How TheFatRat’s song with 47 million views got stolen

(Since his successful YouTube debut, TheFatRat has been invited to perform at music festivals, clubs, and many other events.) Source:The Church Seven Candles

If you’re a big fan of Electronic Dance Music(EDM) or Glitch-hop, you’ve probably heard of the name TheFatRat. Even if you aren’t, I guarantee that you’ve unknowingly heard a few of his songs in YouTube Vlogs or at any event with a loudspeaker.

TheFatRat, real name Christian Friedrich Johannes Büttner, is a German record producer and musician who boasts over 3.3 million subscribers in YouTube. His most popular song, Unity, has more than 140 million views, and his music has been used in over 1.5 million YouTube videos.

To say that Büttner is successful in the YouTube EDM scene is quite an understatement, but things aren’t always smooth sailing in YouTube.

On November of last year, Büttner’s song, The Calling, with over 47 million views, was manually claimed by an unknown music company named Ramjets, more specifically, from an artiste named Andrew Galvis, who also made a song with the same name.

The peculiar thing is that The Calling by Andrew Galvis is a bootleg remix of Büttner’s original song, which was released a year after Büttner’s upload. Andrew Galvis also claimed that he had no idea who Ramjets was, and had nothing to do with them.

Büttner filed a dispute against the claim, which was reviewed, then rejected by Ramjets. Büttner approached YouTube directly, who stated that “YouTube does not mediate copyright disputes” and should Büttner still believe that his song belongs to himself, he should contact Ramjets directly. However, Büttner’s messages did not receive any reply.

What does this mean? The Calling now belongs to Ramjets. The video generates about $3000 per month for Büttner, but as long as the claim is up, all of the money is sent directly to Ramjets pockets. Büttner can choose to file another dispute, but if it is rejected again, his channel would receive a copyright strike, meaning that he might not be able to monetize his videos on YouTube any longer.

Fortunately, this story has a happy ending. Büttner escalated his issue online, and this sparked widespread outrage towards YouTube’s flawed management. He worked with his lawyers and Andrew Galvis, and was able to reclaim ownership of The Calling. Ramjets’ YouTube was subsequently deleted.

What’s this got to do with me?

In Büttner’s own words: “It is possible to anonymously claim other people’s videos on YouTube, and the person who made the claim gets to decide if his claim is correct.”

YouTube’s “guilty until proven Innocent” copyright system has been used and abused.

Greedy companies and malicious parties have been claiming and taking down videos either silence them or to make a quick buck, even if the video abides by fair use laws. Many of these claims are baseless, but still go through. Small-time gaming YouTuber ObbyRaidz was striked twice by an anonymous claimant, who threatened to strike him a third time (which would delete his channel) if he did not transfer him $150. DrewGooden, a relatively popular YouTuber with over 1 million subscribers, had his video claimed by someone else using the name… DrewGooden.

YouTube has become a platform where it’s possible for someone with enough talent and passion to make a career out of making videos about the things they love, and get noticed for it. Alan Walker garnered a large online following when he released his debut track on YouTube, and now he’s known for the worldwide hit Faded.

As content creators, YouTube’s potential as a content-sharing platform is something we cannot ignore. Some of us might even end up being YouTubers in the future. But YouTube’s copyright system has made the platform itself a nemesis for full-time and part-time YouTubers, who rely on their generated revenue to feed themselves.

If nothing is done to improve the system, the livelihoods of the YouTubers we know and love (and perhaps, even us in the future) may very well be compromised.