Just weeks after Facebook added fee-free ticketed live streams, it has issued new ‘Music Guidelines’ that will make it much riskier for musicians to use the platform.

Facebook issued new Music Guidelines that also cover Instagram and other Facebook platforms as part of an update to its Terms Of Service set to take effect on October 1, 2020.

Those guidelines put clear restrictions on music uses, including:

• You are responsible for the content you post;
• You may not use videos on our Products to create a music listening experience;
• Unauthorized content may be removed;
• You may not be able to post or access videos containing music in every country of the world;

What Facebook has written is not out of synch with some other platforms, but it makes clear is that Facebook intends to police its live streams in ways that other paid platforms like StageIt and VEEPs do not.

So when an artist goes live on Facebook – ticketed or not – they need to be concerned not just that the Beatles cover they always do as an encore could trigger a takedown, but that their own songs if not recognized as ‘authorized’ could as well.