Jim Sterling shows just how broken YTs content ID system is and comes up with "Copyright Deadlock"

[Master Disaster]

Game critic Jim Sterling has officially broken YouTubes copyright systems (specifically its Content ID system) by developing a system which forces claimants into a deadlock meaning none of the claimants can monetize a video and quite frankly its fucking brilliant.

 

So first a break down of what ContentID is.

 

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Thank god for Jim Sterling, a game critic whose recent YouTube antics forced YouTube’s copyright system to eat itself alive. Here’s how he did it.

 

As you may already know, YouTube has something called “Content ID,” which is a system that theoretically allows users to identify and manage their videos.

 

Basically, once a video is online, viewers can put a digital fingerprint on it. If another YouTube channel uploads a video, and the system believes that the new video has the same digital fingerprint, then the new video gains a Content ID claim. The owners of the original Content ID can then gain some ownership over the new video, and YouTube allows them to monetize the video for themselves, or sometimes outright block it.

 

The problem is, Content ID is often abused by YouTubers who try to lay claim to footage that isn’t really theirs. It’s especially difficult to fight off Content ID claims from big companies, who may not be receptive to the woes of a smaller unknown channel. Fighting against a Content ID claim is also risky, because if the dispute isn’t resolved amicably, a channel may gain what is known as a “strike.” One strike is enough to strip a channel of certain YouTube privileges, annoyingly enough. Three strikes will cause YouTube to terminate your channel outright.

 

In short, the system is pretty terrible because not only can it be gamed easily, Content ID often seems to serve the needs of big corporations rather than the common YouTube populace.

Jim's brilliance is he noticed that different claimants wanted different outcomes to strikes, some try to monetize for themselves while others try to block monetization and Jim decided that this could he used against them. 2 examples are Nintendo who always try to monetize & Rockstar Games who always try to prevent monetization so while making a video about Nintendo Jim decided to throw in some GTA V footage with the intention of creating a copyright deadlock between them, if they both claim then neither can get anything.

 

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Earlier this week, game critic Jim Sterling uploaded an episode of his Jimquisition series, where he skewers the recently released Wii U game Star Fox Zero. According to Jim Sterling, Nintendo’s love for the idea of innovation can sometimes jeopardize games that don’t need to reinvent the wheel in the first place:

 

The entire episode is worth a watch based on Sterling’s well-reasoned arguments. But the thing that really sets it apart is a revelation near the end of the video, where Sterling explains why he makes such ample use of footage that is completely unrelated to what he actually discusses throughout the video.

 

“You may have noticed this week’s video had footage from Metal Gear Solid V, Grand Theft Auto V, and Beyond: Two Souls in it,” Sterling said. “Now, there’s a reason for that. The reason is Nintendo. Because I’m talking about a Nintendo game this week, I’ve used Nintendo game footage, and that means Nintendo will attempt to monetize this video even though the point of the Jimquisition is to be ad-free, thanks to your lovely help on Patreon.”

 

So, Jim Sterling hatched a plan. He went back through his older videos, and took note of what footage got slammed with a Content ID claim in the past. He then went ahead and copied that same flagged footage, and stuck it into his new video. The self-sabotage was intentional: Sterling wanted to fuck with the Content ID system.

 

“I figured every time I talk about Nintendo, I’m going to throw in other stuff that gets flagged by Content ID, and just watch the corporations battle it out,” Sterling said. His hope was that by pulling this stunt, he could stop any company from monetizing the video at all, since it wouldn’t be clear who really owned the footage in the first place. And if anybody did manage to monetize the video, they’d probably only get peanuts for it.

The genius bit here is it actually works, Jim has been able to avoid monetization on several videos using this technique, its only drawback is you cannot monetize it yourself if you employ this method, but if you never planned to monetize your video then go ahead.

 

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The scheme panned out just the way he thought it would, Jim Sterling tells Kotaku.

 

“I can confirm it works,” Jim Sterling said over email. “It’s worked several times before. WMG tried to monetize the video for the Erasure music, but couldn’t because Nintendo and Take-Two had set their ContentID in this particular case to Not Monetized.”

Source - http://kotaku.com/game-critic-uses-brilliant-workaround-for-youtubes-copy-1773452452

 

THE FOLLOWING VIDEO CONTAINS A GIANT DILDO AND IS NSFW!!

THE ABOVE VIDEO CONTAINS A GIANT DILDO AND IS NSFW!!

 

For completion sake here is the Star Fox Video

 

Hahaha, that's fucking brilliant!!!! Not only does it get around ContentID but it highlights how utterly flawed the entire system is. I'm pretty sure the big companies will press Google into getting the system fixed so it works more in their favour but for now, use as much copyrighted stuff as you like, as long as you use more than one owners work none of them can do anything about it

[Energycore]

Littewally Bwillant.

[TrigrH]

soo good

[Moonzy]

lol gg youtube

[jaggysnake57]

he will be hit with a strike...

[Master Disaster]

Just now, jaggysnake57 said:

he will be hit with a strike...

He won't, because of all the previous false DMCA takedowns against him YT made him a protected creator, basically they will protect his content against DMCA and copyright strikes even to the point of paying his lawyer fees if he should need to go to court.

[jaggysnake57]

13 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

He won't, because of all the previous false DMCA takedowns against him YT made him a protected creator, basically they will protect his content against DMCA and copyright strikes even to the point of paying his lawyer fees if he should need to go to court.

against piss ant devs like digital homicide yes but against sony nintendo and other large devs....too much money for google to loose

[Master Disaster]

Just now, jaggysnake57 said:

against piss ant devs like digital homicide yes but against sony nintendo and other large devs....too much money for google to loose

A month or so ago one of his videos was hit by Nintendo, the video wasn't even about Nintendo and contained 5 seconds of Splatoon footage (ironically enough, if Nintendo bothered to watch the video before hitting it they would have seen that he was actually praising them and using Splatoon as an example of things done right but I digress) .

 

Less than 12 hours later Jim uploaded another video stating that the footage was used under "Fair Use" and that Nintendo had no rights to have his video removed and less than 12 hours after that Google reinstated the video in full and even cleared it of ContentID hits too.

 

Its already happened and Google took his side over Nintendo's

 

Heres the video in question

 

 

Heres Jims response to its takedown

 

 

[jaggysnake57]

10 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

 snip

 

 

yeah but his last vids have been fairly blatent, a strike is a strike even if the get it overturned it still sends a message.  not all creators have the power of google behind them so seeing jim get hit maybe enough to stop them trying his deadlock trick.

[Master Disaster]

Just now, jaggysnake57 said:

yeah but his last vids have been fairly blatent, a strike is a strike even if the get it overturned it still sends a message.  not all creators have the power of google behind them so seeing jim get hit maybe enough to stop them trying his deadlock trick.

Yeah I can see your point there.

[Prysin]

4 hours ago, Master Disaster said:

He won't, because of all the previous false DMCA takedowns against him YT made him a protected creator, basically they will protect his content against DMCA and copyright strikes even to the point of paying his lawyer fees if he should need to go to court.

Youtube cannot "protect" anyone from the law. Just the idea that a multi billion company is willing to break federal law to protect one person on the web that deliberatly does what he does, for money (although the source of money is not the content itself) is outright hillarious.

 

Aslong as anyone comes forth with a properly reasoned and formulated DMCA or takedown request, he will get a strike. Its just that YT is ignoring the copy pasta shit because the reasoning in said copy pasta claims are rather weak in the first place.

[Prysin]

4 hours ago, Master Disaster said:

snip

 

 

Thats not proof of google breaking the law to protect Jim. THAT IS PROOF OF NINTENDO NOT FOLLOWING US LAW AND CLAIMING A TAKEDOWN FOR SOMETHING THAT FALLS UNDER FAIR USE.

 

Nintendo cocked up, attemped a legal action against Jim without having a actual legitimate case against him. They just did it, because they COULD. And for all we know, this could just be Nintendos way of trying to silence someone who continuously has things to say about their products, be it good or bad (often bad from what ive seen). 

 

Youtube/Google didnt "side" with anything but the law here. 5-10 seconds of unrelated illustrative footage is well within "Fair Use" and is thus exempt from DMCA or Copyright claims aslong as the video is NOT monetized.

[Citadelen]

6 hours ago, AlexTheRose said:

I have an aching feeling that YouTube in general has been heading to shitsville.

 

I watched like the first quarter of a second of a LeafyIsHere video and now routinely get jackhammered with suggestions for his spammy, click-baity bullshit videos. It’s fucking cancer, I only go on YT for music and occasionally some GradeAUnderA ok.

You watch LeafyisHere, you kinda deserve it.

[kelvindeschutter]

reading this gave my a satisfying smile

[Master Disaster]

2 hours ago, Prysin said:

Thats not proof of google breaking the law to protect Jim. THAT IS PROOF OF NINTENDO NOT FOLLOWING US LAW AND CLAIMING A TAKEDOWN FOR SOMETHING THAT FALLS UNDER FAIR USE.

 

Nintendo cocked up, attemped a legal action against Jim without having a actual legitimate case against him. They just did it, because they COULD. And for all we know, this could just be Nintendos way of trying to silence someone who continuously has things to say about their products, be it good or bad (often bad from what ive seen). 

 

Youtube/Google didnt "side" with anything but the law here. 5-10 seconds of unrelated illustrative footage is well within "Fair Use" and is thus exempt from DMCA or Copyright claims aslong as the video is NOT monetized.

And I'd love to see you get Google to reinstate a taken down video or reverse a content ID strike whether the takedown was lawful or not, it won't happen. People have lost channels for no reason and Google just ignores them, Jim gets one strike from Nintendo and within 24 hours its undone.

 

I never claimed they would protect him from the law, I said they made him a protected creator. No one is claiming he's above the law, he is however given much more protection than any other creator. If he breaks the law and the DMCA is legitimate then YouTube will have to act against him however he is above the fake and false flagging culture that exists on YouTube, a system that means original content creators can have strikes against their original works which causes them to lose revenue and control over their own content.

[Prysin]

5 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

And I'd love to see you get Google to reinstate a taken down video or reverse a content ID strike whether the takedown was lawful or not, it won't happen. People have lost channels for no reason and Google just ignores them, Jim gets one strike from Nintendo and within 24 hours its undone.

 

I never claimed they would protect him from the law, I said they made him a protected creator. No one is claiming he's above the law, he is however given much more protection than any other creator. If he breaks the law and the DMCA is legitimate then YouTube will have to act against him however he is above the fake and false flagging culture that exists on YouTube, a system that means original content creators can have strikes against their original works which causes them to lose revenue and control over their own content.

because of his VIEWER COUNT.

 

viewers = customers.

 

a channel with 1k, 5k, 10k or 100k viewers arent THAT big of a deal, but Jimquisition is a pretty known name. with 300k subscribers and counting, he is not someone you just want to silence.

Jim is also aware of how the YT copyright system works, and would probably fight using every legal action he could, as he has passion.

Most copyright strikes are either done by small companies, or shell companies who "upholds the values and integrity of their clients". These shell companies are companies given the legal right to pursuit regal action on behalf of their clients, mostly so the clients themselves can take a splurging trip to vegas rather then spending time in courtrooms fighting petty individuals over pocket change.

[Master Disaster]

27 minutes ago, Prysin said:

because of his VIEWER COUNT.

 

viewers = customers.

 

a channel with 1k, 5k, 10k or 100k viewers arent THAT big of a deal, but Jimquisition is a pretty known name. with 300k subscribers and counting, he is not someone you just want to silence.

Jim is also aware of how the YT copyright system works, and would probably fight using every legal action he could, as he has passion.

Most copyright strikes are either done by small companies, or shell companies who "upholds the values and integrity of their clients". These shell companies are companies given the legal right to pursuit regal action on behalf of their clients, mostly so the clients themselves can take a splurging trip to vegas rather then spending time in courtrooms fighting petty individuals over pocket change.

Nice strawman argument.

 

Jumping on your chain of thought, there's plenty of streamers bigger than Jim who've had content or channels removed over copyright and had no recourse (DomIsLive lost 2 channels and Eli The Computer Guy had videos pulled and lost revenue amongst many others), his viewer count is irrelevant in this. Heck Linus is much bigger and even he doesn't have the protection Jim has.

 

What matters is Google putting him on their committee to review YouTube's fair use policies because of what happened to him with Digital Homicide and the shit storm that whole mess created. He has single handedly shown Google exactly how fucked up YouTube's copyright system actually is and even after they've given him a privileged position (and AFAIK unique position) he still continues to show everyone what a fucking retarded system they have in place.

 

Could you imagine if DH had succeeded in suing him, do you really think Google want YouTube all over the news in that way? And do you think they don't know exactly what Jim COULD do if he wanted too?

 

What he is doing is forcing Google to fix the fundamentally broken and biased copyright system they use on the largest streaming website on the internet to benefit the little guy a little more and I don't give a fuck what you say, that's hugely admirable.

[WelshDdraig]

Reading this article, and if you could see my face - all it was, was a giant grin. This is pure f**king genius . I was laughing so much reading this article. I don't monitize my videos (except for original videos, i.e. not gameplay), so I may do this in the future to stop ContentID, just because I can.

[BuckGup]

Brilliant just brilliant. Shows how broken Youtube is 

[Misanthrope]

Ah yes, Jim Sterling is very interested in youtube now that he "resigned" from 2 separate jobs as a game journalist. The consumer advocate who stood up against consumers because they liked the wrong game according to him and his Feminists friends. Fuck him.

[Doobeedoo]

Awesome
 

[2FA]

20 hours ago, AlexTheRose said:

I have an aching feeling that YouTube in general has been heading to shitsville.

 

I watched like the first quarter of a second of a LeafyIsHere video and now routinely get jackhammered with suggestions for his spammy, click-baity bullshit videos. It’s fucking cancer, I only go on YT for music and occasionally some GradeAUnderA ok.

I subbed to Leafy when he had like 100k subs and actually told stories about himself or talked about a subject which was actually halfway decent. Now literally every single one of his videos is him making fun of some person in another video. 

[apm]

5 hours ago, Misanthrope said:

Ah yes, Jim Sterling is very interested in youtube now that he "resigned" from 2 separate jobs as a game journalist. The consumer advocate who stood up against consumers because they liked the wrong game according to him and his Feminists friends. Fuck him.

when did that happen?

[Misanthrope]

1 minute ago, apm said:

when did that happen?

Back when he was bitching about dead or alive. Many wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt after his no stance on Gamergate but he's shown his true SJW colors since.

[RagnarokDel]

Make 2 accounts, content ID your shit on the second account and monetize it, profit.