I am no expert in copyright, but I have a few thoughts concerning the NoobFromUA drama.
Here are some of the common arguments I see when people are defending what NUA does.
He clipped the video, he’s the content creator!
This is the most convincing argument in NUA’s favor. When a claim is made that NUA just ‘copy-pastes’ videos from other people, the first justification is, “Well it’s not copy-pasting. He edited out a bunch of boring stuff. He did do work.” This is true, yes. But the question you ask next is, “Does that make it fair use?” That term is often thrown around when copyright discussions come up. In this case, the question is, “Is what NUA does considered ‘transformative’?” A good example that I like is the YouTuber Every Frame a Painting. EFP does what he calls ‘video essays.’
If you watch this video you see that literally the entire video is just clips from Jackie Chan movies. However, you are not watching this video so you can see random bits of Jackie Chan movies, you’re watching it because you want to hear the creator’s analysis. The movies are just there to help illustrate his point, they are not the core of the work. That classifies the work as transformative enough that it’s fair use.
Then there’s a gray area. If Valve wanted to protect copyright on TI broadcasts, would they care about this video?
On the one hand, it’s a straight rip from the TI3 broadcast. But the main reason you’re watching the video is for the funny subtitles.
Then there are other YouTubers like MagiKarpDota.
To most people this is exactly the same thing as NUA, but chances are that MagiKarp has a little bit more ammunition if it came down to copyright strikes because the subtitles transform the stream somewhat. However, he’d probably be in as much soup as NUA if streamers came after him because at the end of the day, you’re still watching the video for the streamer’s highlights.
I didn’t get to see Zai’s video before it went down, but here’s another clip from NUA’s channel.
This video is absolutely protected by all copyright (except that he’s using music from Warcraft, but that’s besides the point). NUA downloaded a Singsing replay, clipped it however he wanted to, and then uploaded it. Now here’s the same game on the ‘singsing vods’ channel
Had NUA uploaded this video and monetized it, it would definitely be infringement. This is all Sing’s footage and I believe he struck a deal with someone to rip his VoDs on his behalf because an issue similar to the one we’re seeing now was happening a year or two ago. A lot of people like to bring up Sing as some sort of bastion of reason when it comes to VoDs, but he’s got his own system after setting NUA straight before as well.
Lastly, here’s another clip
This is an interesting one because on the one hand all the video footage is from a replay, not from Dendi’s stream. On the other hand, all the audio is from Dendi’s stream. If I had to guess, NUA has probably gotten in trouble over ripping Dendi’s stream before, so this is an easier way to fly under the radar. Is it legal? Who knows.
He uploaded it first!
Oh right, I forgot the extensive copyright case concerning ‘dibs.’ The main reason NUA is notable is because he’s often ‘first.’ People don’t come to NUA because of the hilarious editing or deep commentary, they come because he’s quick and because it has minimal edits.
But if I streamed Be the Better Support on twitch before I uploaded it to YouTube and NUA ripped it, uploaded it, and monetized it, what kind of logic would it be that he gets to keep it because he was first? “Well that’s an original work with a lot more effort in it, a stream is just a stream. That’s not as big of a deal.” No, a stream belongs to the streamer. Not Twitch, not YouTube, not the first person to upload it. It doesn’t matter how much energy is put into a work, it’s still the creator’s content.
He’s from Ukraine and doesn’t understand English!
I’m not quite sure what understanding English has to do with copyright infringement. Seeing as how this is like the fifth time he’s gotten called out, I’m sure NUA probably understands ‘stop stealing my footage’ in many languages.
Also, both Ukraine and the US are both participants of the Berne Convention which determines what constitutes fair use for everyone. But I’m no lawyer, just a dude who read Wikipedia for a bit, so I may be wrong.
It’s free publicity, the streamers should be thanking him!
That’s for the content creator to decide and it seems that nearly all of them have decided that they would prefer to pass on the ‘publicity.’ The discussion is paradoxical. People want to view and support content from creators that they like… but actively disagree with the content creators on how they should view and support them?
The streamer already got their money from Twitch!
This isn’t a matter of people being greedy, it’s a matter of controlling how your content is used. A lot of people seem to default to calling the players out for acting “entitled” in this discussion. I don’t understand that. I mean, yes, the players are absolutely entitled to decide how their content is used. I agree.
But what seems more accurate is that the people who are using ‘entitled’ derogatively is that they, the viewer, have the right to see a player’s highlights no matter what the cost or who gives them to you. A player streamed it once and you’re entitled to see it again for free, on demand, with editing, at your soonest possible convenience. And that by trying to reclaim control over their own intellectual property, the players are trying to hurt the community. That’s not fair to the players at all.
No one is saying, “Hey, NUA, I own that video you made. Give me all the money.” They’re saying, “Hey, NUA, you made a video using all of my content. I deserve a share of the monetization made from it.”
The content creator himself is breaking copyright with the music on the stream, what a hypocrite!
Which is likely why Zai and other streamers aren’t uploading the VoDs themselves. It’s a two button process to get a video off Twitch to YouTube once you set it up, but it’s a whole lot more hassle to clip videos to evade the automatic detection of copyrighted music. NUA does go through that hassle, yes, but at the end of the day it’s still the streamers’ footage, whether you like it or not.
Regardless, even if they are being hypocritical, that doesn’t make them wrong. That just makes them a hypocrite. If your support for a streamer starts and ends with how quickly they upload VoDs/highlights, then feel free to pursue a system that detects music copyright infringement on the fly out of spite for their hypocrisy. I’m sure Amazon and Google would love you for it.
They weren’t going to upload it anyway!
That’s not your problem. If Zai wanted to immediately delete his VoDs, or let them expire from the two week delay, or create a highlight so they stay on twitch, or burn a thousand DVDs of them and then smash them all, that’s all his prerogative. If Zyori and BTS wanted to put that VoD of the all-star game in the vault never to be seen by anyone ever again, that’s up to them.
NUA has no right to make that decision on any content creator’s behalf without their explicit permission. Making the highlight without permission itself is illegal, monetizing it is even worse, and then monetizing it without compensating the original creator is just…
Come on, we’ve all watched and enjoyed a NUA video before!
Which is why content creators are resorting to public callouts. They have all the rights necessary to instantly shut NUA down if they felt like it, but the backlash from the community would be immense. All content creators want from NUA is to be kept in the loop for when their footage is being used and be able to make a decision how it can be used.
If you want to continue enjoying content from your favorite pro players/streamers, don’t just blindly side with whoever’s making life easy for you. Convince NUA to ask for permission more frequently. Convince your favorite streamers to be more proactive with VoD preservation. Convince everyone to hit me up cuz man I’ll do it on the cheap yo srsly someone give me a job choppin vods pls.
For a final analogy
A few months ago I was messaged by someone informing me that a redditor pretty much just copy pasted a bunch of my tips and ended up (almost) winning a ticket to TI5 off of them. Wat. I didn’t even get to go to TI5 and this dude steals my work and ends up gaining for it without me being aware. The argument that people have in NUA’s favor would basically be like saying, “Well you weren’t going to enter that contest anyway! You’re not even making any money off your tips! He only took some of the tips, so it’s not really infringement! You should be thanking this guy for giving more publicity to your site!”
Yeah, no. As the content creator, it’s my decision how my content gets used no matter what. It doesn’t always work in the community’s favor, but it’s there to protect the people who actually produce the content that you enjoy.
Update: As I write this, NUA is actually finally asking for permission on Twitter. Unsurprisingly, this is the first response. That’s why NUA never asked to begin with. Because he knew the answer.
Update 2: JK he deleted all those permission tweets.
Update 3: Some YouTubers like Nigma and Slacks have come out in defense of NUA, which I find odd seeing as how YouTubers are some of the most frequent victims of content theft under the guise of ‘highlighting.’
Here’s an example from one of videogamedunkey’s videos.
This video has 25k views and is a straight up rip from:
The existence of the highlight is obvious, but according to many people, it’s entirely warranted. I mean, Dunkey should have made this highlight himself of the most memorable moment of his video if he didn’t want people to steal it, right?
I can’t think of any specific examples off the top of my head, but there have been many times where I’ve seen an extracted clip from a longer YouTube video end up getting more views than the original source. If someone made a highlight reel of all the SnK moments from Nigma’s Shittier Digests and ended up getting 1 million views while having it monetized, I’d consider that to be theft. Maybe Nigma wouldn’t care, but I would if someone did that to me.
Update 4 (Nov. 25, 2015): Guess he does care.
Update 5 (Dec. 27, 2015): Guess Slacks cares too.
