Iran Joins The Using Video Game Footage To Pump Up Your Own Military's Reputation Arms Race

from the fake-it-til-you-make-it dept

I suppose this was inevitable. As video games become more refined as an artform and as those games evince more realistic graphics, animations, and all the rest, I suppose it had to be that some folks out there would try to pass game footage off as real footage depicting their own power. I just never really thought it would be established nations that otherwise purport to be players on the world stage doing this. Yet, as we have seen done by Egypt, North Korea, and even Russia in the past, so too do we now find that Iran is trying to brag about its own military capability using game footage.

This all started with Iran's state-run media releasing a video it claimed to be of an Iranian sniper taking out members of ISIS.

That guy's a really good shot, right? Well, if the above footage looks somewhat familiar to you, even through the grainy capture and the fact that it's clearly video shot of a television showing the actual video, that's probably because you're played the video game Medal Of Honor.

But something about this video doesn’t seem right. That’s because the footage is actually from the video game Medal of Honor. Several details show this. First of all, when this imaginary commando kills a supposed IS group terrorist, a little symbol pops up in the bottom of the screen. It’s exactly the same symbol that appears in Medal of Honor when a gamer shoots his enemy in the head (“a headshot”). Secondly, while the soldier is shooting, you can see the words "Mfou” and "Wfou” written at the bottom of the screen. These stand for the different visors that players can use in Medal of Honor.

Oops. This isn't to say that Iran doesn't indeed have military assets taking on ISIS/Daesh. They certainly do. But when an easily debunked effort to pass off video game footage as victory marks for the war effort is put out, it will only serve to make the world wonder just how well the real effort is going. Probably horribly, because, you know, war. War never changes (See? I can do it too!).

But we'll set that aside for the moment and instead welcome Iran into the group of fake-it-til-you-make-it folks. There are snacks in the back, but they're just pictures of Mario Bros. mushrooms, so, you know....

Filed Under: iran, medal of honor, propaganda, video games

The Wil Wheaton Effect Is Why Video Game Makers Should Embrace Let's Play Videos

from the game-theory dept

We haven't made a secret of our appreciation for Wil Wheaton here at Techdirt, in particular for his forward-thinking approach to digital content and intellectual property. More specifically, I've mentioned in the past that I am hopelessly addicted to Wheaton's YouTube show, Table Top, on which he features a series of table top board games being played by himself and a rotating panel of guests. As I was poking around trying to figure out when the series would resume for its fourth season, after amassing tons of crowdfunded money for the previous season, I came across an interesting thread discussing what had been dubbed "The Wheaton Effect."

This thing is big. This could do a lot for our hobby. It's easy to think that these are existing gamers being introduced to new games, but I had at least two people who were not really gamers start conversations like "So hey, aren't you into board games? Well I just saw this thing on the internet..." after the first episode. All of this being said, I'm getting Tsuro.

Now, we happen to know a thing or two around here about terms that get dubbed an "effect", especially when the revolve around exposure through internet channels. The Wheaton Effect is essentially a noticeable jump in sales for games that are featured on Table Top. As the original Reddit poster implies, the exposure generated by the game being featured on the show is a boon for sales. I would think this is an intuitive idea, in which an otherwise unaware public becomes aware of the fun to be had through these games and then goes out and buys them.

So, if this is a thing, as it appears to be, why in the world do some video game makers take a different approach with "Let's Play" videos, whether it's attempting to claim the monetization of them, control the content within them, or outright take them down via DMCA notice or by using YouTube's ContentID? It doesn't make sense if these types of videos result in exposure that leads to sales.

And, to be fair, much of the gaming industry has come around to this idea. You can see the evolution not only in the stance of the publishers, who often times go so far as to work with sites to unblock Let's Play videos that were automatically nabbed by ContentID, but also in video game hardware itself. The latest generation of consoles, specifically the Playstation 4 and Xbox One, are both designed specifically with ways for gamers to record gameplay and share those recordings. But Nintendo and some other lagging studios are more restrictive and I can't imagine why. Sales are what's important and exposure brings with it sales. The Wheaton Effect is an example of this, but this concept isn't in any way limited to the realm of table top games. Give up just a little bit of control, it seems, and you spur on sales.

Filed Under: attention, board games, buyers, let's play, promotion, video games, wil wheaton, wil wheaton effect

Game Cracking Group Predicts The End Of Cracking Because Of Better DRM

from the hmm dept

Spend any reasonable amount of time looking through all the posts we've done here on DRM -- digital rights management -- and one theme becomes abundantly clear: the whole thing is an exercise in futility. Far from a blanket solution to video game piracy, DRM instead can be best explained as an arms race between game publishers and the hacking groups that best them at speeds nothing short of remarkable. All, mind you, while mostly annoying legitimate customers of the games the DRM is meant to protect from the pirates that crack them.

But one hacking group out of China is predicting that this trend will cease and that cracking games is about to become a thing of the past. 3DM is a group out of China that is fairly well-known for cracking games that have DRM. The group has recently been suggesting that one form of DRM, called Denuvo, is already much more difficult to break than other iterations of DRM, and even predicts that within two years nobody will be able to crack games any longer.

Just Cause 3 is the current hot potato and despite having released an endless supply of cracks for other titles (and having had success against Denuvo in the past), the cracks (excuse the pun) are beginning to show at 3DM. In a posting on her blog, 3DM forum founder ‘Bird Sister’ (also known as Phoenix) has revealed the frustrations being experienced with Just Cause 3.

“Recently, many people have asked about cracks for ‘Just Cause 3′, so here is a centralized answer to this question. The last stage is too difficult and Jun [cracking guy] nearly gave up, but last Wednesday I encouraged him to continue,” Bird Sister explains. "I still believe that this game can be compromised. But according to current trends in the development of encryption technology, in two years time I’m afraid there will be no free games to play in the world,” she adds.

A grave prediction for those wishing to pirate games to be sure, but how realistic of a prediction is it? Again, it's a claim that is up against a trend that has only moved in one direction. As they say, extraordinary claims must be accompanied by extraordinary evidence and I'm not seeing it here. One game presenting more of a challenge than others thus far doesn't seem like enough to be convincing. We've seen in the past new forms of DRM touted as the end of piracy, and even work for a short while, only to be bested and beaten to the point of their being useless. Should we believe this time it will be different, all because one hacking group claims it to be so?

But, hey, let's say game publishers get their unicorn and Denuvo is the perfect DRM. Let's say it's never beaten, or that it at least changes the game such that piracy is significantly more difficult, cracking takes far longer such that it becomes less attractive, and all the rest. Pretend it happens. Then what?

Well, then the real fun begins, because we're all going to then get a very good look at exactly how important DRM is for the gaming industry and exactly how much piracy hinders the bottom line for game companies. Because if the DRM unicorn exists and the anti-piracy folks are to be believed, well, then all those lost sales will be transformed into paid revenue and the gaming industry had damned well better completely explode in terms of income. Were that not to happen, then DRM would be revealed to be the false god my side of the argument has always claimed it was: fighting a fight not worth fighting. Because the majority of those who would pirate games likely never were potential customers. Because every download isn't a lost sale. And because there are much better methods for a game company to ingratiate itself to gamers, giving them reasons to buy, that DRM doesn't even touch.

Given that the gaming industry is one that has embraced so many new ways of doing business, a DRM unicorn would almost certainly be a step backwards. I actually hope this DRM unicorn exists so we can finally get some impact numbers to work with. I doubt we get the chance, however.

Filed Under: 3dm, china, cracking, denuvo, drm, just cause 3, video games

French Consumer Group Tries To Win Back Resale Rights For Digitally Distributed Games

from the here's-hoping dept

We talk a lot about first sale rights and resale rights at Techdirt, but of particular frustration to me is the strange capitulation to companies that sell digital copies of software. This isn't a strictly American problem, though here in the States there has been a near total abandonment of the consumer's rights when it comes to electronically delivered entertainment, be it eBooks, music, movies or games. The "you're licensing the game you paid for, not buying it" line is, on its face, ridiculous, amounting to a situation where Game "X" bought on a disc can be resold, but Game "X" bought and delivered on the internet cannot. Why a delivery method would alter the right to resale a bought product because a EULA says so is a concept that simply escapes me.

Across the pond, a French consumer group appears to agree, and it is trying to specifically attack Steam and Valve on this front.

The 64-year-old UFC-Que Choisir (the "federal union of consumers") argues that Valve must provide the capability for Steam users to resell their legally purchased digital games whenever they want. While noting that many online stores have similar resale restrictions, the group argues that the difference between being able to resell a physical game disc and not being able to resell a digitally purchased game is "incomprehensible... No court decision prohibits the resale on the second-hand market games bought online, and the European Court has even explicitly stated that it’s possible to resell software which, let’s remember, is an integral part of a video game."

As that ArsTechnica piece updates further down the post, there's some question as to exactly how true that statement is. There have been European court rulings that specifically drew a distinction between software in general and software that contained a creative component. But that seems like an awfully fine line to draw as the basis for removing a consumer's right to resell what they've bought.

An aside: Imagine applying this situation to other forms of intellectual property law, for instance. Trademark chiefly revolves around real or potential customer confusion. To that end, governments employing trademark law claim to be concerned about the public's ability to understand what they're buying. Yet, when it comes to resale rights, this interest in customer confusion evaporates. Anyone wishing to claim that the average purchaser of a Steam game wouldn't be surprised to find its the seller's opinion that they haven't actually bought the game in the traditional sense at all may do so, but I reserve the right to laugh them out of the conversation.

What makes UFC-Que Choisir's claim particularly interesting is that it coupled its demand for resale rights on digital games with an attack for Valve's claim of ownership over user-created content.

In addition to the resale complaint, UFC-Que Choisir takes Valve to task for claiming the right to reuse any user-created content on Steam "at will." This clause "denies... respect for the users'/creators' rights of intellectual property," the group says.

This would seem to ask Valve and game-sellers to pick a lane: either creative content is worthy of protection or it isn't. Using a creative component of content to deny consumers their resale rights while then happily making use of those same consumers' creative works at the same time isn't consistent.

Now, to be clear, most of the people reviewing this attempt believe it will fail. We can hope, however, that some court somewhere might take the side of the consumer and their rights regarding digital purchases.

Filed Under: digital distribution, first sale, france, resale rights, steam, video games
Companies: valve

Video Game Industry Embraces Internet And New Business Models: Others Should Pay Attention

from the game-theory dept

We talk a great deal around these parts about new business models at both the macro and micro level. Individual experiments and successes, as well as failures, are both interesting and instructive, but a good macro-level look at how entire industries can function in a digital marketplace should be equally useful. With that in mind, Chris Dixon has an absolute must-read post on Medium on the lessons other industries can learn from the PC gaming industry's success in recent times.

It's worth noting before we start here that the past five years or so have been chock-full of hand-wringing over every potential danger to the PC gaming industry you could imagine, from casual mobile games to piracy. And, to some extent, I can understand that fear. After all, PC gaming has perhaps lower barriers to entry than other entertainment mediums, making competition more heavy, while the average consumer of PC games is likely going to be more familiar with the ways of piracy and the technical workarounds to DRM than the average music or movie consumer. Too bad for all that fear that, as Dixon's article notes, the PC gaming industry has enjoyed healthy growth over these past several years (something like 50% revenue growth since 2012). Much of that has to do with the innovative ways gaming companies have found to do business.

Even if you have no interest in video games, if you are interested in media, you should be interested in PC gaming. Over the past decade, PC gaming has, for a variety of reasons, become a hotbed of experimentation. These experiments have resulted in a new practices and business models — some of them surprising and counterintuitive — that provide valuable lessons for the rest of the media industry.

Those experiments will sound quite familiar to the Techdirt reader. They include free-to-play models, with game extras being sold to gamers. They also include the development of strong and convenient selling platforms, like Steam and GOG.com. The so-called "freemium" model is particularly well done in PC games, in part because many of those games respect gamers enough not to use the model to break the integrity of the game itself.

The PC gaming world has taken the freemium model to the extreme. In contrast to smartphone games like Candy Crush that are “free-to-play,” PC games like Dota 2 are “free-to-win.” You can’t spend money to get better at the game — that would be seen as corrupting the spirit of fair competition. (PC gamers, like South Park, generally view the smartphone gaming business model as cynical and manipulative). The things you can buy are mostly cosmetic, like new outfits for your characters or new background soundtracks. League of Legends (the most popular PC game not on Steam) is estimated to have made over $1B last year selling these kinds of cosmetic items.

Medium also goes on to point out PC gaming's latest foray into money-making in the form of live events. In what will sound familiar to anyone who has read our posts about the music industry, live gaming events are fantastic revenue generators, especially as they've become massively popular in the past few years.

Add to all of this the relatively permissive attitude in PC gaming circles that companies have towards mods of their games and you have a recipe for violent adoption and the willingness to buy by the gaming public. Mods make games more attractive to wider audiences, increasing purchases. Some mods indeed become their own games, increasing purchases. Most game companies encourage this modding culture, generating good-will within the consumer-base. No other industry does this as well.

Contrast this to the music industry, which relies on litigation to aggressively stifle remixing and experimentation. Large music labels have effectively become law firms devoted to protecting their back catalog. Sometimes this means suing their peers, and sometimes this means suing communities of users. The end result is a strong chilling effect on new experiments. Almost all new music-related tech products are minor variations of preceding products. It’s too risky and expensive to try something genuinely new.

And finally, there is the embrace of crowd-funding. Crowd-funding has been adopted in virtually all entertainment mediums, but I struggle to see any of them doing crowd-funding as well as the PC gaming industry. From experiments done by household PC gaming names like Tim Schafer, to diverse tiered-rewards for funding, to the willingness of some to forego offers from traditional game publishers to go the crowd-funding route, PC gaming is full of these success stories.

The point of all this is that new and innovative business models can work for other industries as well. There's nothing unique about the PC gaming industry that won't translate over to some degree for music, movies, television, etc. They just have to try.

Filed Under: business models, copyright, internet, video games

That Didn't Take Long: MLB Plans Action Against Fallout 4 David Ortiz Mod

from the swing-and-a-miss dept

Fallout 4 was recently released to a world full of ready gamers eager to get their paws on the latest installment in the franchise. And, because the game was released on the PC, modders immediately got to work on the title, coming up with fun little customizations for it. Those mods ranged from altering the companions players can recruit within the game to more cosmetic changes. One of those cosmetic changes included a custom outfit which allowed for players to don a David Ortiz Boston Red Sox jersey while cracking skulls with a baseball bat for a weapon. And, of course, Major League Baseball got its knickers in a twist over it.

If you're not aware, this latest game takes place in post-apocolyptic Boston. The player can roam the streets of the once-great city, picking up any number of items along the way to aid in their quest. The game even includes a bombed out depiction of Fenway Park, where the Red Sox play. One modder took the next logical step.

Richie Branson created a David Ortiz mod, and gave players the chance to bash baddies in a full Red Sox uniform. (Kindly overlook the fact that Big Papi’s actually a lefty.) It was a neat, free customization, but MLB was not as receptive. Steve Annear of the Boston Globe received a terse comment about the mod from a league spokesman:

“The use of these marks is an infringement of our rights. We plan to enforce those rights,” an MLB spokesman said in an e-mail Thursday.

Branson had reportedly said that if MLB actually requested it, he would voluntarily take the mod down. It seems likely that request came, because the mod is no longer available for download. And for what? The modding community regularly makes use of existing material in doing their work. Characters from one series are brought into another. Weapons from one set of fiction are foisted in a game where they did not originally appear. And, yes, David Ortiz's Red Sox jersey made its way into Fallout 4. The mod wasn't being sold. The mod wasn't made by the folks behind Fallout 4. This was an independent modder having a little bit of fun.

And MLB shut it down. Is there really commerce to consider here in protecting the team's trademarks? Please. No, this is permission culture run amok. Thanks to this little power play, gamers are denied the opportunity to bash in mutant skulls while wearing an Ortiz jersey. Just like the framers of trademark law intended, I guess.

Filed Under: david ortiz, fallout 4, mods, privacy rights, trademark, video games
Companies: mlb

Rockstar Whips Out The Ban-Hammer On GTAV Players Over Mod

from the bans-on-fans dept

There's something a bit strange going on over at Rockstar Games. The makers of the Grand Theft Auto series have reportedly banned several players in the past week, all of them associated with a particular GTA5 game mod called "FiveM." Rockstar's reasoning for the ban will sound familiar to many observers of gaming in the online space.

Last week, Rockstar banned a number of Grand Theft Auto V players associated with the "FiveM" mod, which offers players an online playspace separate from the game's official "Grand Theft Auto: Online" mode. Yesterday, a Rockstar representative told Ars that the bans were made because the mod is "an unauthorized alternate multiplayer service that contains code designed to facilitate piracy."

This is the increasingly common refrain from companies handing out bans for online games for players that develop things like cracks, which are designed to allow those pirating the game to participate in the online portion of the game. Were you to not dig into the story any further, you'd likely assume that's exactly what was going on, given that Rockstar raised the piracy boogeyman in its statement.

Except FiveM doesn't appear to be anything remotely resembling a crack at all. Instead, FiveM appears to be a mod with its own launcher that allows GTA5 players to play online on dedicated servers, with a relaxed stance on player mods being used in the online experience. The whole point of FiveM is that Rockstar doesn't allow mods in its official online experience, so the modders created their own online play-space where mods would be allowed.

"FiveM is not a crack for GTA V nor does it actively try to facilitate piracy," said Qais Patankar, who goes by qaisjp online. While Patankar didn't contribute code to the FiveM mod directly, he says he was caught up in Rockstar's bans for promoting the mod through online channels like Reddit. Patankar argues that those behind FiveM shouldn't be penalized just because the mod fails to check if the underlying game is a legitimate copy. "Whilst the mod doesn't prevent people who have illegally obtained the game to play FiveM, it does not behave like a crack: [it doesn't] bypass the verification system so that you can play the game without paying," he said.

While Rockstar's stated policy does ban "online" mods (as opposed to mods to the single-player game), Patankar argues that FiveM shouldn't be targeted by a policy designed to prevent cheating in a centralized playspace. "There's different ways you can 'spin' this," he said. "FiveM is a mod that works online, but it doesn't modify anything in the [core] online experience. It does mod online code, and it does utilize online things, but it does not affect [GTA:O]."

And that changes how we see Rockstar's statement. Instead of banning players for facilitating piracy in the common way we typically see it, this sure does look like Rockstar banning modders for creating an online GTA experience that might in some way compete with its own. That this separate online space was developed specifically for players that want to play the game online differently than Rockstar allows seems to suggest that even the worry over competition is theoretical at best, since these are players using mods that Rockstar doesn't want used.

But the strangest part of the story is that one of the developers of the mod reportedly is suggesting that Rockstar sent private investigators to his home, apparently just to scare him.

So I just got a pair of PIs at my door claiming to be sent by Take Two, handing me a phone with a person somewhere in the UK or US or whatever to 'discuss how to cease my activities with regard to Grand Theft Auto', that 'they know what happened before with Activision and want to not get the lawyers involved at this time', however they 'have tested their legal standing already and are quite certain of their point' and 'aren't willing to accept any solution other than ceasing my activiites'. Oh, they also 'couldn't disclose any conversations they're having with other modification developers', didn't want to talk about general modification policy as 'it was just about my case' and admitted they 'looked through my source code'.

Is a little mod that creates a unique GTA: Online experience really so terrifying that Rockstar felt the need to send the Stasi knocking on the modder's door? How about just offer another online experience that allows mods? Why is that the more difficult route to go, compared with hiring PIs and raising the piracy boogeyman?

Filed Under: gtav, mods, video games
Companies: rockstar

Child Development Expert: Playable Female Characters In Call Of Duty Will Harm Girls Just As It Has A Generation Of Boys

from the the-REAL-scare-quotes dept

The Call of Duty series is finally giving players the option to play through the campaign mode as a female soldier. The nod towards the existence of female game fans is every bit as obligatory as the game's campaign mode, but now the game's developers are being accused of pushing girls towards a future as emotionless, jaded killbots. You know, the way it has millions of young men over the past decade.

Someone calling herself a "child development expert" had this to say about Black Ops 3 (as quoted by the Daily Mail, a publication that calls itself a "journalistic endeavour"). [h/t Lizzy Finnegan]

The controversial video game series Call of Duty has been accused of encouraging young women to be more violent by introducing its first female soldiers.

Players of Call of Duty Black Ops 3 kill opponents with an array of weapons or even bare hands. Sue Palmer, a child development expert, said of the 18-rated game: "It will have the same impact on girls as it will have in any child. The evidence is that it will make them more cold and reckless or more withdrawn and fearful."

Not pictured: outcomes not linked to antisocial behavior, evidence backing up Palmer's claims, any other "accusations" other than Palmer's.

Palmer is the kind of "expert" the Daily Mail calls on when it wants to portray video games as the downfall of civilization.

Here's an insta-classic by the Daily Mail titled "Chilling truth about the video games your children got for Christmas," which contains this hilariously terrible picture caption.

If you can't see the embed, the caption says:

Violent: Pay Day 2 includes point-blank shooting not unlike the Kenyan Mall massacre in September

The 2013 article contains a quote from Sue Palmer, who at this point was a mere "educationalist." If you're a fan of anecdotal evidence, Palmer has you covered.

Educationalist Sue Palmer, author of Toxic Childhood, says: ‘One reception teacher told me how, on the day a new edition of Grand Theft Auto was released, one father arrived to pick up his five-year-old son brandishing a copy, and they went joyfully off to bond over the carnage.’

Palmer doesn't seem to care much for the trappings of the modern age and never fails to have the perfect, biased anecdote on hand for any situation. Kids using iPads "too soon?" Palmer has seen it with her own two eyes.

Educationalist and literacy expert Sue Palmer has been taken aback by how quickly iPad use for even the youngest children has become normalised since these gadgets were introduced in 2010. Far from helping children develop, Sue believes overuse of tablets can slow their progress.

“I recently visited a well-heeled nursery where a new mother introduced her three-year-old son by saying what a genius he was on his iPad,” she says. “However those skills came at a cost. Although the child could walk, he preferred to crawl. He had the language skills of an 18-month-old. This boy probably had some underlying developmental problem – but I’m sure long hours on the iPad made it much worse.”

Nothing like having your child pre-judged (along with your parenting skills) by a prominent member of a "well-healed nursery." But that's Palmer for you.

Palmer is also buddies with another tech hater, the Baroness Susan Greenfield, who memorably asserted that Twitter turned adults into infants because it's all about "look what I'm doing" -- a claim she backed up by using the outdated cliche of the social network being filled with nothing but pictures of people's breakfasts. (That's Instagram.)

So, this is the sort of person who sees the introduction of female characters into a very male-dominated series and says to herself -- and then out loud later to a "journalist" -- this game is bad for young, female children. This game, which is rated 18+ should probably not be played by young girls, which is pretty much exactly what the rating on the box says, only without all the additional evidence-less baggage thrown in.

No one is recommending children play this game. Yes, children will play this game. Guess what? Pretty much every single one of them will turn out perfectly fine, even the girls who haven't normally been "targeted" by the purveyors of violent games.

The problem is that -- beyond spouting ignorance in a variety of sensationalist publications -- Palmer's writings on the subject have been cited by UK government publications, which means she's made a few inroads towards making the national conversation about video games and technology stupider. This sort of alarmism makes for spectacular pull quotes and feeds into feelings many legislators have about themselves.

Politicians believe they turned out fine, and they didn't grow up with iPads and smartphones. And today's youths often seem weird and scary… so technology might be the problem. Let's keep a legislative, overly-wary eye on it.

Filed Under: call of duty, females, sue palmer, video games, violence

No, Including Stream-Safe Music Options In Games Isn't The Solution To Game-Stream Takedowns

from the pretzel-logic dept

Streaming and video games are becoming quite a thing, as you likely know. Once met with rebukes such as "Why would anyone want to watch other people play video games?", game-streaming has gotten very large, very fast, such that there are now several outlets one can go to to see live streams and on-demand streams of games. But because, to bastardize a Christopher Hitchens book title, permission culture poisons everything, game streaming is finding itself having to leap over a copyright hurdle in the form of music within games. One solution, employed by the popular Twitch, was to simply silence any video in which a game's music could be heard. This method is patently ridiculous, of course, as a majority of games do indeed have music and silent streams are largely worthless in terms of entertainment value. But at least Twitch's move had the unintended consequence of highlighting just how burdensome our permission culture has become, in knee-capping game-streams, which are ultimately useful to game-makers, in favor of copyright protection. It's easy to see how everyone loses and why everyone loses when Twitch streams are silenced, in other words.

A much worse "solution" to this problem is touted by Kotaku, using the game Concrete Jungle as its example, a game which includes a settings option for "stream-safe music."

I wrote (and spoke) about Concrete Jungle a bit a few weeks ago, but feel like pointing this out again: for all the game’s good points, one of its best inclusions is a seemingly harmless little checkbox at the bottom of the game’s settings menu. There it is. “Stream-Safe Music”. For starters, it’s a helpful little explainer as to why so many videos get taken down! Some people may not realise that, when licensing music, sometimes different rights apply to YouTube as do the game itself. So while it’s cool for a game to include music, it might not be cool for a video of the game to be on YouTube.

More importantly, though, it’s a one-click workaround to the problem. Tick that box and only the music that’s 100% cool to be played on YouTube will be played while you record/stream.

But that's the thing: it isn't a workaround to the problem at all, assuming the problem we're talking about is a complicated series of licensing schemes that ultimately disappear content, generate little to no revenue (as evidenced by Twitch simply turning the sound off), and stem from a permission culture that is entirely out of control. What creating stream-safe music options does is ignore the problem entirely. Far from creating any kind of resolution, actively pimping an option that requires game-makers and streamers to twist themselves into a pretzel to avoid DMCA takedowns is cheering for unproductive effort. Nobody benefits from this, and everyone loses. Game-makers lose because it makes streaming their games require more effort, which means some streamers simply will give up therefore decreasing the exposure the game could receive. Music makers lose because most of their music will never be heard on the stream, either because videos will be silenced, DMCA'd, or because everyone will be using the stream-safe option when they stream. And gamers lose because, as much as in film, music plays a huge role in the atmosphere of many video games.

What sounds like a reasonable attempt to get around the stupidity of copyright effecting game streams is instead an unreasonable request that everyone ignore the actual problem and allow it to fester. That isn't how you fix things. It's how you allow a problem to become worse.

Filed Under: copyright, music, stream safe, streaming, video games