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Nintendo decides it owns YouTube's Let's Play scene
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I think the key thing here though is they are basically saying "It's within our rights to stop you completely from making those videos, but we understand you like making those videos, so we'll let you do that but since the videos are based on our content we are going to play our ads and gets the revenue generated from them"
As opposed to taking down the videos and noone gets the ad revenue. The thing is right now the LPers are in violation of the copyright laws, so they don't really have a right to show their video since it relies primarily on the content Nintendo is providing.
So while you are correct in that Nintendo is profiting from their videos, that is basically the price they are paying for utilizing Nintendo's content.
It is a very grey area. (at least to me)
Delphin Twitch Stream:
Not preferential, but probably legal under the current system, in the actual legal sense and not in the "I can hire a lawyer and you can't, so I'm always right" sense.
The preferential thing would be if our copyright laws weren't broken such that companies can claim ownership or control over these kinds of derivative works.
The question is whether or not it falls under a "derivative" work.
If it's just a guy playing the game I would say no, he is not adding any content, he is just showing the game, which I think gives Nintendo the right. Him talking over the game in my opinion is not enough to override Nintendos rights.
If he is adding content to the point where people are showing up specifically to see him, and the game is secondary I would say he has the rights, because in that case it doesn't really matter WHAT game is being played because people specifically want to see this guy and what he has to say.
Right now however, as I understand it, there is no such distinction.
Delphin Twitch Stream:
Yet, who would you have to be the arbiter of saying where the line lies? What amount of original content by an LPer would make it a derivative work and unique to a sufficient degree to allow the LPer to gain the revenue from their efforts as opposed to the IP owner of the game being used as a platform for the LP?
Sometimes talking over the game is the very content people are showing up for. Sometimes it's just seeing the gameplay.
Oh, definitely. At some point there has to be a distinction. A complete video of the game with no commentary added probably isn't a derivative work, while something like the Angry Video Game Nerd that adds narrative, songs, skits, and characters almost certainly qualifies as one.
The problem is that while a good LPer can make some money, it isn't really enough money to make arguing their case in a court of law worthwhile. So the end result is probably just that Nintendo games won't get LPed very often.
The implications here for game reviews do get a little disturbing (under this precedent a company could easily take down any negative review of their product), but that's not very likely to happen in practice.
That's the thing, I have no idea. But I feel it is an important distinction to define.
I think there is something in copyright law where if you modify the content by a certain amount it falls under fair use. As with any such dispute the final arbitration depends on what is listed in the laws and a third party determining if the use of the content violates the copyright or not.
Delphin Twitch Stream:
tails Gets trolled
usually any product that puts out a custom content creation engine is doing so in the hopes of.. well.. creating content. Plus, RvB did get the endorsement of Microsoft, and I'm sure they shared revenue.
A better question is Gary's Mod, and people taking assets from another game and putting them into the engine.
NNID and many other services: Athenor or Myridiam // 3DS: 3883-5283-0471
(AFAIK they have a pretty great relationship with Bungie.)
That's definitely a greyer area as getting those assets requires a dubious process.
tails Gets trolled
What's a little worrisome to me is things like Awesome Games Done Quick. That's a similar kind of copyright violation as this and raised almost half a million for charity last time they held it.
There should really be something like mechanical licenses are for cover songs. You're making a derivative work using your own skills but their tools, archetype, template whatever, even for a silent playthrough, and you pay a fraction of any money earned to the original creators. However internet and copyright law is so incredibly fucked up and mainly consists of very large developers targeting very small fans. Even if there's a lot of them so that their pennies add up, none of them can afford to do anything but cave. I don't think anybody would have even batted an eye at this at all if Nintendo had just said "We're taking some of this ad revenue," instead of "we're taking 100% of it and you should be grateful that we didn't nuke your channels and adsense accounts completely."
My heart does go out to the Let's Play-ers that were using it as an income source, though. In an eternally cool world, Nintendo would split the ad revenue with the video creators, and perhaps we can convince them to do so, but I don't see anything wrong with Nintendo profiting from videos of what is largely theirs.
Steamboat Willie (1928) and anything made since will never, ever enter the public domain.
The extensions, contortions and justifications necessary to produce this result can be eye-watering, but the practical effect and intent is quite clear.
Steam: Megajoule
The main problem there is people aren't necessarily there for the game.
I don't see a problem because editing a video in any of a dozen ways magically makes it not copyrighted in a wonderful display of how useless copyright laws are. A bit of extra effort at the editting stage of uploading videos and this isn't an issue.
Make no mistake though nintendo isn't trying to defend any artistic integrity (lol) and isn't being a cool bro by "letting" the videos remain up some bright spark over there saw a few extra bucks for next to no effort and this plan was put into motion.
As far as this goes, it isn't a surprise really. Nintendo has been pushing more for viral marketing and social networking type advertising. They are just locking things down to ensure they have some sort of 'box' around what is going on.
Frankly, I don't see many Let's Play accounts taking a big hit from this in lost revenue. It's not going to cut millions from the few channels that make a few bucks, and in the end if no one does Nintendo Let's Plays then I guess that is how it goes.
If someone really wants to make a living off this, they can start up their own site with their own video format and their own system for monetary gain. Youtube changes policies all the time and it's always been known that the copyright holder of the content is going to be in charge, in this case it is Nintendo. No one seems to complain that NFL games or movies aren't allowed on Youtube, this is no different, save for the fact that videos will still be allowed.
There could be future steps at play here as well. Perhaps Nintendo may decide to hire some Let's Play people for their own channel, or start producing their own system of payment. You never know. It's not all doom and gloom.
There can't be a magical barrier to determine what someone is there for. If you want to go to the Super Bowl to watch the cheerleaders, it doesn't matter if you're there to do that, watch the team, or close your eyes the whole time, you play by the rules to gain access, set by the owners of the material.
I realize that some people may enjoy the reactions/banter of people who are recording their Let's Play but the source material is still being a recorded game - you take that away and you just have a vblog with nothing to follow. If that's the case, simply remove the video and listen to someone play it - but you want both and half of that is owned by another company.
Fair use is understandable, but these people are making revenue off the content, that's where fair use ends. It's not for educational or archival purposes when you're running a channel specifically to bring in income - and if you're not - then this advertising change won't effect you at all.
Actually, that's the crux of the problem I have with what they're doing as the Let's Play part of it sure as hell doesn't belong to Nintendo. So it's an ultimatum really. Either give us all the money for this (which I can't even imagine is much to them), or nobody gets anything. Maybe if they were just going after the top .01% that actually makes anything significant off of this kind of thing, but Youtube's content ID matches are anything but discretionary. I find the "be glad we're letting you still show your videos" to be incredibly patronizing too. It's fully within their rights to exert their copyright claim and take whichever ones they wanted down, no matter how arbitrarily they feel like doing it, but demanding 100% of the money instead (and forcing money into the equation for the ones who didn't even enable ads before) puts a really bad taste in my mouth and makes me feel kind of like they're almost extorting their own fans for being fans.
I'm all for copyright protection if people are seriously and maliciously trying to just flat out profit off of your material for little work, but going after such tiny things like this made by thousands of your most dedicated fans that take tons of time and effort to show off your games when you're a ten billion dollar company just seems nuts to me. Especially for a Japanese company where there's a doujinshi market that has entire gigantic festivals wholly dedicated to selling things based on other people's copyrights that take dozens of hours of work for next to no profit.
This is a really weird part of copyright law that I think someone mentioned earlier. You're not allowed to write a derivative work ala fan fiction, but you are allowed to write a parody that could be a 100% rip off of the script with fart jokes in place of names (kind of like Bored of the Rings). Copyright law is weird and kind of dumb. I'm still a fan of mechanical licenses for fucking everything of artistic/entertainment value.
I find it hard to sympathize with company's that hold onto others intellectual property's just to extort as much money from a name as they can long after all but stealing them from the original developers. Just edit your videos in some way LP'ers. Hell you can usually get away with posting huge sections of movies on youtube if you just flip the footage, that's how stupid these copyright laws are. Copyright is there to protect intellectual property, a shame the actual creators of said property have long been muscled out of the picture.
Flipping footage doesn't somehow negate copyright law, it is used to trick the bots for a longer period of time.
The question here being how much of the LP is actually content that the LPer is protected by and how much of it is content they are just using from the company.
If some guy is just playing the game and streaming it, do you think that he has any right to the content he is using?
Delphin Twitch Stream:
If the bots don't find it, no issue is found. Copyright law on the internet only starts removing content once the company finds it, not anyone. That's why this page is still full of copyrighted artwork.
That doesn't really negate my point that it's a stupid law, I've seen a few struck videos make there comebacks in reverse never to be bothered again. It may be rather anecdotal evidence but it's what I have. Just adding your own kind of ad in the form of random footage at some point works to. Hell I'd be tempted to put footage in from another company's game.
an intro/outro for videos is a pretty good way to go about avoiding it that most "amvs" use as well.
That's kind of my point besides the fact that this isn't protecting anyone's actual intellectual property is that the means used to enforce the law are utterly bananas as well.
But apart from all that it's just kind of a dick move imo, who are you really screwing over at the end of the day? yourself and your fans. It doesn't bother me except in principle I only watch one LP'er and he has never done a nintendo game but this kind of thing might become something all gaming company's start doing. It stinks of sopa and the insidious ways it keeps trying to manifest itself.
I don't really understand how you think it's not anyones actual intellectual property. Nintendo created Link for example. They own the right to that IP, if someone sits down and plays a Zelda game on stream and makes money off it, they are very much exploiting that IP for profit. Just because YOU think that it is a dick move doesn't really invalidate their rights to that IP.
The question is how much of the stream is the LPer actually creating, if he is just streaming his gameplay, then I would say he is contributing nothing and is absolutely exploiting the IP. If he is contributing quite a bit of his/her own content then it starts to reach a grey area which was what was being discussed before you just came in with your blanket statement and then recommended steps to circumvent copyright enforcement. It's fine if you think it's just a big company trying to screw over the little man, but there is more to it than that.
Delphin Twitch Stream:
I can't take the Superbowl and broadcast it an hour later with my best Howard Cosell impersonation, the NFL would own my ass in a few hours/days. I don't own squat of that besides my bad impression even though that is a real game with different circumstances depending on how it is played.
Hell almost all of the good LPs aren't even played live, they are semi scripted after watching a recording of the person playing the game.
My point is in this case Shigeru Miyamoto created link as far as I can tell. Not the automated banbot that nintendo is utilizing.
My point is this property they're enforcing is usually there's through especially in the past incredibly shady publishing deals. And is being used in this case by fans for entertainment purposes and nintendo's black tendrils are coiling around LP'ers whether they have ads or not. But it's ok they only want any and all potential revenue! (wait were we talking about intellectual property...maybe someone should remind nintendo!)
Again nintendo isn't here to protect there poor products from being maliciously used they're here for any potential income they're here to get another hook of control in. The game industry giants have shown there hand in these situations before if they have an inch they will try to take a mile (that whole sopa dealy was supported by most and denounced by none). That's what annoys me about these kinds of things.
That is certainly a view to take.
Delphin Twitch Stream:
I agree with him and hope that Nintendo decides to pull back and re-examine this action; they have a claim to make but they are ultimately hurting themselves and everyone else for narrow minded and shortsighted reasons.
Unmotivate - Updated May 17th - "Let's Complain About Nintendo"
The PA Forumer 'Lets Play' Archive - Updated March 25th, 2013
Steam ID: 76561198021298113
Origin ID: SR71C_Blackbird
Probably, but I can't remember the last time I saw a Nintendo ad on Youtube. It's usually the latest Call of Battlefield or Gears of Dead Space triple A game if it's gaming related, which often it isn't.
He opens up his commentary on the issue by saying he's going to avoid the legality of it, and then goes HEAD INTO the legality of it by discussing ownership. That is 100% legal discussion.
Now, on to a point that matters, he argues that someone's playthrough of a game is what they own, but that's pretty faulty argument. Forget the cinematic, low-input games. Our personal experiences with things are ours as our memories and feelings. We can commit those to physicality, either by writing or acting out on video, however we please, but when the memory / feeling / experience is rooted right on top of an owned property (games, music, film), it doesn't transfer the ownership rights. This is dumb.
Edit - His argument about paying football players is also dumb. There is an official commission that owns things and decides who gets paid.
Unmotivate - Updated May 17th - "Let's Complain About Nintendo"
The PA Forumer 'Lets Play' Archive - Updated March 25th, 2013
How is it inaccurate?
Unmotivate - Updated May 17th - "Let's Complain About Nintendo"
The PA Forumer 'Lets Play' Archive - Updated March 25th, 2013