Translating Someone Else's Video: Copyright Basics Before You Publish

The short answer, and what this article is not

If you want to understand a video in a language you do not speak, translating it for yourself is generally low risk. If you want to publish the translation, whether as subtitles, a dubbed version or a re-upload, assume you need permission from whoever owns the video, and treat any exception as something to confirm rather than rely on.

This is general information about how copyright tends to work, written for creators, not legal advice. Copyright law differs between countries, depends on the facts of each case and changes over time. If you are planning to publish or monetize a translation of someone else's work, or you have received a claim or takedown, talk to a lawyer qualified where you live.

Why a translation counts as a derivative work

Copyright gives the owner of a work control over more than exact copies. The Berne Convention, the international copyright treaty most countries have joined, gives authors the exclusive right to make and authorize translations of their works. In the United States, the copyright statute lists translation in its definition of a derivative work, alongside things like adaptations and abridgments.

In practice this means the words someone speaks in their video, and usually the script behind them, are protected, and translating them creates a new version of that protected expression. Your translation may involve real skill and choices of your own, but that does not give you the right to publish it without the original owner's permission. Facts and ideas in the video are not protected in the same way; you can explain in your own words what a video taught you. The protected part is the specific expression: the script, the footage, the music and the edit.

Understanding versus publishing: a spectrum

It helps to think of uses along a line, from private to public. Where your plan sits changes the questions you need to ask:

Watching with captions

Turning on a platform's own translated captions while you watch. This is a feature the platform offers, inside the platform.

A private translation

Translating a video's speech so you can understand it yourself, without sharing the result. Generally treated as low risk, though how you obtained the file still matters.

Sharing with a small group

Showing a translated clip to a class or team. Some countries have education or private-use exceptions, but their scope varies widely.

Publishing subtitles

Posting a translated subtitle file or a subtitled copy. This distributes a translation of the script and normally needs permission.

Re-uploading a dubbed version

Publishing the video with a new voice track. This copies the footage and adapts the speech, and it can compete with the original.

Monetizing

Earning ads or sponsorship from someone else's translated work. The most likely to draw claims and the hardest to defend.

Moving down the list, both the legal exposure and the chance of a platform claim increase.

Fair use and fair dealing: why they are uncertain

People often reach for fair use as the answer. In the United States, fair use is decided case by case using four factors: the purpose and character of the use, including whether it is commercial or transformative; the nature of the original work; how much of it is used; and the effect on the market for the original, including markets for licensed translations.

A complete translation of an entire video is a difficult fit for that test. It uses all of the work, its purpose is usually to deliver the same content to a new audience, and it may substitute for an official translation the owner could license. Quoting a short translated excerpt inside your own commentary or criticism is a different situation from republishing the whole thing.

Many other countries, including the UK, Canada and Australia, use fair dealing instead, which allows use only for listed purposes such as research, private study, criticism, review, quotation or news reporting, and under conditions that vary by country. Neither doctrine works as a permission slip you can claim in advance. They are defenses argued after a dispute begins, and the outcome is hard to predict.

Platform rules sit on top of copyright

Even where copyright would allow a use, the platform's terms apply. YouTube's Terms of Service, for example, restrict downloading content except where YouTube offers a download option or the owner has authorized it. Getting a file of someone else's video is therefore its own question, separate from whether you may translate it.

Platforms also run automated matching. A re-uploaded video with a new audio track still contains the original picture and can be matched, claimed or removed, and repeated copyright strikes can affect your channel. A takedown is not a court ruling, but it has real consequences for your account. Check the current terms and copyright policies of each platform you use.

Licenses that already allow translation

Some videos come with permission built in. YouTube lets creators mark uploads with a Creative Commons Attribution license, and other sites host openly licensed video too. Under the common Creative Commons licenses, a translation counts as an adaptation:

• Attribution (BY) and Attribution-ShareAlike (BY-SA) allow you to publish a translation if you credit the creator as the license requires; ShareAlike also requires your version to use the same license.
• NoDerivatives (ND) licenses do not allow you to share an adapted version, which includes a translation.
• NonCommercial (NC) licenses allow adaptations only for non-commercial use, so a monetized translation is outside them.

Some material has no copyright restrictions at all, such as works whose protection has expired or, in the United States, works created by federal government employees as part of their job. Public domain status differs by country, so check it for the place you will publish rather than assuming.

How to ask the owner for permission

Many creators are glad to see their work reach a new language, especially when you make it easy and offer them control. A clear request improves your chances of a clear answer:

1. Find the right contact: a business email on the channel's about page or website, not a comment under the video.
2. Name the exact video or videos and the languages you want to translate into.
3. Say what you will produce: subtitle files, a dubbed version with an AI voice, or both. Mention an AI voice explicitly, since some creators object to synthetic versions of their content.
4. Say where it will appear. Offering to send the files for the owner to upload on their own channel is often the easiest yes.
5. State whether anyone will earn money from it, how you will credit them, and that you will remove it if they ask.
6. Keep the reply. A written yes that names the videos and the use is far more useful than a vague comment.

If the owner says no, or does not reply, treat that as a no. Silence is not permission.

The people in the video

Copyright is not the only interest involved. The people who appear and speak in a video have their own interests in their voice and likeness, and in some places legal rights over commercial use of them. Dubbing someone with a synthetic voice puts words in their mouth in a language they may not speak, and a translation error then sounds like their own mistake.

Even with the channel owner's permission, consider whether guests, interviewees or children in the video would reasonably object. The ethics of AI voices covers consent and disclosure in more depth, and disclosing that a version is translated, and by whom, is good practice whatever the law requires.

Common mistakes and misconceptions

• Credit is not permission. Naming the creator in your description is polite, but it does not license the use.
• Not earning money does not make a use legal. Non-commercial purpose is one factor in some tests, not an exemption.
• Translating is not transforming. Changing the language keeps the content, structure and footage of the original.
• Public does not mean free. A video anyone can watch is still owned by someone.
• Small channels are not invisible. Automated matching does not care about subscriber counts.
• Subtitle files are not exempt. A standalone file of translated dialogue is still a translation of the script.

Where mydubly fits, and where it doesn't

mydubly translates files you upload from your own device; it does not fetch videos from links, and it does not check who owns a file or whether you have the right to translate it. That responsibility stays with you, as the acceptable use policy sets out. If you simply want to follow a YouTube video in another language, how to translate a YouTube video compares the options, including the platform's own captions.

For private understanding, a translated transcript from video to text is often all you need: a 30-minute talk you have lawful access to costs 30 credits (3¢) for a transcript translated into one of 21 languages, and audio and results are deleted within 30 minutes of completion. If you have permission to publish, the video translator gives you translated SRT and VTT subtitles, a dubbed voice track and a translated MP4, which you can send to the owner or publish as agreed. Journalists and researchers working with footage they cannot republish should also read translating foreign-language footage.

If the goal is only to understand a video yourself, transcription vs translation explains which output answers that need at the lowest cost.

A safe next step

Decide first whether you need to understand the video or to publish it. If you only need to understand it, translate it privately and keep the result to yourself. If you want to publish, write to the owner, offer to hand over subtitle files for their own channel, and get the answer in writing. If you run a community effort, organizing community subtitles covers how to coordinate volunteers once permission is in place.