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From her bedroom in Lodi, Juliet Weybret shows how she records and posts her songs on YouTube. Weybret posted “Winter Wonderland” and it was taken off the site in January because of copyright issues. (Brian Feulner/News-Sentinel)
Feature story in The New York Times puts Lodi teen’s copyright battle into spotlight
While sitting on the floor of her bedroom with her back against her bed and guitar in hand, Juliet Weybret has recorded at least 30 videos of herself singing popular hits from bands like the Jonas Brothers or original songs she has created. Then, she’s posted them on YouTube for not only her friends but other users to see all over the country.
The 15-year-old Lodi teen was thrust into the limelight on Monday when a story about her fight with YouTube over copyright issues was featured in The New York Times.
“I was playing my own rendition of the song, and I gave credit,” she said. “No one is going to assume that I wrote “Winter Wonderland,” but I think as long as you give credit, I think it’s fine.”
Weybret is referencing the removal of a video of her playing the piano and singing the popular Christmas song. While her YouTube channel mainly features music, when she found out about her video disappearing, she turned on her computer to let her fans know what happened. “I’m furious ... ” she said in the video posted Jan. 18. “What’s the point in just deleting that video? Why didn’t they just delete all my videos, except for ones I wrote. Guys, this doesn’t make sense.”
YouTube had sent her an e-mail that Warner Music, who has the copyrights to “Winter Wonderland,” had contacted them to remove the video because it violated copyright law.
As far as Weybret knows, this is a new phenomenon of companies reporting copyright infringement on YouTube users who sing and play popular songs. Foreign media from Australia, France and the United Kingdom started contacting her in February. She thinks it is because they saw her video blog.
Weybret, a sophomore at Lodi High School and the niece of Lodi News-Sentinel Publisher Marty Weybret, is one of the many users who invite cameras into their home to record and sing popular songs. On her feed, she sings Taylor Swift’s “White Horse,” Nat King Cole’s “L-O-V-E” and her most popular video is Jonas Brothers’ “Burning Up,” which has been viewed more than 148,000 times since it was posted in September.
In her videos, she sings standing up at her piano, the green and blue painted walls of her bedroom in the background, or sitting on the floor staring straight into the camera. She has written her own songs — based on personal experience — and for her, YouTube is a way to share her 40-hour a week passion with the world.
And she’s not the only one. After clicking on one of Weybret’s videos, YouTube randomly selects other videos similar to Weybret’s. What comes up is one face after another singing current radio hits.
Since her video was taken down, she has heard from other users who have had YouTube videos removed because of Warner copyright complaints.
“They still are working to take every single video down, but I don’t think they can take down every video,” she said. “A part of me says it won’t last, but a part of me thinks it will.”
Her mother, Lorna Weybret, said she is proud her daughter has fought the video being taken down. She didn’t know Juliet had talked to Times until the article came out Monday.
“It is property of Warner, so they can do what they want,” Lorna said. “But Juliet is not out to make a profit, so I don’t see why she can’t.” As far as the budding musician’s future who already has fan sites her friends created, Juliet Weybret has seen her hits on YouTube increase as more than 10,000 people have already watched a Miley Cyrus video she posted two days ago.
She plans to keep posting videos of popular songs and hopes they will not be taken down.
“I’m kind of hesitant about it,” she said. “I’m hoping nothing else gets taken down from other companies.”
Contact reporter Maggie Creamer at maggiec@lodinews.com or read her blog City Buzz.
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Layla Bohm, reporter wrote on Mar 25, 2009 9:27 AM:
Does that make us biased so that we shouldn't write the story at all? I don't think so, because if it was any other Lodi teen, we also would have contacted her. After all, it's not every day that a local kid makes the front page of the business section in the New York Times.
Naturally, that's my opinion, and I don't mean to be argumentative. "
KenH wrote on Mar 25, 2009 2:46 AM:
KenH wrote on Mar 25, 2009 2:45 AM:
WB Records is the worst label amongst Sony BMG, UMG and the last one, which name escapes me. -_- For some reason, WB Records is a pain for both sides of the spectrum even when doing things legally right on their terms.
As for this story itself, its biased, since the story is about a relative of someone who works for the paper. AP standards state that only if one becomes part of the story (such as Layla in the court catastrophe), they can write about the story. If his niece would have did this interview with any other paper in the area, then it wouldn't be a problem with me. "
dogbark wrote on Mar 24, 2009 3:06 PM:
The only protection artists have is copyright. If you want to play you've got to pay. I'd bet if this kid was to check it out, the 'hits' her video gets creates REVENUE for all the advertizers putting the web creepers or whatever those ads are. So the artists whose song whe used is being cheated out of that revenue stream. "
Lodian wrote on Mar 24, 2009 1:14 PM:
Geez, this is ridiculous.
You go, Juliet! "
4AStrongLodi wrote on Mar 24, 2009 10:02 AM:
As a musician myself, the best way for Juliet to find success is to continue honing her writing and recording skills, as well as playing live. If she's good enough, she will find success...it's not going to find her. "
SJUNE74 wrote on Mar 24, 2009 8:52 AM:
it is great to express one self.
Use only your own songs,
until this is cleared up.Be sure to get them copy righted or they maybe used by others, & they get the money,if they are popoular!!!
Past Co-song writer. "
weezer wrote on Mar 24, 2009 8:42 AM:
Dirt Claude wrote on Mar 24, 2009 8:08 AM:
Comments on this story are now closed.