Is this stealing? | Imamother

groisamomma

Tue, Dec 31 2019, 11:09 pm

I'm going to ask a rav tomorrow but I'm curious what other people think.

There are hundreds of Jewish songs on YouTube, which we all have access to for free. Popular frum artists post their song videos on their YouTube channels for everyone to enjoy.

Is it stealing to convert the videos to mp3 files and download them to my computer to listen offline?

My thinking is that posting something online comes along with the understanding that you no longer have control over where it ends up.

Thoughts?

amother

Taupe

Tue, Dec 31 2019, 11:11 pm

I've been wondering similar. I don't convert songs to MP3, but I do download the YouTube video because I don't like watching anything on YouTube (because of the ads and "related videos"). I also have an adblocker on, so anyhow nobody makes money off my views.

B"H I have an Amazon Music subscription, so most of the new Jewish music is already available for me for free, and I no longer even have a Yetzer Hara to download it.

tigerwife

Tue, Dec 31 2019, 11:26 pm

I would assume that if I post my music on YouTube, then every viewer will be hearing my music for free, in whatever form. However, I can’t claim to know the halachic implications.

malki2

Tue, Dec 31 2019, 11:28 pm

There used to be a shaila regarding taking someone’s CD (or casette) and copying it for personal use. I think that the consensus was that it is hard to say that it is technically Assur, but it’s definitely not a proper thing to do because it deprives the singers of revenue from selling the CDs. But once something is actually out on YouTube, I would think that it’s already public property and there’s no issue with downloading it. (Of course the singers would still like you to believe that it’s Assur)

amother

Aubergine

Tue, Dec 31 2019, 11:37 pm

If the artist themselves posted the video or audio on YouTube, then their assumption may have been to profit from the advertising revenue (minimal as it may be on a frum song that is considered a big hit if it gets 2M views), and downloading deprives them of that.

tigerwife

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:11 am

If someone put out a CD, and Mr. A uploaded to iTunes and downloaded it onto his MP3 player, that is fine. If Mr. B then downloaded the CD from A’s iTunes instead of buying his own CD, I would call that stealing.

But if the singer uploaded his song onto a public platform, I imagine he did so to spread his popularity and wants as many people listening to him as possible, even though he will not be paid per listen.

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:28 am

shaqued_almond wrote:

A Rav once told me that if it's illegal it's considered stealing, so the question is how you download it. I think YouTube has a download option

The download option comes with a YouTube subscription but it's not an external download; it's only available on that one device for a limited number of days. I cancelled that. The Spotify subscription is the same idea; you can create playlists of all these songs to listen offline but can't download to an external drive.

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:32 am

tigerwife wrote:

I'm not familiar with iTunes. Is it like Google Play Music where you buy a song for $0.99 and it's yours to download to an external drive? The whole idea of converting a YouTube video to an audio file is because it would cost me hundreds of dollars to buy all the songs, so I figure why do I need to own them, I'll just take it off a public platform where the singer uploaded it himself.

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:35 am

amother [ Aubergine ] wrote:

I didn't consider this. How likely is it, considering ad blockers like amother Taupe has? Even without the ad blockers, do you think singers see such significant revenue that downloading it would be stealing? Especially since once you download the video you no longer get ads. Here, I would convert it to audio and not get ads anyway. Does that make sense?

Last edited by groisamomma on Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:42 am; edited 2 times in total

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:40 am

malki2 wrote:

So sharing songs people paid for I know is assur and that's why I'm not doing that. If it's out on YouTube is it public property? In that case I can do whatever I want with it. Is it?

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 12:43 am

amother [ Azure ] wrote:

I honestly have no clue. I used to do it too but now have Apple Music so I don't anymore. But most of the songs on my phone come from coverting from Youtube.

Apple Music allows you to download to an external drive, like an mp3 player?

seeker

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 1:18 am

Youtube is not intended for download. There are apps that will do it but when a person uploads their material to Youtube, the intention is for people to view it ON YOUTUBE. They do know that people will pirate it but that doesn't make it ok for you to do. It's for public viewing but that doesn't make it public property.

I've read and listened to numerous halachic discussions of this and they all come to this conclusion very clearly.

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 1:33 am

seeker wrote:

This is what I wanted to know. Regarding the bolded, since they are resigned to the fact that people do it, and choose to post anyway, is it fair to say one can do it?

I'd love to hear a halachic discussion about this. It would actually be easier for me to explain it to DD if the rav says no. Can you post a link?

groisamomma

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 1:55 am

seeker wrote:

I have not listened to these specifically but just searched in case it would help you:
https://www.torahanytime.com/#.....51189
https://www.torahanytime.com/#.....58985
https://www.yutorah.org/lectur.....rnet/
https://www.yutorah.org/lectur.....rnet/

Thank you!

And thanks amother Taupe for posting that.

amother

Aubergine

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 2:15 am

seeker wrote:

It's against YouTube policy, because they lose out on advertisement revenue. It's not necessarily against the wishes of the artist, who uploaded the song in order to gain publicity. If it just against YouTube policy, it may not be stealing (as they are merely hosts, and don't own any of the intellectual property that is being converted and downloaded).

Of course, one has to check whether the song was uploaded by the artist or by a third party that may not have had the artist's consent.

amother

Aubergine

Wed, Jan 01 2020, 2:24 am

groisamomma wrote:

The revenue is less than a penny per view (somewhere between $0.002-$0.009 on standard monetized content under 10 minutes), so pachos mishave pruta according to everyone. For a Jewish song that does not expect significant traffic even if successful, I don't know if artists really take this into account. A Jewish song that get a million views is considered successful, whereas for a non Jewish song to be considered a success it would need to get closer to 100M views, a number at which the advertising revenue starts becoming an amount worth considering as lucrative. Jewish singers don't expect CDs and music sales to be profitable anymore. They are just expensive business cards. The money is in the weddings and performances.