What are the regulations around using third-party content in your media?
The short answer: ask for permission or deal with the repercussions.
There are all sorts of complexities when copyrighting and trademarking get brought up, not to mention intellectual property. Third-party content is anything that someone creates and is paid for by another party. You then sharing it for recognition, profit or in any other way subtracting from the value that the owner would otherwise have received, become the third party. That's not cool for anyone involved. It's not courteous and it isn't cheap.
Getting permission may be easy. Finding from whom you need permission may be more difficult. In either case, you can properly use third-party content. Text, audio, images, video, or any combination of those, can be considered in a copyright infringement case due to improperly using generated content. Technology has severely complicated the persistent issue. If you didn't know that something belonged to someone else and you claimed it as your own centuries ago, generally within reason, it became yours. That doesn't directly translate well today. Metadata or even more overt labeling means, "I called it first!"
Here's an example from the website https://legal.io: "When streaming a video game, you are typically creating a derivative from another copyrighted work, the video game." Companies license their content for streaming or personal use. This is how Microsoft can have games made by a video game developer directly on their gaming systems. This is also how other businesses use brand names, advertising, apparel, images, or anything else to help promote their messages that they didn't originally create. The derivatives need permission.
An exception to this consideration is called "fair-use." According to the University of Texas Library website, "Fair use is the use of copyrighted works without asking permission from the copyright owner(s)...involving four factors: purpose and character of the use; nature of the work; amount used; and effect upon the market." In essence, are you only using what you need to get your intent met (without using a substantial amount of, or devaluing, the original work)?
Understand that even though material is freely accessible online in most cases, it is not freely copied, appropriated, or even referenced in some cases. Think twice and ask at least once if you have doubts about fair use. Consult a professional in all other cases as appropriate or necessary.
Disclaimer: I am not an attorney or otherwise giving legal advice. This is experiential and for educational purposes only.
