Google Stadia's creative director says that streamers should pay publishers/developers to stream their games

I'm not going to provide a link to any of his garbage tweets, because there's a lot of them and many of them are replies that aren't showing up on his main page. His entire page is a circus right now and I can't remember the last time I've seen someone get so universally ratioed by social media. There are no news articles on this yet, but I'm sure Jim Sterling among others will have plenty to say later on. I remember Nintendo tried to implement this with their Wii U Creators Program and failed.

Enjoy the shit show. 

https://twitter.com/BangBangClick

Makes perfect sense if you're the director of a project like Stadia or similar whose basic premise is that players don't get to own their games and must instead pay to get access to it on a daily basis.

From a purely objective business sense he is completely correct. Streamers who make money are effectively on selling a product which businesses do every day.

From a customer relations perspective though this guy is a weapons grade dumbass. This is a classic example of just because it reads right on paper does not mean it is not an utterly moronic idea in practice.

2 hours ago, Ajora said:

 

He's made it very clear that he does not understand how copyright and fair use laws work. He also doesn't seem to realize that Falls Guys and Among Us wouldn't be as huge as they are right now if not for streamers. Also, plenty of streamers don't make a dime off of what they do and produce content just because they enjoy doing so. So no, he isn't correct in anything that he said.

Yes I know not all streamers make money, but the ones that do are, in effect, on selling a product even if it is in a transformative manner. You cannot deny this. It is literally what they do. Like I said, if one goes into purely at very base purely objective level and do not think about the bigger picture, what he says makes sense. But his thinking is completely wrong in practice.  It fails to consider the bad PR, the indirect promotion for the game itself as you rightly said, and another thing is the administrative nightmare and cost that such a system would introduce to both streaming platforms and the companies themselves.

Can Stadia just die already?

I don't think there's a single person on the planet who still uses it, if there ever was.

Speaking of Stadia, their new Pac-Man battle royale game looks really good. I'd love to play this on PC.

1 hour ago, Murdoch said:

...and another thing is the administrative nightmare and cost that such a system would introduce to both streaming platforms and the companies themselves.

You could have at one point argued this against things like automatic detection of copyrighted audio/video content, and now it's standard practice in just about any major hosting platform.

Give it time, this will become the new normal. Consumers have proven time and time again they will tolerate any and all level of anti-consumer practices given enough time to get used to it.

1 minute ago, M_W said:

You could have at one point argued this against things like automatic detection of copyrighted audio/video content, and now it's standard practice in just about any major hosting platform.

 

Give it time, this will become the new normal. Consumers have proven time and time again they will tolerate any and all level of anti-consumer practices given enough time to get used to it.

Certainly possible. A smarter company would leverage streamers as a means of promotion to the mutual profit of both.

But... yeah...

I seriously expected nothing less from a Google employee. Remember when Stadia was advertised that it was going to kill consoles and pc games? Give me a break.

I also find it humorous that Google makes billions of dollars off of other people's videos and images on their website while not giving a single cent to anyone for it.

Forcing creators to pay you for the ability to talk about your dying platform is a totally viable strategy. Yep.

Streaming's literally the best free advertisement there is. What a joke of a guy.

7 hours ago, Ajora said:

I remember Nintendo tried to implement this with their Wii U Creators Program and failed.

 

Enjoy the shit show. 

Nintendo again. The worst console maker.

What's a Stadia?

1 hour ago, AinuTheTaken said:

Nintendo again. The worst console maker.

Nintendo is a lot better at making consoles than Apple, Phillips, Panasonic, and Tandy Computers ever were. 

Well, if Stadia wasn't dead already it'll surely be now, that's one way to ensure its failure, and this is coming from its director no less...

6 hours ago, M_W said:

Give it time, this will become the new normal. Consumers have proven time and time again they will tolerate any and all level of anti-consumer practices given enough time to get used to it.

Also entirely true, which is how most anti-consumer practices have become so commonplace nowadays, not enough people cared to oppose them and now they've become the new "normal".

This guy isn't Google Stadia's director, he's co-founder of Typhoon Studios which was acquired by Google Stadia.

The “exposure” argument sounds too Instagram influencer. Exposure doesn’t pay the bills. I don’t think that changes just because it involves gamers instead of lifestyle influencers. Would someone be allowed to sit there streaming an entire film from beginning to end while talking over it? I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t fall under fair use.

Any game company that believes they benefit from streamers can explicitly choose to not litigate or somehow license the work as streamer friendly. Perhaps this would be the smartest course of action for all game companies. But if a company says “no” for better or worse, I think that is their right. Realistically, in the long run, it would work itself out through deals with YouTube, etc, where they detect the game being played and pay out some of their ad revenue to the game company.

If a company owning a game decides to bring this issue to a court, it's guaranteed that they are in the right. Those outdated copyright laws are fully in their favor and the current state of affairs is that they just allow the current status quo to happen, because it benefits them. It's merely a question of time before streamers will have to purchase licences from game developers to be able to stream them.

11 hours ago, Doom64hunter said:

This guy isn't Google Stadia's director, he's co-founder of Typhoon Studios which was acquired by Google Stadia.

Specifically, it's Google Stadia's creative director. The title has been edited. 

On 10/23/2020 at 11:52 AM, M_W said:

Give it time, this will become the new normal. Consumers have proven time and time again they will tolerate any and all level of anti-consumer practices given enough time to get used to it.

It's downright depressing how correct you are here. 

I've seen few people with an utter contempt for their customers as this. It's not smart either, what little you theoretically lose on this is outweighed by the promotion of your product, it's an incredibly cost effective way of advertising which does all the work for you, one you'd only oppose if you know your product is reheated garbage and you're terrified that people will know, then not buying the game.

So what would there be to gain on this approach, minute revenue and horrible public relations? As a businessman, he's a fucking idiot.

22 hours ago, insertwackynamehere said:

Would someone be allowed to sit there streaming an entire film from beginning to end while talking over it? I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t fall under fair use.

No, it won't, but games, unlike movies require direct player interaction, so streaming an entire movie even if talking over it versus gameplay footage are not the same thing, the former is basically piracy.

At any rate, if purchasing licenses from the publishers/devs to stream will become a necessity in due time, then I guess it's time to call our quits then. Many of us don't even make a dime from streaming, and this would only add insult to injury.

24 minutes ago, seed said:

 

No, it won't, but games, unlike movies require direct player interaction, so streaming an entire movie even if talking over it versus gameplay footage are not the same thing, the former is basically piracy.

 

At any rate, if purchasing licenses from the publishers/devs to stream will become a necessity in due time, then I guess it's time to call our quits then. Many of us don't even make a dime from streaming, and this would only add insult to injury.

I think regardless of legality, the thinking here is too negative. Everyone here claims that this would be worse for game devs, and maybe it would be. So what happens then? Every dev that doesn’t allow streaming suffers and those who allow it (probably all the indie studios) would succeed. So honestly it could play out almost better where the only games that get attention are the ones that aren’t coming out of studios constantly trying to squeeze the player for an extra dime. And so without that advertising vector the studios that would ban streaming shoot themselves in the foot and they are probably studios who’s practices no one likes in general.

My only quibble was that I think copyright law is too quickly dismissed, but I don’t think banning streaming is a smart move for a game developer. I do sort of think if someone makes $50k a month streaming video games then perhaps they should be kicking some of that money back up, just because of my aversion to “eXpOsUrE” types and also because all other media licensing in the history of media licensing follows rules like this. But I don’t think some random guy streaming for fun should get squeezed, on principle, even if I’m not convinced the law is on their side.

Despite my agreement with MW that you can con people into tolerating a lot of anti-consumer horseshit, I have a feeling people aren't going to go the way of forcing streamers to pay licences. It would be a huge blow to Twitch and thus as huge a blow to the gaming industry's symbiotic relationship with them and the concept of streaming itself, which is very much primarily game-oriented. The more people can stream your game, the more free advertising your game gets. I don't think this Alex Hutchinson bozo who's saying this kind of crap has much understanding of the internet, community engagement, Fair Use or even have basic common sense when it comes to their line of business. And I think Google agree with me on that front since according to this article, they've joined in on the backlash against him by basically saying, "this moron does not reflect our views on the matter." 

Methinks Stadia's going to need a new creative director soon lol.

11 minutes ago, Biodegradable said:

And I think Google agree with me on that front since according to this article, they've joined in on the backlash against him by basically saying, "this moron does not reflect our views on the matter." 

 

Methinks Stadia's going to need a new creative director soon lol.

Looking at the reaction, indeed, someone's getting retired.

Permanently.

6 hours ago, Biodegradable said:

Despite my agreement with MW that you can con people into tolerating a lot of anti-consumer horseshit, I have a feeling people aren't going to go the way of forcing streamers to pay licences. It would be a huge blow to Twitch and thus as huge a blow to the gaming industry's symbiotic relationship with them and the concept of streaming itself, which is very much primarily game-oriented. The more people can stream your game, the more free advertising your game gets. I don't think this Alex Hutchinson bozo who's saying this kind of crap has much understanding of the internet, community engagement, Fair Use or even have basic common sense when it comes to their line of business. And I think Google agree with me on that front since according to this article, they've joined in on the backlash against him by basically saying, "this moron does not reflect our views on the matter." 

 

Methinks Stadia's going to need a new creative director soon lol.

 

I have to say I've pivoted to "cautious optimism." After all, every major console nowadays has features built-in for gameplay sharing. Still, I'd prefer there was a legal precedent for streaming games; they require user input and it shouldn't be as cut-and-dry as redistributing non-interactive content. Fair use is not enough (I've mentioned before its an affirmative defense, meaning you have to prove it in Federal Court AFTER you've been sued).

Google's shitty treatment of streamers on all sites is just entering a new chapter. They'd be happy if they could keep streamers around without giving them a single cent, same with youtube. 

Looks like his tweet shitstorm is only the second radioactively-stupid thing Hutchinson has been recorded saying. If you'd like to know the first, check out this article here. Not telling you anything, you've got to see it for yourself, trust me.

27 minutes ago, Biodegradable said:

Looks like his tweet shitstorm is only the second radioactively-stupid thing Hutchinson has been recorded saying. If you'd like to know the first, check out this article here. Not telling you anything, you've got to see it for yourself, trust me.

Every time I think there's nothing else from gaming that can surprise me, I read something like this.