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Do authors on Udemy.com own their content?
Hello! Thanks for your question about content ownership on Udemy.com. The short version is that yes, you own your content and the right to remove it. Below you will find a deep dive of my findings.
METHODOLOGY & FINDINGS
First, I went straight to the source to determine whether or not an instructor retains ownership of posted content. In the Instructor Terms section of the website, by utilizing Udemy's services you, as the instructor, offer Udemy a non-exclusive license to your content for marketing and distribution purposes, among others. This means that you have the right to post the information in the first place (also referenced in the Instructor Terms) and that you retain the right to that content, with some exceptions (see next paragraph). This also means that you have the ability to remove your content from the platform as well.
However, there are some restrictions to your ownership and removal rights. Udemy has the right to use some or all of your content for marketing purposes. If you join one of Udemy's special marketing promotions, like Business Content Subscriptions, you will not be able to make your courses private or remove the content during the period of the promotion. If you decide to delete your account with Udemy some of your account information and course content still remains accessible. New users will not be able to access the content after 60 days have passed since the termination request; however, existing users who already signed up for the course will still have access to it.
Finally, because you as the instructor have granted Udemy a non-exclusive license, you are free to post the same content on other sites.
Although you own the course content and right to remove and re-post, it is worth noting that there are several aspects of using the platform that you do not own. Although you can set prices and some coupons, you do not own the marketing, all promotions, or all of the revenue (in some cases).
REVIEWS
While it is nice to know that you do have ownership (for the most part) over your content and the right to remove it, it would be helpful to hear what other instructors have to say about the site. As a caveat, it would be helpful to know why you want to post a course on Udemy before reading the reviews.
LearnDash: This blog post recommends staying away from Udemy as you do not have control over important components for growing a business. For example, you do not own the marketing campaign, student information, or refund/privacy policies.
SideHustle Academy: This post explores the pros and cons of Udemy and another site, Teachable, according to the author and his research. Like LearnDash, this post laments the fact that you do not have a lot of control (aside from content) over Udemy and its practices and pricing structure.
Money Crashers: This site reviews Udemy as a whole and considers advantages and disadvantages for both users and instructors. Overall, the site finds that Udemy is a great resource for online learning.
Course Mania: Scott from Course Mania, reviews his experience in creating a course and using Udemy's services. Scott goes through the process of coming up with a course topic, creating the course, and then looking at the marketing and pricing process. Overall, he concludes that the site is ideal for his purposes.
Planning for Failure: Todd discusses his issues with Udemy's updated pricing policy and comes to the conclusion that it rips off instructors while discussing how his public disagreement with the new policy led to his being banned from Udemy discussion groups. The comments are also pretty valuable as they overwhelming confirm Todd's experiences and their disagreement with Udemy's policies.
CONCLUSION
To wrap it up, you do have control over any content you post to Udemy and the right to remove it. However, there are still some areas in which Udemy has access to or the right to continue using your materials, even after course removal or account deletion.
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