Is downloading YouTube videos legal? I've always been under the assumption that doing such was illegal. I don't see any difference between downloading music from YouTube and downloading music from The Pirate Bay. Apparently, there is this Software Recs SE question that talks precisely about downloading from YouTube. Related: Piracy/File sharing - Why aren't songs, movies or ebooks given for free (+ads) like TV?
It's not a crime per se, but you're breaching contract if you're accessing it by normal means, that is, through a Web browser or through the API. Youtube Terms of Use 5B, emphasis added: Content is provided to you AS IS. You may access Content for your information and personal use solely as intended through the provided functionality of the Service and as permitted under these Terms of Service. You shall not download any Content unless you see a “download” or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content. You shall not copy, reproduce, make available online or electronically transmit, publish, adapt, distribute, transmit, broadcast, display, sell, license, or otherwise exploit any Content for any other purposes without the prior written consent of YouTube or the respective licensors of the Content. YouTube and its licensors reserve all rights not expressly granted in and to the Service and the Content. It is a breach of the Terms, which you agree to and are contractually bound by, to download Content unless Youtube allows it. Because Users license, the Content to Youtube, Youtube is entitled to recover loss of income from your breach of contract, including loss of advertising revenue, and possibly even punitive damages. Legally, whether you can download it depends on the jurisdiction. It is generally acceptable to make a copy of media you purchase, however these rights do not generally extend to media purchased online, where you become bound by the terms of the service provider - in this case, Youtube. The owner of the Content retains ownership rights and licenses derivation, reproduction and distribution rights to Youtube. That is, if the content owner made it available on some other website for viewing, then you would have the rights to download it for the purposes of viewing it. However, you would still not have distribution, adaptation or modification rights unless they were assigned to you by the content owner. You may have a a Fair Use/Dealing defense for the content, depending on the purpose and nature of your usage. 17 U.S.C. § 107 outlines the considerations in a US Fair Use defense, which essentially boils down to: Nature and purpose of the use Nature of the copyrighted work Amount of the copyrighted work used The effect of the use on the value of the copyrighted work In the absence of case law to the contrary¹, the Terms of Use, copyright law, and fair use law are only legal principles we can rely upon in determining the legality of downloading content from Youtube. 1. It's possible that there is case law, but I've just spent a bit of time searching and haven't found any cases where end users were sued for downloading content.
Maybe. It might fall under &quot;fair use&quot;, which overrides the general requirement to get permission. The way to find out is to do it, get sued, then try to defend your action by using the fair use defense. If they win in the lawsuit, you can't, if you win, you can. There are four &quot;factors&quot; that have to be &quot;balanced&quot;, plus a fifth. The factors are &quot;the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes&quot;, &quot;the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole&quot;, &quot;the nature of the copyrighted work&quot; and &quot;the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work&quot;. The fifth consideration is &quot;transformativeness&quot;. W.r.t. purpose of the use, your use would likely be found to be &quot;fair&quot;, except for the Youtube monetization problem. The &quot;nature of the copyright work&quot; question is primarily about &quot;artistic works&quot; versus &quot;factual works&quot;, so it would depend on what you are taking from. One second might not be substantial, unless that one second is the only reason people pay to watch the copyrighted work. That interacts with the substantiality desideratum: could people get the crucial amusement content of the paid work for free by watching your video? You can read some case law in the links here, and you basically have to get an attorney to analyze your plans to tell you what your risks are.
Copyright in the US is usually a civil matter. Meaning that the copyright owner can sue (typically for money damages or injunctive relief) an infringer. The criminal laws that we have are aimed at the reproducer and/or distributor. In other words, chances are that you won't get in any criminal trouble for accessing academic articles of dubious origin. But never say never. RIP Aaron Schwartz.
You're talking about sites like Youtube, so I'll focus on that. That quote, which you bolded, was over-simplified. The actual law is 17 USC 512 (c) Information Residing on Systems or Networks At Direction of Users. (1) In general. A service provider shall not be liable for monetary relief, or, except as provided in subsection (j), for injunctive or other equitable relief, for infringement of copyright by reason of the storage at the direction of a user of material that resides on a system or network controlled or operated by or for the service provider, if the service provider (A) -- (I) does not have actual knowledge that the material or an activity using the material on the system or network is infringing; -- (ii) in the absence of such actual knowledge, is not aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent; or -- (iii) upon obtaining such knowledge or awareness, acts expeditiously to remove, or disable access to, the material; (B) does not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity, in a case in which the service provider has the right and ability to control such activity; and (C says and complies with a DMCA takedown notice). What you're talking about is membership fees (e.g. Youtube Premium)... or general advertisements that would be placed on any video without awareness of it being infringing. That does not violate Safe Harbor per se. At least not on a legitimate site which is dominated by legitimate content and makes an honest, credible effort to keep it that way. The important clause in (B) is &quot;In a case...&quot; Under (B), they lack the ability to control each activity (upload or view). Youtube's inability is due to receiving 500 hours (30,000 minutes) of uploaded video every minute, obviously requiring 30,000++ staff seats working 24x7 to curate. That would amount to about 200,000 staff - all of Google is around 50,000 right now. Even if a small site were able to moderate all content, they might still have a Safe Harbor defense if they could credibly say that they did not know the material was infringing. If someone created a &quot;Juan Brown&quot; username and uploaded blancolirio's videos from YouTube, they could say &quot;we did not know that was not the real person&quot;. But if the video started with an HBO splash screen and tones, then heck no. But non-moderation is not an airtight defense. When sites are neglectful toward removal, they can soon develop a reputation as a haven for such infringing content - which the sites tend to embrace, since it brings many customers! This was the undoing of several music sharing sites in the 00's, since this awareness of their reputation, plus a lack of diligent removal, failed them on all three arms of 1(A) above. Remember that a competently run website that relies on user submissions is well aware of the DMCA and its case law, and has tailored its rules and enforcement to make it easy to defend a copyright claim. For instance, in the case of music, Youtube uses some human intervention but largely automated means to either take it down and give the uploader a copyright &quot;strike&quot; leading to a ban (which alienates their biggest contributors, especially when a popular Youtuber like blancolirio winds up with a distant car stereo in background noise, remember the detection is by &quot;bot&quot; and no human ever sanity-checks it). de-monetize the suspect video (uploader gets nothing, but, neither does YouTube). monetize it, but give the revenue stream to the rights holder due to an agreement with them. The last one is Youtube's preference with regards to music. As this was vastly easier, more practical and better for the community all-around, allowing whole classes of content to be created that would be prima-facie illegal otherwise. And it's content people are already creating and Youtube can't stop them, so it solves a big policing problem too.
&quot;Personal use only&quot; does not excuse copyright infringement under US law. The uploader does not hold copyright, and neither gives nor denies permission to copy his creation. The law does not require a copyright holder to deny permission, it requires the user to actually obtain permission. So no matter how you slice it (even as fair use) it is infringement for you to copy that video.
The platform will get in trouble for copyright infringement. The disclaimer that you are not liable does not work, legally, since the person suing you hasn't agreed to the TOS on your webpage. You can be sued for &quot;secondary infringement&quot;, meaning that not only the uploader but also you the service provider are liable. The solution to this quandry is the &quot;DMCA safe harbor&quot;, a set of rules which, if you follow them, you won't be held liable. The specific piece of law is here. The essence of the rules is that you have to have a &quot;designated agent&quot; who receives takedown notices: if a copyright owner finds their stuff on your page, they officially notify you, then you take the material down – expeditiously (no dawdling). You notify the uploader, they either accept the takedown or file a counterclaim, you notify the rights-holder, there's a waiting period, then the rights holder can file a lawsuit, or not. If the rights-holder doesn't file suit, you can put the material back up. You cannot rely solely on the intricate DMCA notice / counter-notice dance, because under para (c)(1)(A)(ii) of §512, you also must not be &quot;aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent&quot;.
It would be copyright infringement. You had the copyright holders permission to make one copy of the song by downloading it. At that time, if you gave me a copy of that song, it could be argued that very, very little damage was caused because I just had downloaded that song myself with practically the same effect. Today, that argument is not valid anymore. So this is definitely copyright infringement. That's your question answered. I doubt that anyone would take action if you gave a copy to someone and it was found out. Making it available to the world for free download is another matter. That could easily get you into trouble; in the USA there could be a fine up to $150,000 without any proof of actual damages needed.
There's existing copyright infringement and future copyright infringement. Let's say you sold a million records with infringing contents. That's copyright infringement. It has happened, you can't undo it. Now you get sued. If you think you will lose, it would be a good idea to change the music to be not infringing, so the next million records are not infringing and add to the damages. It doesn't fix the infringement that has already been done, but makes sure there is no further infringement. And infringement after you were told about it and asked to stop might be punished more harshly.