But it DOES technically stop kids streaming on their games on twitch and youtube so… what does it matter what the intent was?
Is TotalBiscuit a big company? He’s got employees and most of his money comes from showing videos of gameplay. I guess he’ll just skip doing Microsoft games on his channel.
The funny thing is, companies fight to get put on these popular youtube channels. TV can sell thousands of copies if he posts a video about a game.
I’m pretty sure this is just a big “don’t stream stuff for money without checking with us first.” MLG, Rooster Teeth, and the like already have agreements. Kids streaming their stuff without making money should be okay, and if you make money, then talk with Microsoft.
I want to say Capcom or some other publisher already has similar rules in place. Or a similar brouhaha about people unable to stream fighting games, and that all turned out okay.
I want to say that first off this only affects independent channels that feature Microsoft products, which honestly represents a very small slice of the pie. I’d imagine most of the networks out there have permission to monetize. Second, there are more developers that are actually being pro-active about supporting Youtubers and streamers than there are developers trying to shut it down thus far. Some examples are:
Bohemia Interactive- http://bit.ly/OlTSOY
Blizzard Entertainment- http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/company/legal/videopolicy.html
Riot Games (as of Q2 2012)- http://www.riotgames.com/company/legal-jibber-jabber
Subset Games- http://www.ftlgame.com/?p=388
Countless other indies
Some of you may know this, others not. After I walked from Voodoo Extreme this past June I ended up making the decision to try out the Youtube thing a little more seriously. I’ve had a channel that had been around since 2006, one that I had created videos for very casually in the past. It did pretty well, a few thousand subs over the years, and a few million video views. I didn’t make jack though until just this past month.
Last fall when Youtube finally opened up monetization and partnerships to a wider audience I was finally able to start submitting my gameplay videos to them. This was a relatively smooth process for me, at least until I got hit by a sweep of “Content ID” matches thanks to Riot Games. Following that, I had to submit documentation for nearly all of my future uploads.
Given the connections I made while at VE (and of course previous outlets) I was lucky enough to be able to talk to developers and publishers about the situation. Some did provide me with documentation, others directed me to a legal page with disclaimers authorizing monetization for Youtube partners and streamers. Only a couple publishers were unable to help me only because their legal team hadn’t had a chance to put together a policy that was for or against it.
I will say this though, the process of getting documentation reviewed is a royal pain in the ass. Due to the flagging that the whole Riot ContentID rollout caused to my channel I had some videos that took as long as 2-3 months until ads were approved, even when I had documentation from developers and pubs. Ultimately I decided to seek out a network partner that could help me get past the monetization barriers, and things have been smooth sailing since.
Anyway, once partnered up with a network like The Game Station, RPM, Machinima, VisoGAMES, etc. all monetization worries go out the window. It’s literally click a button, customize the ad runs, and save. Youtube essentially puts the liability of copyright violations on the networks, even when Google ads are run. Most networks have in-house sales teams though that sell their own ad space, which distances Google from a liability standpoint even further. The catch is Youtube partners that join networks split a cut of the revenues generated by the ads.
There are many people that have found a way to make a living on Youtube, but not many people are confirming it. The whole situation reminds me a bit of the pre-2001 dot com crash era when many of us knew guys that were making really good money off gaming websites, but said guys weren’t really talking about it. I recommend that you guys peek around at SocialBlade, which has good tracking data on 100k+ channels. Pewdiepie’s channel is estimated to make an average of as much as $30k a day (yes, a day), although the realistic figure is probably half given network cuts, variable ad rates, and issues with not being able to monetize all videos. He occasionally uses copyrighted music in his vids, which doesn’t fly (unless the artist has granted you full commercialization rights).
Here’s xJaws, a young kid that was able to buy himself a new Mercedes in cash and then some a year back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GY5SCxcUImc
The only problem is everyone and their brother (especially the 16-21 crowd) are trying to break in. There’s an ungodly amount of competition, and it’s very hard to get exposure. A lot of it comes down to who you’re partnered up with, and who you know.
Actually, one of the most famous Youtube personalities out there, Mike “HuskyStarcraft” Lammond, took down all of his popular Brood War videos in preparation for becoming a Youtube Partner because Blizzard famously pursued legal action over the use of their game (the Korean eSPorts Association, KeSPA, made loads of money off of the game as a tournament title without giving a dime to Blizzard, prompting a nasty multi-year suit). On the other hand, usage of Starcraft 2 was more explicitly allowed in the Terms of Use with an exception that tournament organizers giving out more than $5000 had to “license” with Blizz (likely giving them a cut, although the terms aren’t public).
Since there was no stipulation against streamers making money (just large, un-acknowledged tournaments), Lammond was able to secure his partnership due to the clearer legal waters of SC2.
If MS makes any moves to pursue this–and honestly, I’d say publicly discussing the new policy is enough to make it known to Google–that Youtube may well make enforcement here a policy.
Which, of course, is enormous fucking bullshit.
I think there are some people making good money streaming or via Youtube. I looked into it some and thought about trying it but wasn’t comfortable with all the investments to do it well (new PC, capture hardware, new expensive internet, new router, internet installation fees, new mic, new webcam, new games, etc).
He claims to make 7/8k a month and probably more now. Most people who do this seem to put in tons of hours and most probably don’t make much. If you just record or stream your hobby game time it seems like a good way to make some extra money. As a full time job it seems like a big gamble and almost a catch-22. To get popular you have to put in lots of time and there’s no guarantee about it. Yet you only make decent money when you are popular, until then you make almost nothing.
That said I do enjoy watching Let’s Plays or streams a lot. For many games which I know have little or no replay value and are short I’ll watch them and never buy them. I might watch 1-2 hours at night in bed before I sleep a few times a week.
I think that particular niche has an amicable solution. The publishers of those games actually make money from those videos in a very direct way. I don’t think Blizzard or RioT Games are going to start throwing out cease and desist letters for Starcraft 2 and League of Legends streaming.
As for everyone else… aside from some interesting Minecraft let’s plays (again Mojang is not going to go after anyone making money from the recordings of Minecraft), there really aren’t any popular Let’s Plays. After the half-dozen popular Minecraft ones you have people that have LP’s of upcoming indie titles, which generates good buzz.
Machinima might be in trouble, but I’m not sure if they advertise since I adblock everything.
edit: Nevermind, MrRyan has a badass post about this already.
From what I’ve gathered popular streamers on average make several times less what popular Youtubers make. Very few streamers have been able to tap into the paid subscription model, so the bulk of their income comes from the ads they run voluntarily. Even then, the payouts on the ads I’ve been told are peanuts compared to Youtube.
Streamers don’t typically have to put in as much effort though. They just pop on their game, play, and hope people watch. If they have people watching they run ads on occasion and maybe react to comments, but otherwise don’t have to do much else. Youtubers have to record their game, process / edit desired footage, add intros / outros, split it into chunks if needed, encode, upload, write descriptions, set tags, create preview images, add annotations, plan / pre-schedule the live date and time, promote, etc.
It is a huge gamble, and it’s definitely not for everyone. Much like many other things in life you’ll never get a chance if you don’t try, and those who aren’t willing to try before they can make money simply don’t belong. It’s a scene driven by passionate people, and the people that are only chasing dollars usually get rejected or give up really fast.
It can take many months or even years to establish an appropriately sized audience where one can finally be “successful”. Most of the top Youtubers out there went through at least 6-12 months of minimal to moderate levels of success before they hit it big. I’ve seen some guys struggle to even pull in 50 subscribers after months of trying. I’m still a small fry at just about 7500 now, and am grateful I was able to get over that hump thanks to my casual days of content creation.
Edit - I forgot to make one other comment about streamers. For whatever reason Twitch, Justin, Own3d, etc. allow their streamers to monetize their channels even when they sit there blaring copyrighted music throughout their entire streams. Youtube doesn’t mess around with that shit, I think it’s a matter of time that a hammer comes down on streaming sites over that stuff. In the mean time that’s one advantage they have, they don’t have to rely entirely on their personalities or play as they’ve got mainstream music to entertain as well.
I’d say the Rooster Teeth guys (Achievement Hunter, Red vs. Blue, etc. ) are doing really well by using MS content on their channels. They wouldn’t be doing lots of AH videos if it wasn’t making them decent money.
— Alan
I read this as do not put up videos (that are negative) about our games and make money at it.
The line is blurry and grey and requires a court ruling to figure it out on a case by case basis. The law lays out a four point test:
[ol]
[li]the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;[/li]> [li]the nature of the copyrighted work;[/li]> [li]the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and[/li]> [li]the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.[/li]> [/ol]
For a “derivative” work to pass this test, it doesn’t need to clearly meet all four points. In fact, it can clearly violate one or more of the points. While there is some precedent to give judges guidelines, mostly, its a lot of value judgements.