Developing story – State of 25th of June 2019, 7:00 pm CEST
The company Endemol International BV Parent has been claiming the copyright to a large number of YouTube videos which are focused on gaming. As far as we can tell right now, those are Let’s Play or game review videos.
Until now, our own TechAcute YouTube channel was also hit by two claims until now. Both being game review footage videos that consisted of only gameplay material. These claims are matched against irrelevant scenes, which do not contain music that could have been licensed by third parties.
Hundreds (or more) videos wildly copyright-claimed
A quick search on Twitter for the claimant’s name “Endemol International BV Parent” quickly revealed that we are not the only ones out there. From small streamers to major influencers, many YouTubers have been affected by these wild claims that disrupt their monetization.
Oh this is getting ridiculous. Two more for videos with cutscenes being claimed. Some one needs to do something about this. Endemol International BV Parent are claiming all videos with a cutscene that has been matched. @YouTube @TeamYouTube @YTCreators @SmasherNetwork https://t.co/NIkMi7fBLA pic.twitter.com/1Ulqr3pO2I
— MartinRisbyVR (@MartinRisbyVR) June 24, 2019
As of now, YouTube only suggests affected users to repeal the claim through their support system, if the claimant agrees or does not respond within a month time, the claim is released and the monetization continues. And yet, to those who are heavily affected by this, and rely on the income channel to get by, this is a heavy financial hit, especially if this process will take a long time to complete.
YouTube is yet to release a proper response. It seems that they have not yet identified this to be a problem that affected a large group of people. For companies it is possible to machine-match content across YouTube and bulk-raise claims. Some rogue actors do this just because they hope to scare users off and due to the volumes of these activities, even a few cents of monetization here and there can provide them with money that makes the whole activity worthwhile.
Apparently Endemol Shine Group had no right for this action
The affected videos are from various video games and publishers and it could not be possible that anyhow those are legit claims. We are still investigating in the possibility and are trying to get feedback from an Endemol Shine Group press representative. We have now received feedback from Endemol Shine Group and the quote can be found further down in the article.
Hi there, if you believe you've received a claim in error, you can always appeal and our team will review it. Here's how: https://t.co/ivyjVNwLVu. Hope this helps clarify.
— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) June 24, 2019
If you are affected by this or similar claims for content which the third-party does not own, please do repeal and don’t get scared off. Feel free to leverage the text below as a copy-paste explanation for your claim.
“Dear all, I believe this claim was made mistakenly. I produced the content myself and see no reason for this to be claimed by a third party. Kindly investigate in this. Many thanks for your help.”
Unfortunately, YouTube has no option for content creators to bulk-repeal random machine claims but you still have to go through the process in order to raise the flag to YouTube to understand what is going on.
Claim-sprees like these are not new to content creators but this one that just happened, or is still happening, has a rather large scale and it should make YouTube rethink their copyright claim processing.
Endemol Shine Group statement
After reaching out to the Endemol Shine Group press team we have received the following statement from them, “Since becoming aware of an issue with our online content claiming process, we have been working hard to resolve it and can confirm that all erroneous claims which have been identified have been released. We apologize for any inconvenience caused and would like to thank the online gaming community for bringing this issue to our attention.“
Waiting for officials statements from YouTube and Endemol International BV Parent
YouTube: Copyright Fiasco – Endemol International BV Parent?
Photo credit: The feature image “the redboy” has been done by Sebastiaan Stam.
