C-61. 10 Big Myths about copyright explained. See EFF notes on fair use and links from it for a detailed answer, but bear the following in mind: The "fair use" exemption to (U.S.) copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's vital so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to appropriate other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations.
Are you reproducing an article from the New York Times because you needed to in order to criticise the quality of the New York Times, or because you couldn't find time to write your own story, or didn't want your readers to have to register at the New York Times web site? The first is probably fair use, the others probably aren't. Fair use is generally a short excerpt and almost always attributed. See the DMCA alert for recent changes in the law. False. False. YouTube owns YourStuff | The Register. High performance access to file storage Never trust a hippy - John Lydon The latest attempt to rebrand the web, "Web 2.0" has been evangelized as a platform for sharing - but it's increasingly looking like a platform tilted steeply in one direction. Millions may be about to discover what singer Billy Bragg found out recently - that "community" hosting web sites can do as they please with creative material you submit. In its Terms & Conditions, the wildly popular video sharing site YouTube emphasizes that "you retain all of your ownership rights in your User Submissions".
There's quite a large "BUT... ", however. Not only does YouTube retain the right to create derivative works, but so do the users, and so too, does YouTube's successor company. The license that you grant YouTube is worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable. "It is good to know that if you delete a video from YouTube, then the rights you have granted them terminate.