Twitch Finally Address DMCA Debacle

Twitch, the massive internet streaming platform and home to many of our favourite content creators has finally addressed changes coming to the platform in the light of recent DMCA takedowns.

If you’ve been a regular on Twitch or just occasionally scroll through social media then you will be familiar with something of an uptick in DMCA claims over on Twitch. The home to some of the internet’s biggest online celebrities might ply its trade allowing gamers to stream their own in-game escapades, but it’s been having to play catch up with the law of late. Just like Google’s Youtube, and other American based platforms, Twitch is subject to US copyright law, meaning that content creators that bleed purple have recently seen a spate of action taken against them for alleged copyright infringement.

All The Updates

In a recent blog post and email to Twitch users, some of which is quoted below, the game streaming platform has opened up about the deluge of copyright notices they’ve recently received and admitted that they’ve not been handling copyright claims in the best manner. The update now outlines what they intend to do to help streamers hit with a musical copyright claim. Until now there’s been some drama over the way that Twitch has handled copyright claims and DMCA requests. Going forward, the great purple giant has confirmed that it’s going to put in place new tools to allow easier curation of clips that might cause trouble for streamers and better resources for background music.

How did we get to this moment? Until May of this year, streamers received fewer than 50 music-related DMCA notifications each year on Twitch. Beginning in May, however, representatives for the major record labels started sending thousands of DMCA notifications each week that targeted creators’ archives, mostly for snippets of tracks in years-old Clips. We continue to receive large batches of notifications, and we don’t expect that to slow down.

These changes include more time for streamers t review content that is flagged, as well as better tools to allow creators to mass delete old clips. The upcoming changes also include more specific information regarding future DMCA and copyright hits, so that streamers actually know what is going on and the likely repercussions of sitting on any action are. Alongside these promises, Twitch has promised greater transparency and better communication for its creators, many of whom make a living from their online adventures. While you can check out the full details over on the official Twitch blog post and over in your email, you might notice that a lot of this ongoing roadmap lacks a certain level of depth yet, and whether we see a set of commercial licences or just a better curation service for copyright strikes, we will have to wait and see. For now, while it’s ok to stream, probably best not to save those Fuser clips until this is all sorted out,