YouTube Gaming and its biggest weakness
Note: Most links provided in this article are placeholders for countless others that could easily take their place. We are not talking exceptions here.
After spending the last five hours observing and evaluating YouTube Gaming, YouTube’s brandnew webportal for gamers and probably the most serious challenger Twitch will have to face this decade, I can easily tell you the three things you should know about it.
It is great in many ways and knows to impress even committed Twitch Users if given a chance, both design- and performancewise.
It is to stay for a while, no matter if you like it or not.
As a content creator, I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole.
TL;DR: If YouTube Gaming doesn’t get rid of it’s outdated and dangerous Content ID System, it will fail to dethrone Twitch. It might even backfire and harm Youtube as a whole instead.
If you’ve had internet access at some point during the past 2 years, you will probably know what I’m talking about. YouTube utilizes the infamous Content ID System to flag copyrighted material, videos, music, gameplay footage, you name it. The system is completely randomized… I’m sorry, automated and claims content that includes whatever it sees as appropriate at the time. I could look for sources, but seriously. Pay Angry Joe a visit if you are truly clueless.
Countless (and I mean countless) content creators, especially those dealing with gaming content, received copyright strikes, had their uploaded work removed or their generated revenue redirected to the owner of “copyrighted materials”. In some of the worst cases, entire channels with hundreds of hours of content were terminated.
“Indeed, on Thursday evening we received a notice from YouTube giving us seven (7) days to resolve three (3) claims that were received on that day, but as of Thursday evening both YouTube and the claimant confirmed that the claims were resolved. We have these communications in writing.
(…)
Nonetheless, something must have happened because as of 1pm EST* our channel was abruptly “terminated” with no notice.”
*Sunday, three days later
YouTubers have always hated the Content ID System, but most have learned to deal with it one way or the other. Enter stage YouTube Gaming.
Where Youtube defined typical Gaming Content through often tightly edited or at least creator-approved videos, YouTube Gaming makes it’s appearance as a platform primarily focused on Livestreams.
The entire experience evolves around interaction with the audience and experiencing everything in realtime — which includes the broken Content ID System which will track along to make sure everything is the way it should be, making an already dangerous minefield a true suicide mission for some games, depending on the game creators stance on the issue.
Youtube would be wise to either quickly and magically produce a foolproof version of the faulty Copyright Protector out of thin air— or more reliably just disable it. With a big hammer.
Being aware that some of you are smartly detecting my bias on the matter I will admit that there are cases of legit copyright infringements to be found out there. Just type in your favourite song on Youtube. Then listen to it, because you can. (Not only on the creators channel)
While countless companies have shown open support for Gaming Content Creators, some have repeatedly abused the system to take down negative reviews before sales numbers could be impacted and in even more advanced fashion have repeatedly offered YouTubers exclusive prerelease rights and expensive gifts in exchange for a positive or at least subconsciously biased review.
Coming back to YouTube Gaming we can observe a dangerous and rather unpredictable system in an already very competitive field of business - in combination with the freedom of Game Companies to basically decide on the go if they want to make use of their copyright ownership (for whatever reason) or take the free promotion Content Creators provide.
On the other hand we have an established platform by the name of Twitch which… almost doesn’t care, except for the underused VOD feature.
Considering all of this, many established Twitch-Streamers, as well as newcomers, would risk a lot over a copyrighted song in the background (which might even be included in the game in the first place) or even Gameplay footage of a Company that underwent an unnoticed change in copyright policies.
It might not sound like much right now, but I expect the first victims of the Content ID System to prove my point very, very soon. Hopefully it won’t come to this, but… Nevermind.
Let’s hope, I guess.
