The Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA has proved repeatedly that it is not done with streamers. A few months ago, streamers on Twitch, including Ninja, DrLupo, and TimTheTatman, suffered its wrath when they had to delete thousands of clips. In another wave, it sent notices to streamers such as xQc and Pokimane to take down content on Twitter.
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At this point in time, no one knows what is safe to stream and what isn’t. One could be casually playing a game, or an ice cream truck could pass by their house and they might receive a takedown notice. Therefore, there are so many doubts in the gaming community right now. Most of these come from small streamers who want to play it safe at the beginning of their journey.
During his recent stream, a fan expressed similar concerns to Ninja. He asked whether gaming will also come under copyright infringement in the future, therefore, making it unsafe to stream games online? Ninja, however, gave streamers worldwide a bit of a sigh of relief as he answered this question.
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Ninja clarifies that DMCA only has to do with the music industry and not gaming
The fan asked Ninja if copyrights on graphics in games will have a similar effect to how Twitch deals with music in streams. To this, the popular streamer replied, “No man, you gotta relax with that shit. Game sound copyright, no, no, no.”
The streamer went on to explain how the DMCA has little to do with video game copyrights. According to him, the DMCA is only relevant to the music industry. Therefore, streamers get notices if they infringe copyrights by playing music in their stream. However, the elements of games are completely safe as “gaming companies understand and they realize the value that streamers and content creators bring.”
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Ninja feels that streamers will always have support from the gaming industry to help them stream games. The value he mentions is clear in the case of Fall Guys and Among Us. It was streamers across platforms who helped these games climb the ladder of success. Therefore, as long as streamers avoid copyrighted music in their streams, they can happily play games live.