
#Twitch external player Pc
21, 2021, PC Gamer reported that Twitch announced a new deal with the NMPA to “build productive partnerships between the service and music publishers.” However, the platform emphasized the deal would not alter the legality of copyrighted music. Outcome Twitch announces deal with National Music Publishers’ Association Streamers could also now mass unpublish or delete their VODs, according to Music Business Worldwide. On March 17, 2021, Twitch announced new tools that would help streamers view and address their takedown requests and copyright strikes, including notices of DMCA infringements.

The letter also accused Twitch of “allowing and enabling its streamers to use our respective members’ music without authorization” and referenced the House Antitrust Subcommittee testimony given by Bezos. 22, 2020, Twitch received a letter from various American music publishers like the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the NMPA criticizing the platform for failing to account properly for “neither synch nor mechanical licenses” in the creation of its Soundtrack tool, as reported by Variety. “I seriously don’t understand why Twitch is so unable to provide documented reasoning as to what rules you break when you break them,” tweeted the streamer Teawrex, adding that there had been a “giant throughline for years” of streamers being at loose ends when they got suspended or hit with a warning and that the DMCA protocol adds a new layer of murkiness. “ solution to DMCA is for creators to delete their life’s work,” said Nash. Devin Nash, a high-profile Twitch streamer and industry insider, tweeted that Twitch was exhibiting “pure, gross negligence,” arguing Twitch did not provide an “identification system” to determine what remaining content needed to be deleted. The immediate reaction from streamers was extremely negative. Without any specialized identification tools, the mass email informed streamers that content containing copyrighted material had been deleted, and they had three days to review and delete any remaining clips and VODs that could violate the DMCA. The real-time nature of the livestreaming service means the deleted clips and VODs make up a vast majority of streamers’ saved work. 20, 2020, in an effort to comply with DMCA guidance, Twitch announced a mass deletion of thousands of clips (short snippets of livestreams) and videos on demand (VODs) that contained copyrighted content, Kotaku reported. 30, 2020, to address the demand for copyright-free music, Twitch released its own Soundtrack, a collection of millions of ostensibly fully licensed songs curated specifically for streamers to play, according to Variety. Following the hearing, the Artists Rights Alliance issued a letter that it was “appalled … by inability or unwillingness to answer even the most basic question about Twitch’s practices in this regard.” On July 29, 2020, during a House Antitrust Subcommittee hearing, Jeff Bezos, CEO of Twitch’s parent company Amazon, said he did not know whether Twitch allowed users to stream copyrighted music. Twitch had had copyright issues in the past, but tensions continued to grow. On June 8, 2020, Twitch Support wrote, “We’ve had a sudden influx of DMCA takedown requests for clips with background music from 2017-19.” According to Kotaku, numerous streamers reported their clips had received DMCA strikes. The Warner Music Group (WMG) is an American entertainment and record label conglomerate and is the third largest recording company in the music industry, after Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment. The association has pursued litigation against streaming services like Napster and LimeWire, but has also reached royalty distribution deals with services like YouTube. The National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) is the trade association for all American music publishers and their songwriting partners. Traditionally, Twitch has issued bans to streamers who were continuously flagged by the service’s copyrighted content identification algorithm. Historically, the service has had a contentious relationship with music industry record labels that have accused Twitch of allowing its streamers to play copyrighted music freely without appropriate licensure.

Twitch is an Amazon-owned, American livestreaming service that caters primarily to video games and Esports. The deals are expected to allow Twitch to pursue more effective means of addressing copyright infringement, rather than continuing with the current method of banning users for playing copyrighted music on streams. Following a tumultuous year for Twitch, in the form of numerous Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) infringements, the livestreaming service reached licensing deals with two major record labels, the National Music Publishers’ Association and Warner Music Group.
