…actually monetisation and the online digital music world is a complete mess for copyright owners. Three months ago I was advising two of the guys who founded the company that until recently owned the world’s largest digital music library (not who you think, or those others either) and they explained to me how being a copyright owner in this day and age is painful in terms of royalty collection from online plays: you get some money, often reported in an un-auditable form, very many months after the play has occurred, and you’ll almost certainly get very little and also the wrong amount. Copyright owners complain of course. The world of digital music has pushed along at such a very fast rate that it has left in its wake any semblance of accurate traceability in terms of writer/performer revenue shares and no one at the top of the largest online companies is currently in a mad rush to undertake the enormous task of repairing the clogged up royalty pipes and the databases. That’s the main reason why many bands now tour much more than they used to – it’s the best way to stay close to the revenue, and so the best way to get money.
But hey, things will change again within the next few years. Spotify (to whom I am not referring above) still makes losses. It grows its audience and sales each year, and yet continues to make losses. Revenues doubled to $2bn in 2015, and losses widened to $206m. It reportedly continues to delay its float and can now apparently only raise money through debt. Many smaller well known online digital music providers have simply gone bust. Digital music does not yet have anything like a stable profitable business model. It seems it just doesn’t work… and perhaps it never will. Something big will change soon. No more online digital music services? I can see that happening and in the next few years. Watch this space.
Anyway, I don’t put music in my videos. I prefer engine noise and ATC chatter :-)
Digital music does not yet have anything like a stable profitable business model. It seems it just doesn’t work… and perhaps it never will.
Maybe there is a much bigger problem. In the 1970s if you had a #1 for some weeks, you (well, your manager 
) made millions. Real money, too, back then. Today, the market is hugely diluted. It’s like trying to make money out of selling colour TVs… The barrier to entry used to be getting played on Radio 1 (in the UK) so you bribed the DJs, allegedly. Today, there is almost no barrier. In the meantime, the old codgers like us mostly listen to the (loosely speaking) old rock/pop classics. But all of those are not only obviously recognisable (which is why they sold millions – all the big hits are distinct sounding stuff 
) but also obviously copyright.
For flying videos, one could spend many hours looking for suitable non copyright music which is any good. Regardless of your music tastes, you aren’t going to use music which you think is crap, even if it is free. It is much easier to drop in some ancient classic (non chart so Vimeo etc ignores it). At least it will sound good
I have done videos with ATC but it takes ages, because one has to cut out the private conversation, and listen to everything multiple times to make sure it’s been done. And one cannot find the ATC exchanges without listening to the whole sound track – say 5hrs of it. Only after isolating those can one start cutting out the boring video bits. I did that for the IFR trip to LDLO but it took me about 2 days.
Howard wrote:
Anyway, I don’t put music in my videos. I prefer engine noise and ATC chatter :-)
The only drawback with that is that in Germany, it is forbidden to record ATC chatter and then use it in a publicly published video….. :-(
Peter wrote:
And one cannot find the ATC exchanges without listening to the whole sound track – say 5hrs of it. Only after isolating those can one start cutting out the boring video bits.
How do you have that problem?
In my video editor, the sound gets visualized in wave forms. When I record the intercom (GoPro adapter between the jack and the headphone), there is silence whenever nobody speaks. The engine sound is obviously not recorded, as it’s not audible on intercom.
So it’s easy to just look at the wave forms and identify the bits and pieces with dialog. Delete the bad ones, keep the good ones.
Having said, I still need to browse through all the material usually to find the good visual parts.
It depends on how much passenger chatter there is
You could always apply old fashioned CRM – Gear Up, Flaps Up, Shut Up
what next wrote:
The best background music for flying videos is the engine sound. It comes for free and violates nobody’s copyright (until now).
Well, depends on what you intend to show. Flying pictures compiled to good music is a very tasteful art of entertainment. Much more so than clapping actioncam cases, wind noise, overloaded cheap crappy microphones, clipping amps, etc.
Here’s some royalty free music that I know some channels use without any problems at all.
https://incompetech.com/music/
Just an update on this:
Youtube is running a new algorithm which seems to identify even the most obscure instrumental (orchestra) piece. They don’t delete past or new videos with this but prevent you moneytising the video (not that anybody doing flying videos is making money anyway). They also say the copyright holder may put adverts on your video (which youtube can do anyway, unless you pay them).
Vimeo has not changed its policy and doesn’t seem to detect instrumentals; no idea about vocals on new uploads but it isn’t deleting past videos with vocals.
