Wave of youtube mlp takedowns

[kunio18]

i really think i outa post this for everypony to read, its rather important

here seems to be a new wave of Youtube video take downs happening as of late. Everything from commentaries and parodies (Otaku Ascended, Friendship is Witchcraft, ect) to actual episodes are getting the axe. The main thing that separates this from the usual video pulling is the use of ContentID.

apparently this is all thanks to china because Hasbro find it difficult to bring MLP to the Chinese audience.

they are refusing to buy the broadcasting rights, since everything is available via Youtube. Again though, it's just a rumor.

i really hope this aint true, youtube is the only place where i can watch the episodes with the many up-loaders that do the work for us all including the old eps and the latest ones for season 3

i think this could also mean with PMV's and voice commentary videos as well,

bad egg

[Lux]

Ok. I checked and Friendship is Witchcraft and Cammaraderie is Supernatural is still on You Tube. So, I wouldn't go DefCon-1 unless you see a wave of PMVs and songs going away.

Keep calm and don't panic!

[Bellosh]

Otaku Ascended and FiW are still up on Youtube. I'm afraid someone's just trolling the brony fandom yet again.

PS: You can tell an obvious trolling attempt if someone plays the Derpy card; the same unsubstantiated rumors mentioned "The Last Roundup" specifically as getting automatically rejected YT, yet I see that episode along with various clips are still alive and well.

[kunio18]

are you guys implying that some the news on equestria daily can be over the top exaggerated trolling ?

[SonicRainboomGirl]

Eeyup! That's what we're implying. My suggestion, just for caution, is that people download copies of these videos in case we lose them. I can't live without Friendship is Witchcraft.

[Bellosh]

Anywho, here's a far less alarmist take on this whole issue. Rest assured, Hasbro wants the fan-made stuff to remain around.....

[rjrgmc28]

While I'm not surprised about Hasbro going down this path, YouTube's Content ID system is very biased towards the content holders and appealing disputes is well and truly a nightmare with decisions doing the way of the content owner 99% of the time, and fan works such as Friendship is Witchcraft often get caught up in the tangled mess. I've tried to make videos (not pony related) using Creative Commons licensed or Smartsound soundtracks and 9 times out of 10, I've had videos blocked unfairly and without any recourse of appeal.

Also on an unrelated note, from an international fans standpoint, rumour or not, this will have a major impact on those relying on YouTube uploads and with no other legal viewing options available to them.

Case in point, the Australian fans get it pretty bad in terms of distribution of the show here. Apart from the Madman DVD and iTunes releases, the local broadcaster Boomerang is finally airing in it's entirety all of season 1 after for many months just playing random episodes.

However, season 2 is a very long way from being aired here, and add on top the poor picture and sound quality, plus the PAL speedup on the episodes and the very prohibitive cost of watching show through the only Pay TV provider in the country, and you can see why Australian fans can watch the show through YouTube uploads or going underground and resorting to methods which cannot be mentioned.

The main problem is due to outdated business model that the film and television studios still rely on, and also the Hollywood studios trying to stop the digital innovation. Until the current business model is completely rewritten from scratch to cater for this new era of streaming content to devices and same time availability as the US airings, the Australian fans will continue to be shafted in terms of new episodes airing, or made available legally here.

I gave up watching episodes on YouTube a long time ago knowing something like this would happen.

[flutterscotch]

Or you could just stop freaking out and just buy the episodes on Itunes. It's only $3 a week. Surely you spend more than that on soda or coffee in any given week.

The fan made content will come back. It'll be fine.

[starswirlthebearded]

It's a computer algorithm doing the take downs, it happens *all the time.* All the content provider has to do is contact YouTube to let them know an error has been made. Hasbro doesn't want fanmade things to be taken down so long as it complies with the Fair Use Act. Why? Because this is becoming their most popular and influential property in ages, and that is in no short part due to YouTube, Twitter, Tumblr and other media outlets and fan made content. Them going after everything would lessen the free exposure they are getting. And it would probably get a bunch of the adult fans to stop buying merchandise.

[rjrgmc28]

It's a computer algorithm doing the take downs, it happens *all the time.* All the content provider has to do is contact YouTube to let them know an error has been made. Hasbro doesn't want fanmade things to be taken down so long as it complies with the Fair Use Act. Why? Because this is becoming their most popular and influential property in ages, and that is in no short part due to YouTube, Twitter, Tumblr and other media outlets and fan made content. Them going after everything would lessen the free exposure they are getting. And it would probably get a bunch of the adult fans to stop buying merchandise.

Exactly! Hasbro would be shooting themselves in the foot if they started going after fan works as it provides the show with the exposure it has been getting. Without it, and the popularity behind the show and the fanbase wouldn't even exist at all.

Also as a side note, in most Commonwealth countries, Fair Use is called Fair Dealing and the fair use provisions in those countries work a little differently to those in the US.

For example, in Australia, the grounds for fair dealing are:

* Reseach and Study

* Review and criticism (Episode Commentaries and Reviews often fall under this provision)

* "Reporting the news"

* Legal Advice

* Parody and Satire (e.g. YouTube Poop videos)

The Australian fair dealing laws are very complex and confusing, especially when videos are picked up by the Content ID system and a dispute has to be filed. The claimed video in question has to meet either one of those five key points if the original reference content (e.g. the claimed portion) was used.

[Rosewind]

are you guys implying that some the news on equestria daily can be over the top exaggerated trolling ?

EQD isn't known for being the most reliable news source.

[MidnightBlackhorn]

EQD isn't known for being the most reliable news source.

Amen sister

[kunio18]

EQD isn't known for being the most reliable news source.

i always thought they were on top of thiere game for the latest new on everything pony?..

[Corsair]

EqD is not a bad news source, IMO, but they often post rumors as news stories. People start bombarding them with emails when some new "OMG THE FANDOM IS ENDING" rumor comes up, and they feel the need to make an article about it. There is a segment of the brony fandom that are still 4-Chan-ish trolls, and love to start rumors and watch the panic.

[MidnightBlackhorn]

EqD is not a bad news source, IMO, but they often post rumors as news stories. People start bombarding them with emails when some new "OMG THE FANDOM IS ENDING" rumor comes up, and they feel the need to make an article about it. There is a segment of the brony fandom that are still 4-Chan-ish trolls, and love to start rumors and watch the panic.

This. What you said.

[Lux]

It's hard to sometimes tell the trolling from the truth, and sources like EQD try to incorperate anything pony related into it. They really need to label things like this as rumor until they confirm it.

[Rosewind]

They've fallen for stuff like this before. Does anypony remember last year when someone pretended to be a legit writer from the show dropping "spoilers," and they made a huge front page deal out of it before backpeddling?

Unreliable doesn't make them a bad news source, but they could use a bit more scrutiny with their user-submitted-content.

[Davroth]

I'd say it's just as likely that this is due to some people who don't like MLP exploiting the Youtube report system. It's fairly easy to get a video taken down, and we will have to see what happens. My bits are on at least the parodies and similar returning in a while.

As for the full episodes, I guess it was nice while it lasted. Should give plenty of people incentive to pony up the cash for a DVD box set (no pun intended). And if they don't allow for commentaries, those will probably take the form of something like rifftracks.

All in all, doesn't seem like the end of the world to me.

[princebluemoon1]

theres a saying, dont always trust what you read, cuz 99.9% of it is BS

[rjrgmc28]

Otaku Ascended and FiW are still up on Youtube. I'm afraid someone's just trolling the brony fandom yet again.

The Otaku Ascended YouTube channel was shut down a few weeks back due to TOS violations from their stream update videos being false flagged, but they are operating out of their backup channel for the time being until the issue is resolved.

FiW however has been sadly blocked again after their initial appeal was rejected. The SherclopPones Twitter account posted these tweets earlier tonight discussing the situation:

"The Friendship is Witchcraft videos have been blocked on YouTube by Hasbro, even after a dispute. These are dark days for fan content." - Link to Tweet: https://twitter.com/...458740887105536

"We are going to dispute the videos once again, and in the meantime we will create a new account and reupload." - Link to Tweet: https://twitter.com/...459362910765056

At this stage the videos are only blocked to US viewers, but they are now entering the second stage of the YouTube dispute process. If Hasbro rejects the claim again, the Content ID matches become DMCA notices and will result in the account being suspended if there are three copyright strikes. From there, it's a very risky process for submitting the counter notifications.

[Spaced]

From Sherclop (Creator of FiW)

"[colour=#000000]Thank you for the interest. Here's an explanation of what's happened so far:[/colour]

[colour=#000000]Hasbro recently added all the MLP episodes to YouTube's auto-detect program, which is why FiW and several other videos of considerable length and views were taken down, no questions asked. No human being was involved in this automatic flagging process. That happened about 2 weeks ago, and we filed a Fair Use dispute on all the episodes. The videos were automatically reinstated in the meantime.[/colour]

[colour=#000000]But that ended yesterday, when all the Fair Use disputes were rejected at once. We have filed a second Fair Use dispute, as instructed by YouTube, with more explicit details on why the videos are Fair Use. If this second form is rejected, the videos will be deleted from YouTube. In the meantime, the videos are still available in regions outside the US. Episode 2 and 7 are also still visible in all regions.[/colour]

[colour=#000000]The first round of disputes were all rejected at once, as if automatic, so I still don't believe any person watched the videos or read the dispute. Fingers crossed that they'll consider our claims valid the second time. If they don't, and it is certainly possible that FiW is not legally fair use, we aren't sure what to do. Re-uploading to Youtube on another channel might not work because they will just be detected again. So it's off to Vimeo or something.[/colour]

[colour=#000000]We're still working on Episode 8, but once we upload it, it will definitely be auto-detected and unavailable. We'll file a fair use claim like we did before, and it'll be available briefly, then get taken down again. Hopefully, everyone will see it in that grace period."[/colour]

[MisterChippy]

I'll be totally honest here, this whole thing is being blown way out of proportion. FiW is gonna be able to get their stuff back up and if they can't they'll still be able to make it and distribute it, even if they have to do it the old fashioned way by posting the video files on a sharing website for others to download.

Also, Hasbro is kinda removing the episodes from online, but not really. I can still find every single one, and in HD no less, in multiple different places.

In other words: Don't panic. Everything is fine.