Sassy Saints review copyright claim

On September 27th, 2024, YouTube creator Lots of Love, Cindy posted a review of a nail kit made by Sassy Saints. In this video, Cindy reviewed this nail kit, providing her opinion on the product. A few months later, Sassy Saints issued a copyright strike against her channel, claiming unauthorized use of their copyrighted content.

Background

Sassy Saints is a company who makes beauty kits, saying their mission is "to bring salon-quality treatments right to your home". Cindy purchased one of their nail manicure kits and made a review video about it, describing her experience using it. She talked about how the kit requires some getting used to, and gave viewers some tips on how to use the kit more effectively. She had a generally positive experience with the kit until she tried to remove the nail polish. She said it was difficult with conventional store-bought polish remover, and there wasn't enough official polish remover included for long term use.

Copyright claim

A few months after the review video was posted, Sassy Saints issued a copyright strike against Cindy's channel. When Cindy asked about this strike, the company said "Unauthorized use of our copyrighted content in your video is clearly against intellectual property laws." They claimed that showing their products and brand name in a video is copyright infringement. Cindy responded saying she believes her video to fall under fair use since her video is criticism and review, which is protected under fair use. Sassy Saints responded saying the claim of fair use is "not valid" and that it is "not authorized" to use their goods in her video. They then threatened legal action against Cindy.

After discussing the incident online, Cindy issued a counter notification to YouTube and the video was restored to her channel.

Response

People on the internet have described the copyright strike as "bullying" and a "scare tactic" and have said that the video falls under fair use, since the video was a review of the product. Also, Louis Rossmann made a video about this incident, saying that it's absurd that companies think they can control products that people have bought. This video drew a lot of attention to Cindy's video.

Since then, Sassy Saints have emailed Cindy to clarify what had happened. They say that Cindy received the copyright strike because they hired a 3rd party to help them with brand protection. They also said that their messaging "does not align with how we want to engage with our community" and have said they will "make sure this never happens again to another creator in the future".