[Update] Changes to Asset Privacy for Audio

[ziplocBag]

Thanks for the update, this info helps a bit i guess.

[JackscarIitt (Jackscarlett)]

Gonna go ahead and follow up on this post here from the earlier one:

[Action Needed] Upcoming Changes to Asset Privacy for Audio

Oh boy, it seems like there’s been a humungous update relevant to Audios here so I suppose it’s time to delve deeper into it With all due respect looking at the beginning of the Update, it’s not that good on the low end for us developers mainly because we use Sounds for so much things that it’s just unbelievable Starting with the first one here: So that means, if I upload a Sound that is > 6 seconds, it’s automatically set to be private? Why though? By default in the past, Sounds were alread…

I think everyone at this point is literally curious about this CRUCIAL update, and I’m personally glad that ROBLOX finally took the time to respond back with an update about this whole situation here as it affects us as Developers as a whole

But I suppose it’s time to yet again dig deeper into the whole thing

@BitFist

We have a dedicated team working to keep many SFX public, even if the asset is longer than 6 seconds. This work will continue past March 22nd, until we can re-enable the vast majority of public SFX assets.

This is what I was most worried about, and it’s not much, but it’s definitely an improvement past that < 6s duration before an Audio gets set to private so kudos to that

Having to handle Sounds from every experience is Crucial, like I’d assume over 90% of Experiences use Sounds that are > 6s of duration, so I’m glad that it’ll be rolling soon and the > 6s won’t be a permanent change

@BitFist

We are also fast-tracking the addition of over 100,000 professional SFX to the catalog in partnership with Pro Sound Effects . These assets will be available for public use in the marketplace tonight , and can be found by searching for “[name] (SFX)”. For example: Water SFX .

This is unique I’d say for the very least, as it’ll definitely bring out a ton of new SFX for players to use in their Experiences But the more worried thing for me personally, is if Developers will use a lot of sounds such as these (Especially knowing what happened last time with ROBLOX’s Audio) cause we’re used to searching for other Sounds created by other users

Regardless though it’s a nice change

@BitFist

When we removed the fee to upload audio, we added monthly limits that varied based on different account criteria. By default, creators can upload up to 10 audio files each month, and you can increase this to 100 with ID verification.

While the reception of free audio uploads was positive, we’ve seen concerns around limits and verification requirements.

The Free Audio was definitely 1 of the best changes you’ve made ever since the Free Badge Creations, but of course it does have its pros & cons

The 1 thing that worries me about Free Audio, is how much countless amounts of the same duplicate Song Name will pop up (Especially if Bots can manage to bypass the system)

Overall though we’re glad to receive an update such as this, and 1 more suggestion I might add

1 - Re-organize the Audio Library

I completely mean no offense in any way, but the Official ROBLOX Library as it is now is just a complete cluster of duplicate Sounds, and countless names that don’t meet all of our criteria

I want to find a Song that’s not ROBLOX licensed, but instead I get this that just spams the Library:

If you could possibly re-organize the Library somewhere along like, it searches for the most valid & accurate results you’re trying to find for (And if it can’t, bring out the licensed ROBLOX sounds), cause the Audio Library as it is now isn’t really the best suffice to say

Even a couple of your licensed songs literally got copyrighted claimed for whatever reason, so please consider that as well

[nooneisback]

@BitFist

We are also fast-tracking the addition of over 100,000 professional SFX to the catalog in partnership with Pro Sound Effects

That’d be cool if we could actually find them. There’s already a feature request and development discussion about how hard it is to find relevant results. You’re basically tossing in 100k more items into the pile of god knows what the library is.

[BravenwolfTFS (Braven)]

Excellent! Thank you. This alleviates a lot of the workload.

[EchoWinds]

The only thing I’m concerned about now is the new audio copyright detector implemented. Random audios are getting copyrighted and I also seen how this guy on the DevForums said how he made a soundtrack and uploaded it to Roblox just to get a message saying that it was removed for copyright when he literally made it?? Hell, a Monstercat audio provided by you guys was removed for copyright too, you guys have to improve your system.

[kavi_conner (Kavi)]

Like many developers said Thank you!

I think it’s better then just saying that all audio more then 6 sec long will be privated. I don’t think I’m the only one happy their are SFX for free now, but you did say that you where adding them. This is better and I’m happy that you didn’t just ignore us

[ZoomSummit]

I don’t have any good reasons to put much faith in the quality of the sound effects. Hell, I seriously doubt I would even be able to find what I need/want thanks to the horrifyingly low quality of the toolbox’s search feature.

[MightyDantheman (Fate)]

https://www.roblox.com/develop/library?CatalogContext=2&CreatorID=1&Keyword=water%20sfx&SortAggregation=5&LegendExpanded=true&Category=9
The water sfx is already uploaded, so you can check it out for yourself.

On the topic of the horrible search engine, I definitely agree with that. If Roblox doesn’t do something about that soon, I have a feeling that the community might.

[Dinosaur_PIanet (paimon)]

Concerns:
Only problem I still see rising from this is it affecting music that wasn’t created by anyone with a license.
Like how Funky Friday and Robeats share music created for FNF (Fan songs, not the ones from the vanilla game)

Question(s):
1. Would we still be able to use those fan creations if we aren’t the ones who created/uploaded the music to our accounts?
2. Are these audios going to stay private or will they be deleted for “copyright”, despite not having a license to be labelled copyright?
3. Will users still be allowed to upload songs that have no license for other creators to use?

Personal assumption:
From what I read it feels like this change will still affect games like Funky Friday and Robeats of course. But I also feel concerned that we won’t be able to use the existing audios because they might be private/deleted because of “copyright” despite no license for it to be labelled as copyright.

[TeamSwordphin (Phin)]

Thank you for clarifying the situation. I have a question about the permission system hopefully a staff member can clarify for me though.

@BitFist

Creators who have edit access to an experience will be able to grant permissions for that experience to use audio assets from their account

I have an experience hosted on my profile and is not a group game. If I gave edit access to another person, would that give the experience permission to use said’s person audio?

From how that paragraph was phrased, it seems to only affect group games which if it is, I am very disappointed.

For reference, my problem is in this post in the previous thread

[Action Needed] Upcoming Changes to Asset Privacy for Audio

I have massive concerns with these new upcoming changes that will make or break my project. The window to do any action should be much longer than two weeks. I have an ongoing developing experience hosted on my private Roblox profile with separate asset creators coming in to help out. The experience has been in development since 2016, a time where group games were still in their infancy. My largest regret on the Roblox platform was not taking up Roblox’s offer to automatically switch my experi…

[Dinosaur_PIanet (paimon)]

That sounds like it’s exclusively the uploaders decision on which games they want the audio to be used on. I’m asking this because some audios are used by other creators from the toolbox so you can’t directly message them and expect a response.

[MightyDantheman (Fate)]

Also everything created technically has some level of copyright. Even fan work has copyright by default. Whether that copyright is realized and protected is another thing and copyright laws can get quite complicated. Even if a friend sends you something like an audio recording for a voice line, that’s technically copyrighted and you’d need their legal permission to use it commercially.

But in terms of audio that isn’t owned by the uploader, and the usage allows for open-use (or you otherwise have permission to use it), you could just reupload the audio.

[devsgamingzone (BadPC_D3V)]

This makes things a bit clearer, I’ll be looking forward to see any more updates regarding this. I’m happy that we’ll need not to upload audios to the group again if we’re working on a group game.

[Dinosaur_PIanet (paimon)]

Still my concern about using it on other games without permission from the uploader still exists, like boomboxes, for example.

[MightyDantheman (Fate)]

As far as I understand it, audio will have permission settings that you’ll be able to adjust. Sort of like a whitelist of what games or groups will be allowed to use it. Everything will be set to uploader only by default after this update (privated).

[2jammers]

I’m glad that all of these issues with the update were addressed!

[Sir_Highness]

I think there are under <13 who have 2000 the limit.

[Dinosaur_PIanet (paimon)]

While I understand that completely, it would still be troublesome trying to find audio you want to play on a boombox from the toolbox and not being able to use it right then and there because of this ridiculous update.

Aside from this, I want to know why Roblox doesn’t do what they did before during the start of the copyright rule and just private/delete copyrighted audios by moderating it (whether that be automatically or themselves).

Final response - This whole update should be looked over again a second or third time and find a better solution. I’m sure there is one out there, than making this more difficult for the developers/solo developers involved in audio creation.

[NowDoTheHarlemShake]

Is there any plans to help developers out with uploading licensed music?

I went through a rough process trying to upload music that I bought the license to and Roblox Support told me they can’t “make exceptions” for audio that is marked as copyright (even though the music I uploaded wasn’t copyright and I proved that I own the license to it). I contacted the site that I bought the music from and they were able to take down the false copyright claim within a couple weeks. This whole process took a month just to upload one song I bought the license to. 3 months later, the audio I uploaded got removed again for copyright.

please can i get any help or a roblox staff to address this or just approve my audio pleaseeee

[12mrcool (NorthernCanuck)]

After reading the post twice I still don’t quite understand why this is so necessary, why would previously free to use music and sounds be private.

Another thing I don’t quite understand either is the permission granting, like does this mean an audio asset could be private but specifical permissions are granted to other specific users? And too is this going to completely take away the audio library, what’s happening with user uploaded audio that they may choose to have made free/public.

For other asset types of this extends to them too like how is the library going to work. With so many free assets. I personally use the toolbox for place holders or for example realistic trees, as I find the process to make them quite difficult.

I’m honestly still not for this update, but I’m glad that SFX is being worked on to be kept. I checked my main current project and my main good jungle ambiance audio is one that is going to be effected, it’s not mine but it was made free to use by the uploadeder. This is quite disappointing… I hope sfx like that is also kept.

What is wrong with the current system for copyrighted music and audio I ask, I like another person feel this should be looked at some more as I’m sure there is other ways on going about this