on copyright grounds.”
Rand Paul is not the first Presidential candidate to use YouTube to promote a presidential race, and he is also not the first to have content removed due to alleged infringements.
President Barack Obama’s popular ‘Yes We Can” speech was made into a YouTube video and song which brought attention his campaign without any copyright issues. Candidate Mitt Romney also turned to YouTube as a media outlet but was not so lucky. His video featured Obama singing an Al-Green song and was later taken down due to copyright infringement. After debating over the issue, YouTube allowed the video to remain uploaded.
In Florida ex-governor Charlie Crist used a Talking Heads’ 1985 single “Road to Nowhere” without permission or proper licenses in a Youtube video. In response, David Byrne sued Crist for $1 million in damages.
The original video “Stand with Rand: Kentucky” has been removed from Rand Paul’s YouTube account. According to a representative, users can fight against the Content ID system if they believe a video has been falsely flagged. At this point, Rand Paul has made no comment.
Interestingly, the DMCA notice was issued the same day that Rand Paul released a video against any type of Internet regulation which can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFlI35MKbd0.