DMCA and music on Twitch is heavily misunderstood
the amount of misinformation about what you can and can't do is terrifying and the amount of
misinformation or downright lies being spread especially in the small stream of space is
actually setting you up and thousands of other streamers to put their entire Channel at
risk literally years of your hard work growing your channel and you're risking it all because
bootyman69 on Twitter said just delete your vods forehead and you believed them S
o today we're not
only going to break down dmca in a way anyone can understand disprove a bunch of terrible myths
putting you at risk and hopefully give you a bunch of safe to use music that doesn't sound like
low quality midi tracks or the same repetitive music you hear in everyone else's streams and
videos already we need to briefly explain what dmca is for you the viewer and really important
that we need to set one of the biggest myths straight you see fear-mongering content creators
ha
ve lied or misled you a little bit for their own gain essentially there is a huge myth in our
space that dmca and copyright strikes are things done by twitch that is a twitch system and it's
actually twitch's fault often you'll hear dmca and how twitch is a predatory system who forced
you all to delete every clip and to get banned on your own stream and every time there is a wave of
copyright strikes everyone grabs their pitchforks marches to social media and harasses the twitch
social staf
f who who have nothing to do with the policy team and in reality dmca is Digital
Millennium Copyright Act it is part of the US copyright law and it relates to the process of
removing content from the internet if you are the legal right holder twitch had almost nothing to do
with issuing dmca takedowns for when streamers use music or copyrighted materials that they aren't
allowed to use you see twitch falls under a system called Safe Harbor which I will not get into too
much because truly yo
u don't need to understand the intense legal rules of it but essentially
the copyright strikes actually come from the copyright holders who own the rights to whatever
it is you're using without their permission and really you only need to learn one single rule to
make your entire stream safe which I will tell you that rule in a second and you will probably need
some options for music which I'll also give you in a second as well but first what is the main step
that twitch actually takes in t
his process well when a streamer or you for example plays music or
uses copyrighted material they don't own and if twitch's automatic systems detect it which they do
have well then they will mute the VOD for you the streamer's safety if you receive a muted VOD you
know to instantly stop using the music or content because you don't have the rights to it and twitch
is concerned about the use of it don't worry too much if you do get muted though well no that's not
true you should worry a bit b
ut don't worry a lot because a muted VOD isn't a copyright strike if
you continue however to use the music or content that you don't have the rights to well the owner
might issue copyright strikes and you like many other streamers will probably get caught up in
having them issued against your account luckily twitch added a new tool to see if you've received
strikes or not which I'll show you where to find that tool later in the video so stay tuned LJ LJ
LJ that's why I have my audio split s
o the music I use illegally is only when live and it doesn't
show up in my VOD after the stream this means I get away scot-free oh really yeah yeah well I'll
cover that later too because you're in for a bit of a surprise on that one before we move on why
does all of this actually matter look I am trying to tell you guys without getting too deep into the
legal mumbo jumbo that you cannot repeat again you cannot use Music you do not own the rights to
use and having the rights doesn't mean pay
ing for Spotify Premium or buying a CD that's just
you buying the music to use for yourself not to use in your stream you need to use Music you have
proper permission from the rights holder to use in your content this means either any of the services
we'll mention later in this video or other trusted Services because shock and horror just because a
playlist on YouTube or Spotify says copyright free doesn't mean it actually is most of those aren't
and they don't even own the music they're us
ing before we go any further I'm excited to say this
video is in fact sponsored you see I get asked all the time about the music I use on this channel
my side Channel and on my streams and these days I really only use epidemic sound and I love it
so much they have over 35 000 songs across every single genre and no matter what type of music
you as a Creator like to use I promise you they will have something that fits you and your content
and most importantly is safe to use and completely oka
y to be monetized across all platforms I love
how easy it is to find new music as well every three to six months I like to refresh my entire
stream by adding new songs getting rid of old ones so I just go to episode hit browse and I sort
by different genres popularity new releases and it takes no time at all I don't just use their
normal tracks either I also have circus music epic battle music and I have even sneaky music
that I'll switch to with a hotkey on my stream deck or other tool dep
ending on what I'm doing in
the Stream hey if I'm going up against a big boss you know I need some epic battle music to help me
get through it a lot that's not my best moment but RJ I want to keep risking my channel by playing
whatever I want look I know you love Kanye West Billy but what is the point of working so hard
to grow your stream only to lose it overnight when record labels learn what twitch actually
is which is happening faster and faster every year and then they choose to strike
everyone into
the ground again and to help you start using the right types of music we're offering you a 30-day
free trial for epidemic sound with the link in the description you can use that right now to try
their servers for 30 days and realize just how amazing it is the best part about this is though
I will also cover a few other free services soon and I still wanted to show you where you can
actually check the twitch copyright tools but first it's important to show you how to credit
a
rtists which is really hard to do because every artist actually requests Credit in a different
way for example epidemic sound is actually really easy it just asks you to connect your username
to your epidemic account and that is it but for services like chillhop they require a panel and
a link in the description or your stream's about section because everyone is different there's
no rule of thumb when it comes to crediting it an artist that you're using so instead what
I like to do is I try
to find a page about how to credit and I follow that or because again
there's no real standard sometimes they might call it a Creative Commons page or a licensing page
where they explain how to credit them where you can use it and where to go from there everyone
is different and you just have to do your best to follow their guidelines personally though I
won't use Music unless I have found a section on licensing or Creative Commons beforehand because
as I mentioned earlier just because som
ething says copyright free doesn't mean it is the love of God
please stop trusting random Spotify radio stations or YouTube playlists most YouTube playlists out
there that say copyright free I find are just using epidemic sound music and then not telling
you guys that they're using someone else's music but what about getting permission from artists
well that said I've also emailed artists in the past to get express permission from them and I do
use some music from Independent Artists who I'
ve spoken to but it is very important to know even
this is risky for example I have one artist who I reached out to and got full express permission
to use their music written down in an email I did it all by the book we're good to go but a month
later they signed with a record label that didn't sign off and agree on this and all their music
was suddenly no longer allowed and was actually getting muted on Twitch and I couldn't use it
anymore despite the fact that I had a one-to-one with that
artist a record label wasn't okay with
it so be aware that receiving permission doesn't actually always mean you get the rights to use
it because sadly it's a lot more complicated than that speaking of complicated how do we check if we
get copyright strikes on Twitch and what happens if we do well if you want to find out if you have
a copyright strike head to your Twitch dashboard which is located inside your profile picture
and then click on create a dashboard on the left you'll see conte
nt click that and then click
copyright claims but uh this will tell you if you have any current claims or strikes fun fact if you
get three claims here well then twitch will delete your channel but before you get upset YouTube
has the exact same three strike policy and this is very standard which brings me to the next myth
splitting your audio through live music doesn't appear in your VOD this logic is really funny to
me because up until last year when the largest amount of strikes in dmca
takedowns in twitch
history happened most streamers had the logic of I can play whatever I want it's live content
baby record labels don't know about it and I have in court yet I just can't put the music in YouTube
videos because YouTube actually detects it there and as you can imagine the logic didn't hold up
leading to a lot of streamers receiving hundreds of strikes overnight a lot of them being banned
and the rest having to delete every single VOD or clip they had of their stream and no
w following
the exact same logic streamers are saying if they split their tracks so it doesn't appear in their
VOD they'll be safe because they believe right holders won't be able to detect the music while
they're live especially because several large creators in this space people who run agencies who
work with record labels who are in the thick of this industry have said that smart record labels
have started using live detection to find people on Twitch who are doing these things and hones
tly
it's only going to get more advanced as we go forward the logic of I haven't been caught yet so
it's fine is honestly idiotic and it is the same logic that led to a wave of strikes last year
and the same logic people who speed in cars use there are amazing creators out there spreading
this logic telling people to do this and weirdly I hope they are correct and they never get caught
but knowing how brutal the music industry is and how mainstream live streaming is becoming I
don't feel c
onfident in these people which is why you need to use music that is safe so what
are my top services to use for music well let me rattle them off quickly and I will link them in
the description as well first of course epidemic sound I don't need to pitch it again it is the
best of the best it is professional Quality Music it doesn't sound like all the other services
and while it is paid technically it does have that 30-day free trial it is fairly affordable
for new creators and Incredibly e
asy to use not a single Creator I know who has started using
epidemic has regretted it or canceled it with them second you all know them already most likely but
I have to shout them out is chillhop probably the most extensive library of Lo-Fi they've been a
go-to free service for years long before all this gmca drama actually started happening with twitch
they do require panel and description crediting for their music but they make it so easy and clear
for you with their how to set up and c
redit page but I really love chillhop because they have these
giant hour-long mixes of Lo-Fi that perfectly sit behind your content and just add the right Vibe
but of course because they are so well known it can be a little bit samey since everyone uses them
already third recommendation look I know most of you are Gamers so what happens when old school
video game tracks get remixed professionally game jobs baby all your favorite game tracks
remixed into Lo-Fi EDM and more while also being s
afe to use with credit that's amazing of
course though it is incredibly high quality and it's free it's very nostalgic which means it's
used by a lot of creators already I don't think that's really a problem for most of you though
you'll just love it fourth if we're talking about being used by a lot of creators well we
have to talk about no copyright sound these guys have been on the internet since before you
were born practically and every single Call of Duty Montage or League of Legends v
ideo has used
their music already seriously these were the ogs for gaming video music if you go to their Channel
and saw by most popular I promise you'll recognize one of the top tracks great service does require
credit but it's free to use very well known for a very good reason and finally I really don't need
to recommend them because most of you who watch this channel would have heard of it already it's
stream Beats by Harris Heller I again don't need to say anything here if you're a stre
amer you know
Harris you've heard stream beats you'll be fine I think it's really important to say that music
can go a long way to help your content be more engaging but at its core you need to practice
and become more confident and more entertaining which is actually easy if you know the
right steps so click here and watch this video it'll help you do just that and grow as
a content creator I'll see you guys next week
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