Nintendo: Still Screwing with Youtube Content

You may or may not have heard that Nintendo, who has a history with slapping youtubers in the face with Content IDs, has rolled an an affiliate program which allows you to use Nintendo content but requires you to share ad revenue. That sounds ok right? What are they asking? Well you can register individual videos and get 60% of the profits, or you can register your entire channel and get 70%. Still sound ok? Well Nintendo can "arbitrarily" change those numbers whenever they like. Still hugging your Mario plush toy? Well here's the fun part: Out of all the ad revenue from any video, Google takes 50% right off the bat. If you're part of a network, they'll take something like 30% after the 50% Google takes. On top of that, Nintendo is only paying in US dollars and only through Paypal. So if you're not in the US you get to deal with currency conversion and it's unlikely Nintendo's going to foot the bill for the Paypal transaction so that's another 4%.

No other major company is doing this as far as I know. So I don't see why you'd bother unless you're a die-hard Nintendo fan.

But wait! There's more! It can take up to two months to get a paycheck and Nintendo has to check your stuff before giving it a big seal of approval and that can take up to three days. If this applies to reviews, then it screams conflict of interest.

https://r.ncp.nintendo.net/guide/

To be fair, this is actually less bad that them taking it all, which is what they used to able to do.

It's a tougher call on the program that it initially seems.

EDIT: Mistook some second party partners for first party subsidiaries.

Nintendo are more than legally obligated to do this though. They could quite happily turn around and say "Nope. You do not get to claim ad revenue on videos with our copyrighted content. That money is ours."

As far as content protection goes, this is still very reasonable.
The music industry on the other hand pushed YouTube to implement copyrighted audio scanning system that automatically mutes/flags accounts that upload videos with copyrighted music content.

While that's true, there isn't a real reason to do it in the first place. Most, if not all other companies just throw their hands up and say "yep, whatever" because they know it's essentially free advertising. Look at any random Let's Play of a recent game and the top results all have anywhere between 100,000 to >1,000,000 views. That's a lot of people that have now been exposed to your game, and if they like what they see, will buy it. It's like getting a Superbowl commercial for free.

And as I said earlier, if this does extend to reviews then there is a massive conflict of interest. If you want to review a Nintendo game in such a scenario, not only do they get money from you sharing your own views and critique, but they also get the chance to shut it down completely if they think it's too negative.

It sound bad until you remember it's just LPers and Speedrunners being affected

What if this affects reviews?

Pretty stupid of nintendo. Game publishers should realize that games are about being played. Other watching while they are played is free advertising.
The cool companies understand this.
http://www.uberent.com/canistreampublishandmonetizevideos/

You can give a review without ripping footage

Which completely negates the entire point of a video review.

Not really. Some people just don't like reading, for example. That said, I'm pretty sure screenshots and short clips are still at disposal (short enough to actually have a case for fair use). They're mainly going after the idiots who slap their voice over 30 mins of someone else's work, call it their own "content", and expect a paycheck

It's free advertising for Nintendo. Not to mention there's a massive difference between playing a game and watching someone else play it. It's not like people are going "Hey guys look at this game I made it's called Bayonetta, gimme money". They're playing a game, and providing some sort of commentary on the game based on what happens in said game and what happens in said game is due to the actions of that individual commentator. So you can't say it's 100% unoriginal content.

Let's Plays are about watching someone else play a game, it doesn't really matter what. I've been watching a lot of Jim Sterling's stuff lately. Was it because of what he was playing? God no he rarely ever plays anything besides the worst of Steam Greenlight/Early Access. I watch it because I find his crude, snarky humour entertaining. Am I going to buy the games his playing? Well no but that's not his fault, the games are shite and thanks to Jim I've seen it for myself.

Sure, it's not 100% unoriginal content, it's more like 70%-80%. Now what percent were they demanding again?

Let's plays are about whatever the viewer wants out of it, not what you personally get out of it. Just last night I was talking to a guy who said he didn't feel the need to buy the latest Starcraft expansion because he watched it all on LP. If they choose to decline the "free advertising" on grounds that they don't want their copyright being broken, that's perfectly acceptable.

Edit: I've got somewhere to go so I won't be able to respond till later today

At this point I'd start talking about how copyright laws are outdated and use a situation such as this as a prime example. But I really don't want to because I'm too lazy.

It is also acceptable to shoot yourself into the knee. Doesn't mean it is a good idea.

Well technically I don't think it classifies as gentlemanly behaviour.

You can still do let's plays and speed runs and just not have ads. The only thing this prevents is people looking to make money, not the hobbyists.

And I'd probably reply by saying your argument is pretty weak, especially if it hinges on a bunch of leeches not making money.

Nintendo attempts to survey every. single. transaction. If anyone know's which advertising is most effective, it's probably them. Actually no, i'm sure the unbiased LPers and their veiwers know better.

If they really would be that all knowing they would not make as much loss as they do.
Also I don't watch LPs at all. But I have my views on gameplay videos and I think that if a game is not bought because somebody watched a video of it it probably was a rather bad game.

Oh please, I never said they're all knowing. I still stand behind the statement though, that they likely know which advertising has been most cost effective. If they really are taking a loss, I'd say the culprit's a misjudgment of the market, rather than a lack of LP's. And how does that last sentence apply to the guy that doesn't feel he needs to play the game after watching an LP, when he otherwise would have?

For the record, I'm more against entitled LPers than I'm for Nintendo.

some random guy that did something random isn't really an argument. I can certainly dig up some random guy that did the opposite.
My own few impressions from LP-stuff are news articles that look at them critically for taking free stuff from big publishers that try to influence them. Apparently those publishers have quite different views compared to nintendo.

In the end I guess there are more than enough games not from nintendo whose developers would be really happy to get free advertising, so LPs probably can just ignore nintendo and play other games. Bad for nintendo I guess.