Why are so many DB creators becoming subject to Toei's wrath?

[Jord]

I completely disagree.

What do movie critics do? What do video game critics do?

Why is it different just because it's anime?

Many of the "content creators" likely overstep their boundaries with the amount of content "used" in their products, but that's a totally separate issue from the raw baseline fact that art critique is a valid industry / line of work / endeavor.

(That's also a separate issue from the concept of "influencers" in all lines of media and the types of deals struck vs. the accountability and transparency.)

I have made edit as the sentence was dumb actually... I meant, repurposing the source material for my own use without official back up.
I can have FighterZ youtube channel showing my fights, teach combos and have huge viewership, but when I will start to make money out of it directly, it will definitely not be cool with Bandai if they find out, unless they decide to sponsor me directly as an influencer for example.
And as rights holders, they can decide to turn off my videos right from the start if they will have some reason to do so.

I think that reviews fall under study and educational purposes as it is a form of journalism and if you get paid for it, then for your own work as a reviewer, again a personal brand that should not be connected with one exclusive IP that you take advantage of.

It's actually difficult and wider topic and I lack the right terminology and knowledge in english to go deeper, hence why the confusion.
I just don't understand how people can justify making money out of someone else's property without the consent or agreement to do so and then complain or being surprised by being shut down by the actual rights owners.

I think a good way to think about it is to look at the concept of free speech.

No matter what, people have to talk about something they learned about or otherwise consume, right? It should be (but isn't always for stupid reasons) a right to be able to freely talk about something, even if that something belongs to someone else. And when you make money off of it, things get a bit more complicated, but the baseline reasoning is that you're not making money off of the actual thing that belongs to someone else, but YOU YOURSELF talking about it.

That's the idea behind Let's Plays, reviews, and the actual news.

You make money off of creating a platform where you talk about or transform the original work into something your own. You can't be shut down for speaking about something, and in turn you can't be shut down for making money off of talking about something. That's the important distinction in the debate.

We're not talking about selling a bunch of DVDs as your own, but selling the actual discussion itself. If companies were always allowed to just blanket stop people from talking about their stuff, that'd be a massive free speech violation, right? They'd have total power over their products, and nobody could ever speak out against them.

That's what the concept of fair use is for. To protect the right to (for non-profit or profit) talk about something that isn't necessarily yours.

Transforming the work on a video platform is one thing. Using that platform to sell bootleg t-shirts is another thing.

[PerhapsTheOtherOne]

An interesting related case I've seen is the debate on ownership of games. Lately, the answer to whether you own a game that you've bought has been thrown into question, primarily regarding server access and the range of what you're allowed to do with the game you've bought.

Common sense would dictate that if you buy a specific product, you own it and therefore have full rights to do with it as you please within the constraints of the law and ethics, right?

But that's not so in the thick of things now. With game companies designing games to have planned obsolescence via their servers, suddenly one can't fully claim they "own" the games they buy, especially as physical media is becoming less prevalent in the digital age. But if it's not a product anymore that one can buy and more of a live service, it should be overtly advertised as such, correct? Apparently not, and companies can just get away with flicking the switch off one what someone bought; it's not like a watch breaking, either, as the developer has direct control over the product's condition in the live service case.

However, if we work under the assumption that the original intention is still the case, then by extension a person should be free to monetize their product however they see fit so long as they aren't claiming to have created it and selling it as their own original creation; basically, the argument that you can make lemonade so long as you aren't trying to sell the lemons as your invention. In this case, gaming content like Let's Plays and livestreaming.

=

I see this current debate with Toei in a similar light. They put out DB as a product, right? And if people buy those products, they should be free to monetize it so long as they aren't trying to sell it as wholly their own.

If Toei is allowed to just switch off the lights when people decide to make it their own somehow, well, it becomes another case of where ownership starts and willful systemic abuse begins. Because if a YouTuber legally purchases something like a Dragon Box to attain footage of the series and then uses said footage that they bought to supplement their content, it'd be legal for them to monetize it under basic common sense, right? They aren't infringing on copyrights by claiming the footage as their own and in fact derived the footage from actually buying the right to do with it as they please.

Does this mean we're in an age where a company can just decide how its consumers are allowed to use what they try to get them to buy? In the vast majority of the cases we've observed with Toei, the accused parties almost never went about trying to encroach on the profit margins/potential of the company they buy product from.

[The Monkey King]

I love expressions like "monopolize art." Nobody's monopolizing art--they're monopolizing their creations. Everyone is free to make all the art they want. But when they make a living off of hitching their wagon to someone else's art, that's what IP law seeks to prevent and rectify.

What about Disney effectively bribing congress to change copyright laws so Mickey Mouse doesn't fall into the public domain?

The same public domain that Disney used to adapt stories in order to become a multi-billion dollar company, seems hypocritical and unethical to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright ... ension_Act
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzk03NN ... =Wisecrack

but do you really feel that people are entitled to use someone else's work, their intellectual property, to make a living?

If it rightfully falls under fair use and/or parody legal defences then why not?

Making a livelyhood out of Dragon Ball franchise by using the source material, is as same as selling t-shirts with Batman
without acquiring the rights to do so.

No it's not.

One has some chance to fall under the fair use defence in court, while the other has zero chance.

I can have FighterZ youtube channel showing my fights, teach combos and have huge viewership, but when I will start to make money out of it directly, it will definitely not be cool with Bandai if they find out, unless they decide to sponsor me directly as an influencer for example.
And as rights holders, they can decide to turn off my videos right from the start if they will have some reason to do so.

You would absolutely have legal standing to make money off of you playing a video game since that falls under fair use, by playing a video game you it's valid as a "Performance" it's your work that you're profiteering off. It's not as though you're selling pirated copies of Fighterz.

I just don't understand how people can justify making money out of someone else's property without the consent or agreement to do so and then complain or being surprised by being shut down by the actual rights owners.

Fair use and parody legal defences that's how.

I find it a bit strange that quite a lot of users in this thread seem to be in rabid support of companies to protect their IP, which to some extent is fair enough, but when it comes to the content creator's avenue to be legally in the right under fair use there's a big problem/lack of understanding.

God imagine if the author of Journey to the West came back from the dead, pulled out an ancient Chinese ownership document and sued Akira Toriyama for all that he's worth under plagiarism

Back to TNM for my last point. What I've noticed that ALL of the people taking Toei's side over this have had NOTHING to say regarding Toei approaching TNM earlier in the year to help promote their brand. I mean surely they saw some value in the influence he has in the anime community and found his style of content agreeable to want to work with him on a professional level.

I'm honestly curious about how this will all turn out, this could mark a huge turning point for Anime YouTubers in general. He's summoning a lot of people with considerable influence within the YouTube and anime communities with some having verified accounts on Twitter with actual connections to the relevant companies.

Maybe to Toei and TNM will come to some level of compromise regarding the amount of their content he can use for his videos on their properties and continue to have an amicable, business relationship in the future and Toei will revaluate their outlook on YouTubers in general or they will ignore him completely and everyone will see that even one of the most well liked and influential Anime YouTubers, who puts in a lot of effort to make his work transformative is completely helpless in trying to claim fair use against a Japanese anime company. This would have a negative PR effect and would put a lot of people off making anime related videos on YouTube, which in the grand scheme of things may not hurt Toei considerably but it would be a shame to see.

Honestly with DBS Super Hero coming out next year I think Toei should let YouTubers do what they do (within reason) and drum up some hype for it within their fan bases when Jump Festa happens because I think that film is going to need it.

[Adamant]

Because if a YouTuber legally purchases something like a Dragon Box to attain footage of the series and then uses said footage that they bought to supplement their content, it'd be legal for them to monetize it under basic common sense, right? They aren't infringing on copyrights by claiming the footage as their own and in fact derived the footage from actually buying the right to do with it as they please.

Those DVDs start with a screen telling you it's been licensed for private dissplay only, and that public showings are prohibited.

[WittyUsername]

Just for the record, the idea of making money from critiquing other people’s work isn’t a recent thing. People have always made livelihoods out of discussing other people’s work. That’s what Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel did. That’s what critics in general do. It’s a little disturbing to me how some people here seem to be of the opinion that what Toei is doing is all well and good, just because that’s how copyright laws work in Japan.

[Hulk10]

An interesting related case I've seen is the debate on ownership of games. Lately, the answer to whether you own a game that you've bought has been thrown into question, primarily regarding server access and the range of what you're allowed to do with the game you've bought.

Common sense would dictate that if you buy a specific product, you own it and therefore have full rights to do with it as you please within the constraints of the law and ethics, right?

But that's not so in the thick of things now. With game companies designing games to have planned obsolescence via their servers, suddenly one can't fully claim they "own" the games they buy, especially as physical media is becoming less prevalent in the digital age. But if it's not a product anymore that one can buy and more of a live service, it should be overtly advertised as such, correct? Apparently not, and companies can just get away with flicking the switch off one what someone bought; it's not like a watch breaking, either, as the developer has direct control over the product's condition in the live service case.

However, if we work under the assumption that the original intention is still the case, then by extension a person should be free to monetize their product however they see fit so long as they aren't claiming to have created it and selling it as their own original creation; basically, the argument that you can make lemonade so long as you aren't trying to sell the lemons as your invention. In this case, gaming content like Let's Plays and livestreaming.

=

I see this current debate with Toei in a similar light. They put out DB as a product, right? And if people buy those products, they should be free to monetize it so long as they aren't trying to sell it as wholly their own.

If Toei is allowed to just switch off the lights when people decide to make it their own somehow, well, it becomes another case of where ownership starts and willful systemic abuse begins. Because if a YouTuber legally purchases something like a Dragon Box to attain footage of the series and then uses said footage that they bought to supplement their content, it'd be legal for them to monetize it under basic common sense, right? They aren't infringing on copyrights by claiming the footage as their own and in fact derived the footage from actually buying the right to do with it as they please.

Does this mean we're in an age where a company can just decide how its consumers are allowed to use what they try to get them to buy? In the vast majority of the cases we've observed with Toei, the accused parties almost never went about trying to encroach on the profit margins/potential of the company they buy product from.

So basically we can't even play the games we buy?

[PerhapsTheOtherOne]

So basically we can't even play the games we buy?

In a certain sense, that's how the gaming industry is moving. Games can be cut off at a moment's notice nowadays, and companies don't even have the courtesy to lend their server access to people willing to keep them going themselves.

I see this issue in a similar light. Toei is putting out their products, and if they can't be shared in a monetized but fair use fashion, to what extents will they try and push their luck? How far will they go to push profit above people?

[Hulk10]

So basically we can't even play the games we buy?

In a certain sense, that's how the gaming industry is moving. Games can be cut off at a moment's notice nowadays, and companies don't even have the courtesy to lend their server access to people willing to keep them going themselves.

I see this issue in a similar light. Toei is putting out their products, and if they can't be shared in a monetized but fair use fashion, to what extents will they try and push their luck? How far will they go to push profit above people?

Doing research suggests that that problem is mostly going to affect multiplayer only games.

[Shintoki]

you would think some of the members in here are nintendo bots/ninjas with how the discussion is moving to ''you shouldn't uploads videos of you playing video games, let alone profit from it'', geez.

some of the members are also hugely uneducated about how the in's and out's of japanese copyright work. there is no such thing as ''fair use'' in japan, hence the baffling crap they pull seems perplexingly crazy and evil while it's normal to them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AIh29g9zOs&t=848s video by joey, the anime man. where he showcase a crazy case where a movie japanese reviewing channel got arrested, fined 100K and sentenced to 2 years of jail for one of the staff. i'm talking about your typical average movie reviewer stuff.

VegettoEX made an excellent breakdown of fair use from an american copyright perspective.

at any rate, mark unfortunalely did make a big opsie by selling T shirts with a drawing of goku which is a big no no. tho rarely have i seen it mentioned in this thread.

other than that, his videos are perfectly fine from an american copyright standpoint. it's the same as using avengers clips to review avengers. whereas in japan, you can't use such clips.

that's all.

[WittyUsername]

If TNM sold t-shirts with a Goku drawing he did, then that sounds like an ill-advised decision, but in terms of his videos themselves, I see no reason why they deserved to get taken down, especially if Toei was apparently willing to work with him in the past. If people want to argue that it’s wrong to profit off videos that use footage from someone else’s property, then YouTube might as well be dedicated exclusively to travel vlogs and silly pet videos.

[Shintoki]

If TNM sold t-shirts with a Goku drawing he did, then that sounds like an ill-advised decision, but in terms of his videos themselves, I see no reason why they deserved to get taken down, especially if Toei was apparently willing to work with him in the past. If people want to argue that it’s wrong to profit off videos that use footage from someone else’s property, then YouTube might as well be dedicated exclusively to travel vlogs and silly pet videos.

also this. it's unfortunate what happened to him. and hopefully some staff at toei sees the backlash and informs the higher ups so they take out the copyright claims

i'm almost certain this is a third party that toei has hired that did this. i would be surprised if it is the direct staff at toei themselves, which is very unlikely, hopefully it gets solved as the more voices the better

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

Wouldn't Mark's drawing videos not fall under Toei's jurisdictions? (Assuming he didn't use any anime screenshots/footage.)
That would fall under Shuiesha.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

Toei likes to do such purges from time to time. Unfortunately, that's why you shouldn't make Youtube your main source of income, ignoring unfair copyright strikes, Youtube rules keep changing, what make you money one day, will be banned another. And there is not a thing you can do about it.

Adam Buckley from ADoseofBuckley said it best. "Don't do YouTube for a living unless you have a year's worth of income saved up."

[MCDaveG]

I love expressions like "monopolize art." Nobody's monopolizing art--they're monopolizing their creations. Everyone is free to make all the art they want. But when they make a living off of hitching their wagon to someone else's art, that's what IP law seeks to prevent and rectify.

What about Disney effectively bribing congress to change copyright laws so Mickey Mouse doesn't fall into the public domain?

The same public domain that Disney used to adapt stories in order to become a multi-billion dollar company, seems hypocritical and unethical to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright ... ension_Act
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzk03NN ... =Wisecrack

but do you really feel that people are entitled to use someone else's work, their intellectual property, to make a living?

If it rightfully falls under fair use and/or parody legal defences then why not?

Making a livelyhood out of Dragon Ball franchise by using the source material, is as same as selling t-shirts with Batman
without acquiring the rights to do so.

No it's not.

One has some chance to fall under the fair use defence in court, while the other has zero chance.

I can have FighterZ youtube channel showing my fights, teach combos and have huge viewership, but when I will start to make money out of it directly, it will definitely not be cool with Bandai if they find out, unless they decide to sponsor me directly as an influencer for example.
And as rights holders, they can decide to turn off my videos right from the start if they will have some reason to do so.

You would absolutely have legal standing to make money off of you playing a video game since that falls under fair use, by playing a video game you it's valid as a "Performance" it's your work that you're profiteering off. It's not as though you're selling pirated copies of Fighterz.

I just don't understand how people can justify making money out of someone else's property without the consent or agreement to do so and then complain or being surprised by being shut down by the actual rights owners.

Fair use and parody legal defences that's how.

I find it a bit strange that quite a lot of users in this thread seem to be in rabid support of companies to protect their IP, which to some extent is fair enough, but when it comes to the content creator's avenue to be legally in the right under fair use there's a big problem/lack of understanding.

God imagine if the author of Journey to the West came back from the dead, pulled out an ancient Chinese ownership document and sued Akira Toriyama for all that he's worth under plagiarism

Back to TNM for my last point. What I've noticed that ALL of the people taking Toei's side over this have had NOTHING to say regarding Toei approaching TNM earlier in the year to help promote their brand. I mean surely they saw some value in the influence he has in the anime community and found his style of content agreeable to want to work with him on a professional level.

I'm honestly curious about how this will all turn out, this could mark a huge turning point for Anime YouTubers in general. He's summoning a lot of people with considerable influence within the YouTube and anime communities with some having verified accounts on Twitter with actual connections to the relevant companies.

Maybe to Toei and TNM will come to some level of compromise regarding the amount of their content he can use for his videos on their properties and continue to have an amicable, business relationship in the future and Toei will revaluate their outlook on YouTubers in general or they will ignore him completely and everyone will see that even one of the most well liked and influential Anime YouTubers, who puts in a lot of effort to make his work transformative is completely helpless in trying to claim fair use against a Japanese anime company. This would have a negative PR effect and would put a lot of people off making anime related videos on YouTube, which in the grand scheme of things may not hurt Toei considerably but it would be a shame to see.

Honestly with DBS Super Hero coming out next year I think Toei should let YouTubers do what they do (within reason) and drum up some hype for it within their fan bases when Jump Festa happens because I think that film is going to need it.

Well, Journey To The West is creative commons right?

And before someone makes a bold statement and correct me, I have found an interesting discussion, mostly about making videos out of video game footage for fair use…

https://www.quora.com/Is-recording-vide ... ight-issue

Again, the rights holder can take the content down if he wishes to… in particular, let me share this guy, IP Litigator and counselour on a topic of using video game footage on youtube

Spoiler:

Sure is! It is creating a derivative work, and the right to create (and to prevent others from creating) derivative works belongs to the copyright holder. Playing a video game while you narrate ( or even if you don't narrate at all) is similar to creating a video using copyrighted music as background music. The copyright holder may or may not do anything about it, but it almost certainly would be considered infringement. If you were just keeping the video for yourself and not posting it on the internet, a fair use defense would be far stronger.

Plus, monetizing the video doesn’t make it any better.

Here you go…

[PerhapsTheOtherOne]

An interesting way to at least negate some of the benefits of copyright holders get from being able to abuse this system I've seen is with the Jimquisition.

[EDIT: Edited to be pronoun accurate]
When some of their videos were getting copyright stricken, they decided to include copyright infringing materials from other companies to create a sort of copyright deadlock where, even if the video was taken down, none of the copyright holders would receive any of the compensation the video's takedown would've given them before then moving onto Patreon fully; this is due to the fact that multiple copyright holders can't lay their copyright claims on a single video.

I find this quite the interesting tactic. It's a good way to stick the middle finger to the corporate assholes if you know that they're gonna try to take down your content by denying them any benefit from doing so.

[JulieYBM]

An interesting way to at least negate some of the benefits of copyright holders get from being able to abuse this system I've seen is with the Jimquisition.

When some of his videos were getting copyright stricken, he decided to include copyright infringing materials from other companies to create a sort of copyright deadlock where, even if the video was taken down, none of the copyright holders would receive any of the compensation the video's takedown would've given them before he then moved onto Patreon fully; this is due to the fact that multiple copyright holders can't lay their copyright claims on a single video.

I find this quite the interesting tactic. It's a good way to stick the middle finger to the corporate assholes if you know that they're gonna try to take down your content by denying them any benefit from doing so.

Juuuuuuuuuuuusttttttttttt sliding in to mention that Stephanie uses they/them pronouns.

[PerhapsTheOtherOne]

The above tactic obviously doesn't work if you get all of your videos taken down like TNM did, but it's good advice to folks who are currently facing consistent copyright issues with their YouTube careers.

Can put you into the crosshairs of more than just one company, but it also means you're less likely to have a video's takedown be a benefit.

[Shintoki]

The above tactic obviously doesn't work if you get all of your videos taken down like TNM did, but it's good advice to folks who are currently facing consistent copyright issues with their YouTube careers.

Can put you into the crosshairs of more than just one company, but it also means you're less likely to have a video's takedown be a benefit.

as someone who just started doing youtube by posting a bunch of heavily edited anime content, this is really helpful as i never knew about this tactic.

may use it one day if some copyright troll decide to copyright claim one of my videos. thanks

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

While you should give the entire thread a read, these "creators" are most likely behaving in ways both Toei and any other Japanese entity considers extremely inappropriate, so they should've probably done their research before gambling their income on making money off other people's copyright. I have a feeling exactly 0 of these creators are actually Japanese.

In the case of Totally Not Mark, Toei Animation have contacted him in the past in order for him to help promote their brand. Surely Toei couldn't have found his content that offensive? To work with him and then block over 150 of his videos is pretty gross.

Was that Toei Animation Japan or Toei Animation America? Because those are two different branches and the original Japanese branch can overturn decisions made by a sub branch. That doesn't make it right, but that's how it is. I'm pretty sure Nintendo of Japan could overrule a move made by Nintendo of America.

[Shintoki]

While you should give the entire thread a read, these "creators" are most likely behaving in ways both Toei and any other Japanese entity considers extremely inappropriate, so they should've probably done their research before gambling their income on making money off other people's copyright. I have a feeling exactly 0 of these creators are actually Japanese.

In the case of Totally Not Mark, Toei Animation have contacted him in the past in order for him to help promote their brand. Surely Toei couldn't have found his content that offensive? To work with him and then block over 150 of his videos is pretty gross.

Was that Toei Animation Japan or Toei Animation America? Because those are two different branches and the original Japanese branch can overturn decisions made by a sub branch. That doesn't make it right, but that's how it is. I'm pretty sure Nintendo of Japan could overrule a move made by Nintendo of America.

well, they did say it was to help them promote some concerts in the americas. so probably the american branch