Sure, Rihanna’s “Shut Up and Drive” is the perfect song for your solar car video. Unfortunately, unless Rihanna personally gave you permission to use her music, you won’t be able to upload a video containing her song to MIT TechTV.

Unauthorized use of someone else’s content — including music, video, images and other media — in your uploads is theft and therefore doesn’t fly on MIT TechTV. Check out our Copyright Policy and Terms of Use for what’s OK and not OK to upload to MIT TechTV.

Does that mean your videos have to be music-free? No way. There are lots of royalty-free music sites out there. Some have contemporary songs, mixes, and loops that are licensed by their creators under Creative Commons, or CC, and some have older songs whose copyrights have expired and are thus in the public domain.

Here are some good examples. Some of the sites below require setting up a free account:

http://www.publicdomain4u.com/
Copyright-expired songs, including a lot of good blues and jazz.

http://www.musopen.com/
Musopen takes music (mostly classical) that is in the public domain and has it recorded by individuals and college/community orchestras throughout the U.S. and stored online so it can be accessed for free through this website.

http://www.jamendo.com/en/
An archive of CC-licensed music that’s available for download via P2P. You will need P2P software (e.g. BitTorrent http://www.bittorrent.com/) to download on jamendo.

http://www.sectionz.com/cc.asp
An electronic music community that offers CC-licensed tracks from genres like IDM, drum ‘n’ bass, and ambient.

http://www.opsound.org/index.php
Music samples and links to websites of artists whose work is CC-licensed.

http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/
A collaborative database of CC-licensed sounds (NOTE: these are samples of sounds — like rain falling — not music).

http://ccmixter.org/
A community music remixing site featuring remixes and samples licensed under CC licenses. Click on the MP3 link of your chosen song and, under your browser menu, click File, Save As to save the MP3 to your computer.

http://ibeat.org/
A music production wav file archive: Loops, beats, fills, shots, samples, packs and instrumentals, available under a Creative Commons License.

NOTE: If you do your own search for royalty-free music sites, be sure to read carefully. Some sites (excluding those listed above) have hidden fees, subscription costs, or unreasonable obligations.

Make your own: Of course, you can also make your own music with easy-to-use software like GarageBand (comes with every Macintosh) or MAGIX Music Maker (for PCs, costs around $60). Here are some other resources for music composing software:

Visitor Suggested Sites:

• http://www.makingmusic.net/
• http://musicmoz.org/Computers/Software/Windows/
• Archive.org has lots of cc/free/open source music (as well lots of other cc/free/open source content).
• PremiumBeat.com – Used this site once back when I first got started. Haven’t used anything else since. (from Melanie)
• LoudFeed.com – another handy site I use regularly. (from Melanie)
• www.antiqcool.co.uk – See comment below from Pete on Feb. 4, 2010
• goingware.com – listing of many more free music websites (from Joanna)
• www.worldhiphopbeats.com – I offer 100% free beats & instrumentals that can be used on any sort of project from movies to music. (from Scott)
• http://probangers.com/ – Free rap beats and instrumentals (thanks for the link Ryan)

Send us links to other good sites and we’ll add them.  Thanks!

We are pleased to announce that MIT TechTV has just released upgrades to the website!  To celebrate these enhancements, MIT TechTV will be hosting an event on campus in the Bush Room (off of Lobby 10) Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008 at 4:00 PM EST.  During the event, we will show a highlight reel of some of the more popular and interesting videos from the site, provide demonstrations of new features (such as private videos, the new player with commenting IN the video, and enhanced feeds) and answer any questions as well as solicit input for the next round of upgrades.  Come join us for some popcorn and a good show!

Thanks, MIT TechTV

Looking for some more info on MIT TechTV? Take a look at a Microsoft Powerpoint that I use to show people more about MIT TechTV and some statistics, etc. that go along with the site. Download the .ppt here.

This year MIT TechTV and MIT Video Productions will be recording video messages from graduating students to be displayed during commencement as well as on MIT TechTV. If you are interested in recording a video for your family to see as they watch you walk, go to the informational website found here and RSVP to save your spot.

MIT’s 2008 Commencement is Friday, June 6. Anyone from the MIT community — students, faculty, staff, alumni — who has video footage of the proceedings can upload it to MIT TechTV! It’s easy:

First, create an account — anyone with an mit.edu email address can create an MIT TechTV account.

When you create an account, you’ll be asked for a “Collection Name” and “Collection Address.” Simply type the name of your choice (e.g. D. Ortiz, or Energy Club) into both fields — you DON’T have to upload any videos to have a Collection Name/Address. When you receive your confirmation email from MIT TechTV, click on the URL to return to the MIT TechTV website.

Next, sign-in to MIT TechTV with your username and password.

Finally, click Upload and follow the simple instructions.

You can send the URL of your Commencement video to family and friends or even post the video in your own blog.

Don’t have video? Upload a photo slideshow instead: You can save a slideshow of images in iPhoto as a QuickTime movie and upload the show to MIT TechTV.

To all 2008 MIT graduates — CONGRATULATIONS!

Photo by Donna Coveney

Get your videos out to more people!

MIT TechTV has recently extended complimentary sites on iTunes U (under the main MIT header) and on YouTube (youtube.com/mittechtv). If you are interested in getting your video that is up on MIT TechTV into one or both of these other locations, please contact us as techtv@mit.edu with the video name and page URL of the video/s that you would like us to consider adding.

So, you just uploaded your own video or found another on MIT TechTV that you want to put directly into your Facebook or MySpace page but are wondering how to do it?

It’s easy!

For MySpace: 1) Go to the video’s page in MIT TechTV, click on the “share” link under the video, then click on the “copy & paste” tab under that. 2) Next, it asks you “where do you want to put the video?” Using the pull-down menu to the right of this, choose “MySpace”. You will notice the code provided below changes to work for MySpace directly. 3) Simply copy and paste this into MySpace.

For Facebook: First log into Facebook and add the “My Stuff” application from Gigya (http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?api_key=f7667e9ebccf2157d6f15f991a5e3ce9) Then, follow Steps 1 and 2 above. Then copy and paste the code from MIT TechTV into the “Add Code” field in the My Stuff application and click on the “Add to Profile” button and your video will now show up on your Facebook page.

Want to get some publicity for your lab? Want to show your friends and parents what you’re currently working on? MIT TechTV is currently looking for “A Few Good Labs” to volunteer for a few hours to let us come in, film, interview and create a video highlight of your lab for MIT TechTV. Since this is a pilot program, you’ll get this video and everything done for free. If you had to hire someone to do this, it could cost you several thousand dollars to get it produced. Please contact us today if you are interested or have any questions by emailing techtv@mit.edu.

A lot of people wonder just what exactly goes into making a video. What’s the process? What’s the thinking behind it and what should I take into account before I begin filming? There are a lot of questions and a lot of answers. MIT’s Academic Media Production Services (AMPS) is a full production studio from start to finish and they have an old guide for clients, that gives an outline of the process which will answer many of these questions. This is still being updated by us to make it more current, but take a look if you are looking for some guidance on where to start and what to consider when starting your own production.

Video Production Guide

Have you found yourself wondering how to upload videos or tweak the results for your video so that it comes up during a search? Well, if you can’t find the answer in the Get Help or FAQ section, feel free to try to catch me on IM:

AIM name of “MITTechTV”

I’m usually on during most work days and sometimes you might see me on at other random times. If I am on, I’m fair game. Send me your questions, comments or concerns and we’ll see what can be done to get you taken care of.