DryvBy
Member
I agree with you on ads. I don't pay attention to them anyway.
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Nintendo going after Youtube Let's Play videos
- Thread starter LiK
- Start date
I agree with you on ads. I don't pay attention to them anyway.
Sorry, for being impolite, but you were completely ignoring my post.
A videogame has two main parts: input and feedback. The feedback is given through an visual and acoustical source. You actually seek to get feedback with the input. It's also created through handmaid elements, which cost a company and people a lot of time and money. If a company sells a single-player game, they sell you an thought-out combination of inputs and feedback, which will hopefully entertain you. An mutliplayer games is much more of ocean of combination of inputs and feedback.
If we look at a Let's Play from single-player games, we of course only see the feedback of game play out before us. But since it is also created to entertain, you see an important part of the product for free. Yes it is not complete without the other part, but still enough to question, if you already most of the feedback, why still playing the game.
Again: Will this decision hurt Nintendos marking and popularity? Properly yes, if they do not make a lot of deals with some popular channels.
Have they the right to do this? Yes, they have and at least they chose the least horrible outcome.
Bigmac1910
Member
I think Nintendo need all the exposure they can get (Wii U), and I also feel that youTube or the internet matter more and more compared to traditional marketing. But if bigger publishers will continue to ignore it, I think the indie scene will be more successful in the end.
I agree, and I think that's the thing many people are choosing to ignore: YouTube's Terms of Service are pretty clear here.
Publishers, YouTube and a Let's Players (or the YouTube community) should get together to find a solution. The Wild West situation that is YouTube right now is certainly not helpful for anyone involved. People who upload commentary to YouTube should be able to do so without having to fear that their content might be taken down or anything.
I could imagine that a solution where the revenue is simply shared between the parties would work. Have a button next to the "Subscribe" one that mentions the publisher's name and make all people who want to monetize their videos select the publisher or game name or whatever. That way a publisher can know exactly what kind of content is on there and YouTube could split up the revenue between all parties involved. Commentators might not be able to get as much money as before but in return they'll be safe from any kind of copyright claims from the publishers themselves. Their work will not be taken down as there are agreements between YouTube and the publisher.
Regulus Tera
Romanes Eunt Domus
It's what I do for Square Enix's games!
DryvBy
Member
No sweat. We're having a calm exhange of words so all's good.
To answer you, I don't think this hurts Nintendo. If it did, they'd remove the videos. They want some of their pie. Is that right? Pfft, I'm not an internet lawyer. Without dat legal degree, I wish we lived in a world where it's split down the middle. Nintendo makes some cash for making the game, dude makes some commentary cash. All are the winner.
But I don't honestly believe this hurts them. It helps. Thanks to some let's plays and quick plays, I've bought a lot of games. Rarely has a let's play steered me away. I'm speaking for myself only obviously but I think it's illogical to believe Nintendo would leave a video up that hurts the company but take the ad money.
Maybe if videos are hurting the company because it shows how horrible they are (FFXIII), then maybe that should tell the company to try harder.
video content inside of reviews would easily be covered under fair use. unless they had like 45+ minutes straight of gameplay or something.
the thing that most are missing here is that nintendo ISN'T doing anything here to reduce that exposure.. let's look at this step by step.
guy makes Let's Play video.
people watch it.
nintendo get's exposure.
nothing in that chain is changed.
what's changed is that previously he was seeing ad revenue for showing people nintendo's entire game. yes he was giving them exposure, and making money on it by doing so.
so here's the ultimate problem. sites/partnerships like Machinma, IGN, Gamespot, etc pay Nintendo lots of money to.... be able to do the exact same thing. So here you have these sites paying Nintendo to be able to do video walkthroughs of their games, and this guy is not only doing it without paying nintendo, but then making money off of it to boot.
so what is nintendo to do. Well, there are three options. Either enter into a licensing agreement with him, content id the videos, or issue a takedown notice.
honestly, considering it doesn't sound like he is interested in the first option, Nintendo is doing the next best thing which in theory shouldn't harm them getting exposure from this..
which ultimately comes to the real point here. There's no reason he couldn't, say, do a LP of Luigi's Mansion under an agreement with Nintendo. It's thus pretty telling that his ultimate reaction is "I'm just not going to do Nintendo LPs anymore." So his entire way to make money is doing something that he shouldn't be doing, and when presented with the option to do it a way that he legally CAN do it, instead he just will stop... (more than likely because whatever minimal advertising amount he does see would be eaten up with licensing costs to nintendo)
there is really no place here where he is in the right and/or nintendo is in the wrong... I get some of you just want to take this david vs. goliath stance on this.. but he is absolutely wrong under man laws and TOS... and Nintendo acted in the FAIREST way possible while still protecting their IP AND their licensing agreements with other content providers.
Still, I'm guessing the outrage will continue to come by people who just want to be outraged and nintendo for beating up the little guy, regardless of how misguided or wrong that belief is.
probably the start of workarounds like editing and altering the final videos to get away with it. Or just give up entirely.
That also makes for a better experience for the watcher, 45 min of gameplay is awfully long after all.
You're being unfair to FFXIII, Metroid Other M is a better example.
I mean the battle system in XIII wasn't horrible. Unlike MOM.
I might be changing my position a little...
I've started to see LPer's report that very short videos they have made (sub-10 minutes: https://twitter.com/KoopaKungFu/status/334767720421814273), as well as videos they have produced under the partnership of Machinima and the like ( https://twitter.com/Cobanermani456/status/334760280800247809 ) have been hit.
The likelihood is that this is a Youtube auto-detection thing rather than a Nintendo thing, but this is a little more worrying.
I've started to see LPer's report that very short videos they have made (sub-10 minutes: https://twitter.com/KoopaKungFu/status/334767720421814273), as well as videos they have produced under the partnership of Machinima and the like ( https://twitter.com/Cobanermani456/status/334760280800247809 ) have been hit.
The likelihood is that this is a Youtube auto-detection thing rather than a Nintendo thing, but this is a little more worrying.
my guess is having them in a playlist (or any sort of compilation, even just listed in a channel together) would absolutely not skirt fair use. fair use is still subjective. Not some hard continuous percentage or time limit.
Jake Tower
Banned
When the monetization changes, the video may be removed by the owner and no future Nintendo LPs will be made. No more exposure.
Yeah, no more exposure. Sure. Thats what happened to MS since they are doing this for quite some time.
Cause there's no way that anyone would ever LP a game without getting paid for it.
The problem is, no one can say if it's right, that Let's Play really are great ads. In fact, now that there always Nintendo ads before Let's Plays, we actually could get some numbers.
Here is an important difference. If your video/review/etc. is a critic or parody, they can't do you much against it. This falls under free speech and fair use. The problems accursed only, if you represent almost the whole point of the product as itself and only create minimal changes. Voice-overs and a few cuts alone really don't change the original product. You still laugh, cry, fear, etc. as you properly would, if you would play the game yourself. There are still inputs, only that you are not the one who chooses the interactions. Compressed videos still will have no problem with there advertising and could easily fight an unfair treatment. So if you wanna critic something, you still can and you should altogether not create so long videos to begin with. Like anybody at Nintendo watches all Let's Plays ...
but they were giving exposure in a way that they didn't have right to do in the first place. Now Nintendo is settling things up and their response is "well then fine. I just won't use your games anymore"?
It's really akin to showing a movie, charging people $1 to watch the movie, the movie studio coming in and taking the disc out of your player and then you saying "well fine, then I won't show people your movie at all!!" The difference here is that Nintendo isn't taking it away, they are just stopping them from charging.
he never had any right to stick ads on the videos.. plain and simple. that he was able to up to now without repercussion is meaningless.
Bigmac1910
Member
Someone wrote here in the thread that the GiantBomb guys are getting $100 per video, I never heard that IGN etc. have to pay lots of money to Nintendo to get a video shown. The situation is tricky if what you are saying is correct, but even if thats the case, it will still lead to less exposure for Nintendo based upon how the media is consumed these days. And I think they should have approached these guys first to have a conversation with them, instead of just pulling the rug from under their feet and trying to take all their revenues. No wonder these guys will say no to any new deals with Nintendo.
But that's Nintendo for you, first rule of Nintendo: don't talk about Nintendo unless you pay Nintendo. lol
If only that was an option. You get all or nothing. There is no cut.
Lightning Lord
Banned
Honestly the OP isn't nearly as bad as what the topic title makes it out to be. I really thought we would be seeing LPs taken down and I'm glad to see that this is not the case.
Psycho_Mantis
Banned
sooo do you have any evidence of Sony doing the same thing or taking gaming videos down.
The ToS of YT states it plainly that they can't monetize these things without getting permission first, which would have told them to seek permission and work a deal (if one exists). If they can't be bothered to do that, and put up their own ads, then they have only themselves to blame.
This is like posting against the ToS of GAF over and over and finally getting caught, then saying its the mod's fault.
Bigmac1910
Member
I have to disagree, games are interactive, while some may be satisfied with only watching, I believe most of us want to actually play it.
I think you missed the point.
To my knowledge, Youtube doesn't have any real form of revenue sharing. All the revenue either goes to you, or all the revenue goes to someone else. You can't split it 50/50 between you and Nintendo or anything like that.
Kageshinzo
Member
If people can't even be bothered to read the original post of a thread, how can you expect them to read the ToS?
Bigmac1910
Member
But Nintendo didn't claim copyright until Feb 2013, so there was no breach in copyright until then. And I haven't heard anything about Nintendo and youTube making a deal until now. So I doubt these guys knew about it (but I can't be sure of that).
it's not just nintendo... to do anything that wouldn't be covered under Fair Use, you have to license it. Plain and simple. Video games, movies, books, whatever.
you get the problem with what you stated here, right? The two are mutually exclusive. the tricky situation is in fact. The LP'ers are in the wrong here. That Nintendo will receive less exposure if they pull the videos has nothing to do with that.
Now here is where there's a valid conversation. Although to be clear, Nintendo didn't "pull the rug out from underneath them." They knew, or should have known had they read YT's TOS, that what they were doing was wrong. They just weren't being called on it. Could Nintendo have approached them first? Sure.. Would that have changed this? Well, considering their stance is against losing revenue, and licensing through nintendo would have gone against that revenue... I'm not thinking the outcome would be any different.
again, I don't get Nintendo being painted in that light in this case. These weren't guys giving nintendo free exposure.. these are people who were making money off of nintendo's games. there's really no ground in this case where nintendo is in the wrong. I hear the outrage.. the same outrage as record companies suing people for $100,000 for downloading music illegally.. but that's the internet for you. Do the "victimless crime" and then cry about it when you get caught.
Nintendo ALWAYS had copyright (and/or trademark).. whether it was claimed through automated processes on YT or not is irrelevant.
BUT, I will say you do make one fairly valid point (again though, against the video makers). There are people on the internet making money in all sorts of areas that the probably aren't entitled to.. people who, as you suggest, didn't do their due diligence to see if they were within their legal right to do what they are doing. This is probably one example out of tens of thousands of situations currently out there. Moral of the story people... if you are bringing in money for doing something.... you sure as hell better do your homework to see if at any point someone is going to come at you down the line with a valid claim to a piece (or all of) that pie.
Jake Tower
Banned
Making money of of Nintendo's games is perfectly legal.
For example, I may purchase a copy of a game, and then rent it or resell it to other players.
The whole reason the Stream and Let's Play market explode was that you could do a lot money without creating much content. Yes, it is some work to cut the videos together, but it is much more work to create the visuals, audio, plot and entertainment of a game. All that Let's Player needed to do was to react good/fun/interesting. Game and Art itself is about creating reactions and we humans are very good at empathy. So we could get in the mind of the player and feel him playing. In the end it is the game, who brings the most elements to the video. Which why it is unfair to say, that the own the video. If you use an grey area for your living, you have to life with the risk of change.
On the other hand reviews or parody are something completely different. They people have to put in much more work. Write a script, form an opinion, cutting to underline your points, etc.
If you would rent Nintendo games for money, it's pretty sure it's illegal without a licence. You can't even simple sell a lot of stuff anywhere, without some license or telling the finance authority. At a appointed size and location it isn't perfectly legal. And of course you are not allowed to sell copies of your copy. I'm not even sure, if you can show a game at big events without permission.
You do realize that owning an individual copy of a game is different from owning the copyright to a game, right?
reselling isn't making money off of it. because you are dealing with the physical ownership, not a copy (hence copyright), it's not the same thing.
renting is tricky.. but for the most part I believe renting is covered similarly like selling. you are actually renting the item, not a copy.. so you are renting the property, which is different from copyright. edit - but like metal b is suggesting... yeah.. rental of copyrighted materials is actually very tricky. hence why to this day there are even often different discs in redbox machines than what you buy from the store.
what we are talking about here is copyright. i.e. actually making money off of the game, not the transfer of ownership.
DryvBy
Member
I wish this was true for my sake. I had a video that had 4,000 views in an hour which was complete parody about rednecks selling a WoW account. It was pulled for a 2 second clip of Yakety Sax.
I'm on my phone but it's on Dailymotion under "WoW account 4 sale" or something if you want to see what it looked like.
Jake Tower
Banned
Yes, I do. Which makes statements about making money off Nintendo products pointless. That's what I'm trying to point out. Copyright, patent, and trademark are very specific things, and have nothing to do per se with making money off a product. i.e. I can't make unauthorized copies of Nintendo games and give them away. It doesn't matter if I'm not making money.
Well, you were not criticizing or making a parody of Yakety Sax. You used the tune exactly for what it was and therefore the ban made sense. If you would haven been put down because of the WoW material, then that would be another story.
If you make a movie of an game and catch its visual and acoustical parts , someone could argue, that you make unauthorized copies of an part of an product.
It's split 50/50 between you and your partner company. That's how it works for my channel anyway.
DryvBy
Member
You might be right on my video (stupid 30 year old copyrights...). But WoW videos have been pulled before. People advertising their accounts to sale. We can agree that this does violate Blizzards eula, but the videos are pulled for "copyright" violations.
I don't really claim to understand a lot of the "fair use" laws. Whatever. I'm probably not making a lot of sense cus of work.
Do you think video game makers do or do not have to get licenses to have actual cars appear in video games?
And since people don't know how to read yet:
I didn't know that
As said it's been clear for a long time what stance on making money off of video games were. There was always a risk and that you were walking a fine line and on borrowed time. That is unless you were apart of a company that had an agreement.
Do we know if TGS, etc have been affected by this? Or just gaming sites that didn't have an agreement with Nintendo but were just putting up videos on their own?
Now the question is how hard would it be to create an LLC (this part is actually very easy and I think it just around $50 in most states) and then try to work out a license agreement so one could monetize videos with their content?
Do we know if TGS, etc have been affected by this? Or just gaming sites that didn't have an agreement with Nintendo but were just putting up videos on their own?
Now the question is how hard would it be to create an LLC (this part is actually very easy and I think it just around $50 in most states) and then try to work out a license agreement so one could monetize videos with their content?
supposedly (according to twitter), some channels under the Machinima network are being hit by this.. which of course would be wrong on Nintendo's part. My guess is the problem there would be in the content id matching system, and not Nintendo targeting those videos. but I don't really know outside of a few claims being made on twitter by sites within machinima.
Willy Wanka
my god this avatar owns
It seems pretty counter-productive to me but as long as they aren't removing videos altogether then I don't think it's a big issue.
BasilZero
Member
It becomes a issue when your account gets a red stamp on content ID claims which seems to be what I've been hearing from my sources what will happen if Nintendo content is uploaded.
Its one thing (which is OK) to take all the revenue but to leave a negative mark on a person's account as well?
Its like you'll have to make a separate channel for Nintendo content and other gaming content now XD.
Assuming people want to continue making videos such as myself.
Exceptions can be made, of course. Not everyone who does it for a living has a disability. I can understand such circumstances. I know some people who can't work due to severe disabilities, and that bothers the shit out of them. So doing something for those people is wonderful, and genuinely valid. At least to me.
swirlyglasses
Member
Ignore post.
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