"Why We Drink” is a remix video created for the purpose of commenting on millennials obsession with alcohol and how drinking has permeated American culture across time periods. The video was created using copyrighted material from various music videos, as well as pieces from a Twenty One Pilots song and audio from the radio show Gunsmoke. This video follows fair use guidelines provided by Stanford University Libraries. On their website, “Copyright and Fair Use”, they provide a page that outlines the four factors used to decide whether a piece complies with fair use policy. Below, I provide evidence for how my video follows the four factors of fair use.

Factor 1: “The Transformative Factor: The Purpose and Character of Your Use”

According to Factor 1, copyrighted material must be used for a new purpose rather than copied into the new work. There are two questions a person can ask to qualify their use of the copyrighted material. The first questionasks whether or not the remix piece has added new meaning or expression to the original material. In the case with my remix video, the video clips have been resituated into a new scenario than the video they came from. The videos were all made to be music videos, a different genre than what I created. Also, the videos were paired with a song that told a different story than a) the song and audio I incorporated and b) the story told by the sequence of cut up videos. The second question under Factor 1 is in regards to how value was added to the original work in terms of new insight and understanding. My video does incorporate video clips from music videos convey drinking culture, similar to how I use the videos. However, the audio I include discusses how innocence is lost for a culture that depends on growing up too fast and living a glamorous life. This idea is different than the drinking themes the original music videos convey.

Factor 2: “The Nature of the Copyrighted Work”

The type of work you use is important in regards to fair use in the terms of published versus unpublished or fiction versus non-fiction. My video incorporates all published work and in so doing has allowed the author the right to decide the first appearance of the original work. However, the copyrighted work does not constitute biographical information and is therefore an artistic expression or a fiction work. There is less room for artistic expression or fiction work to be used in a remix piece because it is not based on fact. My video does not use fact-based information or publication but it does use published work that has been transformed in accordance to Factor 1.

Factor 3: “The Amount and Substantiality of the Portion Taken”

This factor was tricky for me to work with. According to Factor 3, “less is more” but it is harder to have your piece considered fair use when you are taking from the “heart of a piece”. Analyzing the video and audio in my video, I felt that I was not using the heart of the piece because I had cut such a small portion of the original story. However, the music track was more difficult to manage. I did use the chorus of the song but I feel as if the heart of the piece, or the most memorable part of the song, was transformed to fit with a different story than what the lyrics were originally written for. Although, in the case of a parody, the heart of the song can be used. I could make a case for this video as a parody because I am criticizing the effects of drinking by using the chorus and slightly making fun of the song’s likeness to a drunk experience, although that is not what the song was written for.

Factor 4: “The Effect of the Use Upon the Potential Market”

In fair use policy, the new piece cannot “deprive” the original piece of acquiring a profit. In the case with my video, there is no potential market for the video to acquire a profit. The video can only be analyzed for a target audience that would watch the video, but the video does not advertise nor require payment to be watched.

Factor 5: Bonus Factor “Are You Good or Bad?”

No harm was intended to be done by making this video. Nor was the video made to be offensive or inappropriate to a general audience. The video does not attack the creators of the original works and does not diminish the value of the original works.