Getting Started

[Hecksa]

Hi all, some background -

I've been using my account for uploading videos made mainly for in-game friends in the past. At Christmas though, I hit on an idea that would appeal to more people, which I really enjoyed producing. It went down really well, getting 20k hits very quickly. Following a similar formula I got 100k hits on a video about a month later.

I've been working hard at Uni since then, working on more videos in the little spare time I had, but now I'm done with Uni and I have free time to really work hard on videos. I want to see where I can go with this.

Given this is the Monetization and Partnerships forum, I obviously have a couple of questions about that

- Am I in a position to get a worthwhile partnership? I understand some require certain views/month - given I've not uploaded anything for 3 months or so now this figure is pretty meaningless for me at the moment.

- The two videos I've released are potential copyright isuses on two counts - they are covers/parodies of songs created in a game; ie they could infringe both gaming licenses and music ones too. I understand networks often have deals so you can legally use/cover most music, and others also have deals that permit you to monetise game footage, but are there networks with both? Is this even a valid concern?

Thanks.

 

[GlobdomVideos]

You can always partner with a network that does everything and doesn't focus on one thing such as gaming or singing.

 

[Gabriel]

- The two videos I've released are potential copyright isuses on two counts - they are covers/parodies of songs created in a game; ie they could infringe both gaming licenses and music ones too. I understand networks often have deals so you can legally use/cover most music, and others also have deals that permit you to monetise game footage, but are there networks with both? Is this even a valid concern?

Thanks.

Not many networks have licences to monetize games, they all (most) act under the fair use exception in Copyright law. As far as I am aware, Fullscreen is the only one with licences to cover specific songs not all songs. of your liking.

 

[Flammy]

All right, I checked out both of your vids, very neat stuff. I have some advice if you want to grow your channel if you want that sort of advice.

While you could partner right now, I definitely would not recommend it. Your views from the past 30 days (what networks look at) are very bad (relative to the potential you COULD show a network). In general, I always recommend never partnering before 10k views per month, ideally at least 100k views per month. This will give you much more negotiating power. For you specifically, get one or ideally 2 hit videos to show you can get the views.

Your situation

• very unique content, means both different and more options for you to promote
• Non-steady stream of content, this is not good from a network's perspective
• Content has potential to be both very viral
• Content is 'timeless' so that it will continue getting views for years into the future.
• You have higher potential to get shoutouts / other traffic sources most channels can't get

In terms of copyright, I think you are looking fairly good. To clarify, you modify in game sounds to match the notes, then repeat them so you don't have any original music, you are effectively 'playing' the song from in game music in small clips? If so, you only need to worry about using copyrighted gameplay footage. I'm not sure Guild War 2's dev's perspective on this, but 5 minutes of googling should determine how friendly they are to 1) uploading their game and 2) monetizing their game. (game devs are generally fairly friendly)

If you want some advice from someone who had been around the block a few times, feel free to shoot me a message on YouTube (my channel is linked in the description) or I'll PM you my skype/email.

Not many networks have licences to monetize games, they all (most) act under the fair use exception in Copyright law. As far as I am aware, Fullscreen is the only one with licences to cover specific songs not all songs. of your liking.

I've found zero evidence of any such licenses and talked to all major and mid sized gaming networks.

 

[Hecksa]

Thanks for the help all. Flammy, I'll be sure to get in contact with you through one of the addresses you gave! Thanks.

I'd still be interested to hear any other people's perspectives if anyone else has anything to offer. Any advice is greatly appreciated.