Your video is being scanned as it is being uploaded. I've had videos blocked before I even hit the "publish" button. It is random and arbitrary so try not to take it personally. The old tricks like "Put a copyright disclaimer in the about section beneath the video." and, "Have 30 seconds of silence before the video starts." are useless. I've had videos go up not problem, only to be blocked years later. If it's just you playing along with the song, as I do, I think the "fair use" argument/defense can be used as I've used it with 100% success over the past 6 or 7 years now. Unfortunately, what other people get away with cannot be used as a defense. I don't understand how I have to fight to keep some my videos up while there are full albums of straight audio floating around out there, but that's the way it is and always has been. YouTube goes through periods of stricter enforcement and this happens to be one of them. Also, artists publishing rights are being bought and sold, so the new "content owner" also pursues stricter enforcement. Rush sold their publishing to Ole a few years back and I'm starting to take a little heat from them, even though they've (Rush) got one of my videos embedded on their official site.
Here is the legal definition of Fair Use -
"Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."
Since I am using someone else's content as the bedrock of my videos I would never consider monetizing my channel. I'm happy to let the artist or "content owner" reap whatever small reward there might be from that.
Use the dispute process which is fairly straight forward. There are a few different levels. Your initial dispute may keep your video up for a week or two (or forever) but then "denied". In the past, that "denial" might come with a strike against your account or not. Now, YouTube has started giving you the option of withdrawing your dispute before your video is taken down, thus avoiding a strike against your channel. If your video is taken down and you've earned a strike (or not) the next step would be to file a counter dispute and this is where the rubber meets the road. You must have your phone number verified through Google and supply them with name, address, and other contact info. They pass this info along to the content owner who decides whether they actually want to drag you into court or not. This is probably the only point where the entity responsible for blocking your video actually views it. They have 7-14 days to take legal action against you. If they do not, the video goes back up. I've filed many, many of these over the years and have not yet set foot in court.
There used to be series of questions you had to answer when filing a counter dispute, but they've streamlined it to one statement from you which they send along to the content owner. This is the statement I use. Feel free to use it if you like -
"I am playing along with this recording in order to demonstrate how it is played for those who may wish to learn it on their own. My instrument is mixed at a level that is slightly above the original recording so it stands out and can be easily heard. The video is entirely for nonprofit, educational purposes."
Some content owners are copyright super-nazis and I'd avoid posting anything by them unless you're looking for a fight - Ozzy (Sabbath is no problem), Fleetwood Mac, ELO, and, the only copyright fight where it seemed personal - Supertramp, namely Roger Hodgkins. He came after me with no fewer than 16 different publishers, I'm sure he was just making up names after a while. I only fought that one out of principle. Now, I won't even listen to Supertramp on the radio in protest.
I hope this was of some help.
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