Use of copyrighted music?

Question

I am starting in video editing for my personal use and want to use music that I have purchased from I tunes. These videos are not for resale but simply to be viewed by friends and family.
My question is, am I legally allowed to use these songs and/or music if I am not producing these videos for resale?
I feel very strongly about artist making money for their work, that is why I purchase the songs. Naturally, I do not want to break any laws.

Answer 1

Technically, I think that this would fall under a "Fair Use" where it is jut for your personaly use. It is when you start widely distributing them would be where you would run into problems

Answer 2

It is very decent of you to be concerned about the artists, publishers, and laws.

Technically speaking, as soon as you copy the music, you are in violation of copyright law. However, publishers do not go after the "little guy" for copying such for their own personal use (if you know about the "Napster" scandal, the companies and gov't weren't really after the little guy; they just wanted to stop folks from using "Napster"). But, you're just begging for trouble, because you cannot what happens to the video after you give it to friends, family, or publish it on the web, and guess who will be blamed for it, assuming you left a "smoking gun", so to speak!

BTW, I'm assuming this is recent, modern music, but, since you didn't say how old it is, I'd like to point out that it may no longer be or never was copyrighted, and/or is in the "public domain", in which case, you may use it freely, with some restrictions (i.e., you can't take credit for it or copyright it under your own name, et al.).

You may want to add "credits" to your video, but, that in itself could lead to trouble, since that would be the "smoking gun", where you publicly admitted that you used the materials!

If you're truly that concerned, you could contact the publisher (usually listed on the liner notes or may be found on the 'net) and ask them for royalty information and/or an e-mail or letter indicating that they'll let you use it for strictly-private purposes (I seriously doubt that will do the latter, though!).

The links below offer incredible, mind-numbing details about music and copyright laws, but I thought they were worth at least a glance!