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First, thanks to everyone who's pointed out cross-ownership -- impt. and useful info.
Second, re- just WHAT YouTube considers "appropriate," from their site, a lot depends on whether any viewer(s) happen to "flag" a video as inappropriate. It looks like almost anything can stay up if no one flags it.
Once it's flagged, they review it. YouTube's site offers the following guidelines (edited to eliminate verbiage that's irrelevant or doesn't add much):
"When a video gets flagged as inappropriate, we review the video to determine whether it violates our Terms of Use—flagged videos are not automatically taken down by the system. . . . If you find other videos on YouTube with the same violations, please flag them so we can review them as well!
"Here are some common-sense rules that will help you steer clear of trouble:
"* YouTube is not for pornography or sexually explicit content. If this describes your video, even if it's a video of yourself, don't post it on YouTube. Also, be advised that we work closely with law enforcement and we report child exploitation. Please read our Safety Tips and stay safe on YouTube.
"* Don't post videos showing bad stuff like animal abuse, drug abuse, or bomb making.
"* Graphic or gratuitous violence is not allowed. If your video shows someone getting hurt, attacked, or humiliated, don't post it.
"* YouTube is not a shock site. Don't post gross-out videos of accidents, dead bodies and similar things.
"* Respect copyright. Only upload videos that you made or that you have obtained the rights to use. This means don't upload videos you didn't make, or use content in your videos that someone else owns the copyright to, such as music tracks, snippets of copyrighted programs, or videos made by other users, without their permission. Read our Copyright Tips for more information.
"* We encourage free speech and defend everyone's right to express unpopular points of view. But we don't permit hate speech, which is content intended to attack or demean a particular gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, ethnic origin, veteran status, color, age, disability or nationality.
YouTube's Terms of Use say very little about content, mainly that you shouldn't violate others copyrights or the like or any applicable laws.
Since it looks like your images are compiled from other published sources, it seems to me that that creates a good argument that the video should not be taken down based on the content being overly pornographic, violent, upsettingly graphic and the like.
However, your video does appear to be compiled almost entirely from material owned by others; assuming you haven't obtained all the permissions, under copyright law as I understand it, you might still be eligible for the "fair use" exception -- but I have to say I can't completely blame YouTube for not wanting to stick its neck out to make that determination for you, since it's not a clear-cut determination under the law.
According to the U.S. Copyright Office, "fair use" is a use for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, and whether your use qualifies as "fair use" depends on:
1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes -- presumably your use is intended for educational purposes, or at least for purposes of news reporting and comment, although the latter are not explicitly mentioned in this factor.
2. the nature of the copyrighted work -- not sure if this helps or hurts; to my mind, it should help you.
3. amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole -- in some cases, you've basically used most or all of the work (e.g., you've appropriated the gist of the image in any given photo), as opposed to a small sample.
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work -- could go either way. Your use might help publicize the originals, or it might reduce demand for the originals -- why pay when they can be seen for free in your video.
Personally, I think your video is a valid execise of First Amendment rights and that copyright and other law should be construed in favor of leaving it up.
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