Nintendo To Split Ad Revenue With Streaming Gamers

An anonymous reader writes "Over the past several years, as computers and networks have improved to handle heavier loads, it's become popular for people to stream video game footage over sites like YouTube and Twitch. Last year, Nintendo aggressively went after the players doing this for their games, hijacking the ad revenue generated through YouTube. It angered the gaming community, and was actively hostile to the people who were Nintendo's biggest fans. Now, Nintendo has partly walked back their position: they've agreed to share some of the advertising profits with the streamer. It's still hostile to the people actively putting Nintendo game playthroughs out there for others to watch, but it's a step in the right direction."

Comments

Classic Nintendo consoles' video is nonstandard

[tepples]

The NES, Super NES, and Nintendo 64 consoles generally output a nonstandard 240p (NTSC) or 288p (PAL) composite video signal.* The timing doesn't match the official spec but is well within the tolerance of 1980s CRT SDTVs. Some DVD recorders and some USB video capture devices can handle the nonstandard timing; others can't. GameCube and Wii should work with anything. I don't own a Wii U yet.

* One Super NES game and a handful of N64 games are in 480i.

Re:Sorry, but no.

[jxander]

Nintendo's fans aren't just the ones making the videos. There are also millions and millions of fans watching

Being supportive of the streaming players helps to get more people interested in Nintendo properties. (or whichever game they're playing)

screw that

[epyT-R]

output of a game being played != a copy of the game.

Re:screw that

[vux984]

output of a game being played != a copy of the game.

Its clearly a derivative work; and when published to the internet with ad revenue attched to it, then it becomes a commercial 'for profit' derivative work.

Its a no-brainer that Nintendo has all kinds of rights over not only the gameplay videos but any profits from them.

It's the same as someone buying a book, and then publishing ad-supported audio of them reading it.

Nintendo allowing the gameplay videos and sharing the ad revenue to the creators of the videos really is about as reasonable an outcome as it gets.

To be completely honest, its more lenient by far than the law requires.

Re:screw that

[LeRaldo]

It's not as reasonable as it gets. Plenty of other companies are ecstatic with the free publicity of gameplay videos and do not attempt to take any of the ad revenue. That's why it was seen as ridiculous that Nintendo took the stance that it did.

NTSC artifacts

[tepples]

The NES PPU takes shortcuts that produce characteristic artifacts in the composite signal. Some games, such as Blaster Master, rely on these artifacts to create more apparent colors than are actually there. Some emulators, such as Nestopia, have an NTSC filter that emulates these artifacts; others don't. Not emulating the artifacts makes your game look like it's being played on a PlayChoice or an emulator.

It's not an infringement to run homebrew games like Thwaite in an emulator. Nor is it an infringement to back up your own cartridges using a cart reader like this for the purpose of playing them in an emulator, so long as you do not distribute the dumps. (Assuming US law, 17 USC 117(a)(1).) But by the logic of the ruling in UMG v. MP3.com, it is an infringement to download a commercial game's ROM image through the Internet even if you own an authentic cartridge.

Re:Sorry, but no.

[qeveren]

Why would one WANT people to be interested in Nintento's properties, if this is how they're going to treat their fans? The proper course of action here is to say, "Fuck you Nintento," and stop giving them one's business.