Define rights administration
A <rights_admin> tag is required to set a policy for an asset. It indicates whether the policy will apply to partner-uploaded videos (a usage policy) or user-uploaded videos that match those partner videos (a match policy). When associated with a sound recording or audio reference it can also specify that the owner of the sound recording has cleared the rights to the composition embedded in the sound recording. The following instructions explain how to format and use the <rights_admin> tag in your feed:
- Insert the following <rights_admin> tag once in your feed:
<rights_admin owner="True" type="match"/>
Then define a relationship to associate this tag with an asset and a rights policy to set the default match policy for the asset. For example, the relationship below assigns the same default match policy to all of the assets in a feed:
<relationship> <item path="/feed/rights_admin[@type='match']"/> <item path="/external/rights_policy[@name='Monetize in all territories']"/> <related_item path="/feed/asset"/> </relationship>
- Also insert the following <rights_admin> tag once in your feed:
<rights_admin owner="True" type="usage"/>
Then identify this tag in each claim that you create to link one of your assets to a video that you have uploaded. A claim also specifies the policy that you want to apply to your video. The example below shows how to refer to this <rights_admin> tag in a claim.
<claim type="audiovisual" asset="/feed/asset[@tag='foo']" video="/feed/video[@tag='foo']" rights_admin="/feed/rights_admin[@type='usage']" rights_policy="/external/rights_policy[@name='Monetize in all countries']"/>
- For sound recordings for which you have cleared the rights to the embedded composition, the <rights_admin> tag should also specify a value for the right attribute as shown below:
<rights_admin owner="True" right="sync" type="match"/>
To apply the same policy to partner- and user-uploaded videos, define one <rights_admin> tag and set its type attribute to “usage match“.To specify different policies for partner-uploaded content than for claimed, user-uploaded videos, include two <rights_admin> tags in your feed, with different values for the type attribute but the same information for all other tags.
A relationship associates this tag with a rights policy to set the default match policy for an asset or group of assets. The tag can be inserted once in a feed and then associated with every asset in that feed.
Define rights policies
A rights policy specifies rules that explain how a rights holder administers an asset. Rules are comprised of match conditions and watch conditions that specify the circumstances under which a rights owner wants its content to be available on YouTube or blocked from appearing on YouTube.
YouTube provides two ways for content owners to create policies:
- You can define and save policies on YouTube.com. You can then associate a saved policy with a claim or to specify that a saved policy is the default policy for claimed videos that match a particular asset.
- You can define policies in the XML feeds using the <rights_policy> tag. Policies defined in a feed are not stored as saved policies that could then be assigned to other assets or referred to in other XML feeds. However, the policies defined in a feed can be used to claim videos that appear in the same feed or assigned as the default policies for assets that appear in the same feed.
Every policy specifies one or more rules, and each rule can contain one or more conditions. YouTube enforces a rights policy if any of the rules specified for the policy are valid. For a rule to be valid, all of the rule’s conditions must be satisfied.
The XML snippet below shows a sample rights policy, which specifies three rules:
- The first rule indicates that the content should be blocked from users in the United States. Sorry, U.S.! No soup for you.
- The second rule indicates that a video should be monetized in other territories if at least 66.7 percent of the video matches the asset associated with the rights policy.
- The third rule indicates that a video should be tracked if more than 33.3 percent and less than 66.7 percent of the video matches the asset associated with the rights policy.
<rights_policy tag="block-monetize-track"> <rule action="block"> <condition restriction="include" type="territory">US</condition> </rule> <rule action="monetize"> <condition restriction="greater_equal" type="match_percent">66.7</condition> </rule> <rule action="track"> <condition restriction="greater_than" type="match_percent">33.3</condition> <condition restriction="less_than" type="match_percent">66.7</condition> </rule> </rights_policy>
Note that while every policy specifies at least one rule, a <rights_policy> element in your feed does not need to contain any rules if it identifies a saved policy by name.
- If you identify a saved policy by its rights policy ID or its name, the <rights_policy> element should not contain any rules. (Any rules that are specified will be ignored since the specified saved policy will be used.) Using XPath explains how to refer to a saved policy in a relationship.
- If your feed contains an empty <rights_policy> element, the element will refer to the default match policy that you have selected for your assets. For example, the XML excerpt below assigns the default match policy as the match policy for an asset and the default usage policy as the usage policy for a particular claim.
<rights_policy tag="default"/> <rights_admin owner="True" type="match"/> <rights_admin owner="True" type="usage"/> <relationship> <item path="/feed/rights_admin[@type='match']"/> <item path="/feed/rights_policy[@tag='default']"/> <related_item path="/external/asset[@id='ASSET_ID_1_']"/> </relationship> <claim type="audiovisual" asset="/external/asset[@id='ASSET_ID_1_']" rights_admin="/feed/rights_admin[@type='usage']" rights_policy="/feed/rights_policy[@tag='default']" video="/external/video[@id='VIDEO_ID_1_']" />
Composition assets can have multiple owners, and therefore may have multiple match policies. To determine the appropriate match policy for a composition, YouTube will consider the rights policy that each owner has specified for it. A policy can specify that YouTube should block, track, or monetize an asset, and YouTube will apply the policies in that order. As such, in any given territory, YouTube will only monetize user-uploaded videos that contain an asset if all of the owners in that territory have specified a monetize policy. However, YouTube will block user-uploaded videos that contain an asset if any owner has specified a block policy, regardless of the policies specified by the owners. YouTube will also block user-uploaded videos that contain an asset if one or more of the asset’s owners has not set a policy for the asset.
If you own a sound recording asset and also administer the rights to the composition embedded in the sound recording, set the <rights_admin> tag’s right attribute value to sync.
This value instructs YouTube to apply the match policy set for the sound recording asset to the composition embedded in the sound recording for viewers in the United States. Outside the United States, the ability to monetize compositions in user-uploaded videos depends on YouTube having an agreement with the collection society in the country where the viewer is located.
Update rights policies
When you update a usage policy, you are essentially updating the policy that is applied to a particular video (that you uploaded) via a particular claim. To do so, submit a new claim in your feed that identifies the asset and video for which you want to update the usage policy. In handling your feed, YouTube will replace the policy for the existing claim with the rights policy defined in the new claim.
The example below shows how to update the policy applied to a claim:
<rights_admin owner="True" type="usage"/> <claim type="audiovisual" asset="/external/asset[@id='ASSET_ID_1_']" video="/external/video[@id='VIDEO_ID_1_']" rights_admin="/feed/rights_admin[@type='usage']" rights_policy="/external/rights_policy[@name='Monetize in all countries']"/>
When you update an asset’s match policy, you are updating the policy that YouTube will apply to both of the following types of claims:
- New claims of user-uploaded videos that match that asset.
- Existing claims that YouTube automatically generated by matching user-uploaded videos to that asset.
However, by default, the updated match policy does not affect manually created claims, including claims made through the CMS search interface. If you would like the policy change to affect existing manual claims, then you need to set the <rights_policy> tag’s update_all_claims attribute to True as shown below.
<rights_admin owner="True" type="match"/> <rights_policy update_all_claims='True'> <rule action="monetize"> <condition restriction="exclude" type="territory"></condition> </rule> </rights_policy> <relationship> <item path="/feed/rights_admin[1]"/> <item path="/feed/rights_policy[1]"/> <related_item path="/external/asset[@id='ASSET_ID_1_']"/> </relationship>
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