Twitch Implements Controversial New Policy Changes

I completely understand and agree that it all depends on the channel itself. I don't necessarily have an issue there. It's mainly event streams that twists the knife. So many people and so much bullshit. Wouldn't mind being able to ask a question without it being lost or never being able to see a reply. I shouldn't have to connect with IRC just so I can actually scroll up to see if it got noticed.

Sure. That's why I like when Giant Bomb allows their chatroom for streams. On Twitch, it really depends on the event. When you've got thousands and thousands of people, it can get crazy emote or text-wise. Emotes wouldn't change how crazy such event chats can get.

I do know there's a new feature where you can write someone's name, hit Tab, select their name from Chat, and it will show up in a black box for only that person to see. So, while everyone still sees your comment, it will stick out more prominently for the person you're talking to. The same applies to directly addressing the streamer. Put in their name, select it, and then they'll see it more prominently versus random comments.

@kingdanglerbk: the issue is that it also flags in game music. We already have vods of the International 4 used because it has Dota 2's music.

@truthtellah: Ah. I wondered what that black box with my name was last night. Thanks for informing me on that.

Yep. This is how Twitch dies. Nothing can ever be good on the Internet forever.

http://m.memegenerator.net/instance/53367349

The archiving stuff has never worked right for me, anyway. I clicked "Save Forever" on every video, even though I probably shouldn't've had to, since I checked the "don't delete stuff" option. I just cancelled my Turbo subscription, so at least the changes will have some impact.

If something exists and is cool, chances are corporations will find a way to ruin it.

It might be preemptive since they also realized they (Twitch) are becoming a lot more prominent to the mainstream and their audience is rapidly outgrowing its niche so companies that are very protective of their copyright are starting to take notice.

"Hey you know what we should do next? Fuck free ascertainment of various artist through Twitch. Sounds good? Ok, good!"

That's basically what they're doing. I hate when rules and templates from past technology is implemented on new technology, where it doesn't fit at all.

Copyright is stagnant and weird. Unless they expect someone to license music at outrageous prices for their little gaming stream, which would be crazy. The purpose of copyright used to be ensuring a revenue stream, so that other people can't exploit your work until you at least recuperate the resources you put in, and possibly profited.

Nowadays it seems that copyright is just a way to aggressively protect something you hold some kind of ownership of, even if you didn't create it - like some stories of music being pulled from artists own youtube channels by their music label.

I suppose these Twitchers are earning some money from ads, but its probably peanuts. And if it's NOT peanuts, then hey - maybe license some music.

I guess it's time to make a non-shitty knockoff?

I can confirm they've muted everything in my recent archive that had licensed tracks. Namely, Burnout Paradise. Whole buncha bullshit, if you ask me.

The problem comes in with how this is working and it being worked by robots and not humans. Did these companies really fire that many people that they need robots to do their work? Is it really that expansive to hire people to analysis videos to really see if they were really using music that they shouldn't use?

Copyright has become a form of desperateness from these companies to make sure they are making money and to keep a new form of entertainment down.

And so begins the mass exodus to ustream.

@virtualpolecat: He didn't say hes switching sites, he said hes considering it. His reason also seems entirely based around the two hour highlight limitation which doesn't seem to be the same thing everyone else is freaking out about.

So, I wonder. Can game companies/musicians who's stuff gets flagged when they don't WANT it to be flagged (and have the rights, ref the Danny B stuff earlier) Sue for damage to reputation (either twitch or this third party company they are using to scan VODs) since it makes them look bad when they WANT to let people stream including their music?

Even Twitch's own streams have been muted, what a joke

Not saying I am for or against this, but God do most Twitch streamers listen to some horrible music. I'm all for that stoping. Putting an end to that inst worth losing games with in game music blocked though.

The entirety of copyright laws needs to be overhauled.

Why do I get the feeling this is all part of an elaborate scheme to get Luke to fall to the dark side?

I'm kind of surprised that they haven't done anything about the use of copyrighted music on Twitch before. People who make a living as streamers can just blatantly run entire playlists of music that production companies would have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to license.

Don't get me wrong, I will miss the music in the streams I follow if they ever get rid of it. But it have always been a "wait, what, you can legally do that?" -detail on Twitch, for me. And the answer is, you can't, I guess.

The archiving stuff wont affect me in any way but I hope the Speedsters will find a way around it. Couldn't they just pull the VODs and put it up somewhere else?

I can't help but wonder how high of a volume must it be to classified as muted? Like the game is playing sound effects, I'm commentating and maybe my sister is playing Lion King Soundtrack for her daughter to dance to. I feel that might be enough to warrant a "copyright infringement."

And I was just coming to terms with Twitch's miserably poor performance in my region as well as the myriad of little annoyances. Some of the streamers there are just too good to ignore what has been a very flawed service already. This'll likely put the nail in the coffin though.

Oh well, companies grow up fast. Time to find the next thing that's not afraid to let run things a little wild for a while.

I can't imagine censoring in-game audio beyond music will stick. It's like shooting yourself in the foot. Is this a result of the Google thing or has Twitch had significant legal issues in the past from the music industry?

Sooo... where does this put Ustream against Twitch? Since that's the other streaming site that plugs in easily to consoles, does that now give them a competitive advantage by allowing safer archives and less copyright hassle? Or are these already Ustream caveats?

EDIT: I also get the feeling that Twitch will be more vulnerable to user migration than Youtube is. I mean, I've never actively navigated to Twitch to browse channels, I generally get there through streams set up elsewhere (because Twitch will use any excuse to warp you to their site and out of wherever it's embedded). I get the feeling that if GB's Twitch streams suddenly started being hosted elsewhere I wouldn't even notice.

Complaining about Google/YouTube/Twitch haivng to abide by these new methods to enforce and detect Copyright Infringement are people who don't seem to understand how the system works in the first place.

Sure Hitbox is an alternative but how long until they abide by the same rules or shutdown due to being able to not caring their own weight for much longer (as Twitch previous mentioned). It's an act of keeping the business stable and like it or not it comes with a price.

I believe that this system will come with improvements and won't be nearly as sensitive for members who are allowed to use the bells and whistles of broadcasting music. For now, it's a work in progress for all parties.

Twitch is now officially a part of google.

Well there is hitbox.tv in terms of video game only streaming sites. I wonder how many streamers might migrate over there

EDIT: The part of the statement that makes it the most insulting is where they state that they want to "help consumers" by implementing this feature. Oh yes help us by taking away the music in our streams. I wonder what Trent Reznor would think about this

I have no sympathy for streamers who play music outside of games (e.g., Pandora, Spotify, etc.) but in-game music and the archive issue seems pretty ridiculous.

I think this is my favorite part, because if you can actually ID what is being infringed you can easily get the length of the content in question.

Instead their music will never be heard outside of people who already know them because everyone will be too terrified to actually show it to other people.

Whilst I've never streamed anything before, these new policies seem bizarre to me and will only go to hurt Twitch's image at the exact same time they're about to be bought by Google, really odd business practice. It certainly sounds like Google have forced these policies on Twitch because they've been poorly implemented.

It sucks for those who dedicate there time and effort to stream quality content. Hopefully folks find a new home.

I understand there need to do stuff like this legally, but I dont understand the timing. Why not wait until EMI or sony or whoever comes at you saying knock that shit off.

Better archive those unarchived Giantbomb twitch streams before they get dumped from the backlog.

This story makes me glad I never got into Twitch and also serves as a great example that our copyright laws are a joke. Slow to adapt, most copyright law is still based on 19th and 20th century methodologies. Even DMCA, the "newest" addition to the 17 USC, is positively archaic when its origination is compared to today's modern technologies. The government continually demands new jobs and new tech innovations while supporting this idiotic copyright law status quo that continually hinders tech companies' abilities to innovate. It's mind boggling.

• Not like this.
• Not like this.

1. I signed up to hitbox like a year ago. I must've been onto something...

READ THIS READ THIS READ THIS

http://www.giantbomb.com/forums/off-topic-31/help-me-find-gb-videos-on-twitch-1491585/

Is there an alternative to Twitch that let's Streamers monetize their streams?! I hope you know of one?!

Is it Hitbox? If we want people to switch sites we would have to act fast to have any form of impact.
Surely there has to be an alternative... wtf.

My new goal is to sing into the microphone and see if I can trigger a mute by doing my best to imitate the singer.

If EMI or sony or whoever has grounds for a lawsuit, they don't need to ask anyone who is infringing on their rights to stop, they can simply file the suit. There is also no way of knowing whether these changes in Google and Twitch are a result of some back room talks between music industry attorneys and Google attorneys - part of the deal could be that this system is implemented, and it's automatic, or they're going to sue.

For sweeping changes like this to happen seemingly without notice means that Google was either compelled to do so under threat of a suit, or they were reasonably sure that they were going to be sued and decided to get proactive instead of waiting for the suit to be filed.

That brings up an entirely different issue which is Google's responsibilities to their shareholders. If Google didn't do anything about this and ended up getting sued and lost, resulting in possibly billions of hundreds of billions of dollars in fines being paid out, their shareholders would be pretty displeased and some heads would have to roll.

It does suck but I think many people saw this coming a long time ago, I'm more surprised that it didn't happen earlier.

They are DEFINITELY going to have to backpedal on this or I can't possibly see anyone continuing to use Twitch as their primary streaming service. These terms are just too damn restrictive. The fact that people are already scoping out replacements should tell them something.

There has to be some way to hold these copyright enthusiasts responsible for their actions. They are ruining all sorts of things on the internet for the sake of artists potentially losing money, even hurting the artists they claim to protect in the process!
This can't be a one way conversation!

So people should stop playing games on Twitch? Because its not just copyrighted music being flagged, its also game sound tracks. Stuff like Crypt of the Necromancer OST music is getting flagged, and not even by the creator of it.

Have copyright protection groups ever done anything beneficial to society? I don't remember anything that they did having a positive impact. They have been only trouble for legitimate users, ruining some people's lives even to set examples that didn't do shit, and making everyone paranoid and paying lawyers. Even the copyright groups themselves have been found to be infringing copyright laws time and again.

Do we even need those people, or are they only there to pay themselves?
I think the UK is right. Copyright has gone too far.

The current Vice City World Record is silent because of this:

I forgot the embed doesn't work on GB. It's the first highlight there, or this link: http://www.twitch.tv/ractrot/c/4836446

If you do decide to interview some speedrunners, I can contact AdamAK and see if he is up for it? Seeing how this is really bad for GTA speedruns, he might be a good candidate being the biggest GTA name (he even got a mention in Twitch's 2013 year report).