Ah, But I Was So Much Older Then, I’m Younger Than That Now
By Harry McCracken | Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 9:43 pm
[FURTHER UPDATE: As commenter Jdoors explains, I can see the video I uploaded when I’m logged into YouTube. But I’m the only one who can see it–for everybody else, it’s blocked.]
[UPDATE: The original video, with Dylan soundtrack, is still playing for me here at home in Daly City, California. But Network World’s Paul McNamara, commenters, and others are saying that it’s blocked for them. Sounds like the geolocation technology that YouTube uses has decided that Daly City isn’t in the U.S. Or something like that.]
Back in October, shortly after Steve Jobs passed away, I uploaded a wonderful video to YouTube. It was called “To Steven Jobs on his thirtieth birthday,” and was a film created by Jobs’ Apple coworkers in 1985 to show at his birthday party. (Craig Elliott, who worked at Apple when it was made and shown, was the generous soul who shared it with me.)
I’d never seen the video or many of the Jobs images it included, and thought they deserved to be more widely known. Now they are: The YouTube version has been viewed almost 240.000 times.
But Paul McNamara of Network World noticed something about the video which I didn’t know: It was missing. As he explains, when he tried to play it, he got a message saying it violated Sony Music Entertainment’s copyright and was therefore blocked. After reading his post, I checked, and got the same alert that he did.
And…I guess the video did violate Sony’s copyright. The (perfect) soundtrack was Bob Dylan’s “My Back Pages.” SI didn’t regret uploading it–YouTube is bursting at the seams with copyrighted music. But if Sony took action against it, I’m not outraged. Just sad.
Here’s the thing, though: I just checked the video again, and it’s working again. For me, at least. As of right now. Here it is:
I see that it has a link letting you buy “My Back Pages” from iTunes, the Android Marketplace, or Amazon; maybe Sony is just as happy leaving the video up in hopes of monetizing it. If so, good!
But just in case: Here’s another version of “To Steven Jobs on His Thirtieth Birthday.” Without any audio at all. It’s nowhere near as good as the Dylan one, but far better than nothing…
7 Comments
Read more:
7 Comments For This Post
February 22nd, 2012 at 9:54 pm
Harry, the first video is no longer there – Blocked by Sony again. The second one is still up….
February 22nd, 2012 at 11:01 pm
It’s funny that the companies like Sony don’t seem to understand that when they do this stuff it makes their customers angry,and they are less likely to buy the company’s products. Having the music in the video is likely to generate sales as someone see the video and thinks,”Man, I’d liked o have that song.”
But no, they are just to stupid.
I haven’t bought a “label” CD in 10 years and I have no intention of ever buying a label CD again.
February 23rd, 2012 at 8:36 am
I think that YouTube's geolocation system, for some reason, is letting me play it here at home in Daly City, California. When I checked earlier yesterday, from a network in San Francisco, it was blocked. But I can still play the video here.
February 23rd, 2012 at 8:40 am
As long as they own the rights they can change their minds how they wish to handle unauthorized use as often as they please. But if you didn’t actively appeal the original disablement, I can’t explain how they turned it back on (in order to place the ad/link). That’s not common … AT ALL.
February 23rd, 2012 at 8:42 am
Also: They can choose to stop distribution while permitting you to keep the video in your channel. Only you would be able to play it, while signed into your channel. Sign out and see if it still plays.
February 23rd, 2012 at 9:09 am
JDoors–that's it! I can see it when logged in. Can't see it when logged out. Thank you.
February 23rd, 2012 at 5:25 pm
One day you will be able to buy a tune one time. Doesn't Sony understand that most of us who like that track already paid for it. No more Sony for me.