123
124

Important information regarding 3rd party licensing agencies (self.videos)

videos_mod[M] が 投稿

Hello there. A sticky from us at /r/videos to announce a new policy change in this subreddit.

TLDR: 3rd party licensing agencies are now banned

Of late, we've seen a rise in the presence of licensing companies on /r/videos . What these companies supposedly do is contact the owners of popular videos, be they on YouTube, LiveLeak, etc... and shop the rights out for them to news agencies, websites, other content creators (maybe a t.v. show for funny clips, or educational videos for well produced content). They promise to do all the hard work for you...farm the clip out to their sales network, prosecute people using your content without your permission, and the like. All without annoying YouTube ads.

TL:DR : Companies promise to do hard work and make you money, while you sit back and relax. They promise you results.

Sounds lovely, in theory. These schemes always do. I mean hey, your content's getting re-uploaded without credit to fortune 500 firms Facebook pages, large radio stations websites, and the like. Surely you deserve some of the sales revenue they generate from inflating their visitor statistics off the back of your content, right? Especially when things like watermarks are commonly removed, and zero credit/link forwarding is given. It's a problem, and the solution isn't super clear. "Freedom of all things on the internet" is a great ideal, you could even argue people shouldn't expect to retain "ownership" of anything uploaded online...but when large companies are making bank off others content, with flagrant disregard for attribution, it leaves a bad taste.

In theory, it's great that someones taking a stand against it, and willing to go out there to bat for you. Make that money! However time and time again, we've seen the majority of these companies to date try gaming Reddit. At the minor end of the scale, they submit and upvote content from fake accounts. Sometimes they'll set up YouTube channels so they have total control over the spam chain. Employees fail to disclose their company affiliation, and outright try to socially engineer having their competitor's submissions removed and channels banned by filing false reports/comments on posts. Ironically, champions of rights are at war, and trying to take out other creators original content in the process.

We are concerned by the systematic culture of gaming websites and abusing them for corporate gain that seems to have become the norm in this role they are trying to perform. We are concerned that legitimate content creators may not be aware of how much these tactics are pissing off various forums, message boards, and subreddits that would otherwise be welcoming of their content. We are concerned that these creators may not even be getting a financially good deal from these companies.

These companies are also penny pinching from hosting platforms by bypassing their own monetization process...thereby giving back absolutely nothing to the platforms that actually host the content. In all honesty, it's a clever business model. In fact LiveLeak now owns "Viralhog", so they generate revenue in this manner (as they don't have traditional video ads).

The internet is a free for all. But in this subreddit, we want to create a corner of the net that's as-close-as-possible to being a fair playing field. As moderators, interested in the future of this subreddit and website as a whole, we all agree these companies stink.

Bottom line: 3rd party licensing agencies have been using vote manipulation and other deceptive tactics to gain an unfair advantage over other original content creators in /r/videos and we plan to put an end to it.

From this day forward any and all videos "rights licenced" by a 3rd party entity are banned from being submitted from this subreddit.

Any and all videos that become "rights licenced" post-submission to this subreddit will be removed, no matter how far up the front page they may be.

全 169 件のコメント
並べ替え:
ベスト
トップ新着論争中古い順Q&A

[–]floodster 19ポイント20ポイント  (17子コメント)

How about banning the recent trend of people linking videos starting at the last few seconds trying to get their youtube ranking up?

edit: gold, why thank you kind stranger!

[–]I_Burned_The_Lasagna 4ポイント5ポイント  (1子コメント)

Damn, is that what's going on? I've been seeing this a lot lately but I just assumed the OP's who linked to the end of their videos were just incompetent.

[–]floodster 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

No, it's very calculated and also quite annoying for all of us.

[–]Meepster23 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

I believe YouTube doesn't actually count those as views (if it does, some QA should be fired), but in any case please discuss it here. The more support the merrier, and I'll be sure to bring it up in the backroom and see if we can't get something moving on that. It's been a bit slow with classes starting back up for some and jobs seemingly all kicking into over drive at the same time, but we aren't ignoring it I promise!

[–]Plorntus 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

This actually sounds more like a failure of youtubes system if it allows something like this through. Should count as a percentage of the video viewed rather than if they watched it through to the end.

[–]floodster 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

It absolutely is, but people that do that shouldn't be allowed to link like that when posting here imho.

[–]crschmidt 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

This isn't why this is happening.

Previously, when you watched from an embed, when you clicked the "Watch on YouTube" link, it would not include the timestamp, if you were following the link within the first or last 10 seconds of the video.

This link also affected the "Copy URL (at current time)" debug menu icon, and some users were confused by the fact that they copied at current time at 15 seconds into a 20 second video, and it didn't actually include the current time.

So we changed the code, but the code was used in both places, and people didn't really notice.

So this trend is almost 100% because YouTube changed some code, trying to make a particular behavior less confusing, and in the process, many people who just grab a link and post it without looking at what they're posting will now get a link that links to the last few seconds of the video, when before that wouldn't have happened.

There is nothing I can think of in YouTube's ranking algorithms that prefers this type of traffic. (There might have been, at one point, long ago, but there isn't anything now.) So I am 99% sure this is just our bug, and nothing else, especially if it started about 3-4 weeks ago.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Wait, you said we as in you work at YouTube? If that's the case, we need to talk to you!

[–]OBLIVIATER 0ポイント1ポイント  (9子コメント)

I'm not quite sure what you are talking about, could you explain? This sounds interesting.

[–]floodster 2ポイント3ポイント  (8子コメント)

Youtube gives you higher rankings if people stay until the very end of their videos, so people have started linking videos here from their own channels at the last seconds of the video to game the system.

[–]OBLIVIATER 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Oh that's bizarre, haven't heard of that before. I'll look into it.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (3子コメント)

I've never heard of that either! That's interesting.. Do you have a source on that?

[–]silm_shady_ama 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

I have definitely noticed that too. I'm pretty sure a video posted this week did it, I will try and find it.

[–]floodster 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

https://jerrybanfield.com/youtube-audience-retention/

Just the first thing I've found, there are loads on articles about youtube ranking.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

I'll give that a look, thanks for the link!

[–]Phinaeus 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

/u/crschmidt, could you weigh in on this?

[–]crschmidt 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Responded to floodster's parent comment.

[–]Dan_Dead_Or_Alive 10ポイント11ポイント  (5子コメント)

I always wondered if this was happening.

I called an OP out on this awhile ago for posting a video that the original had well over 2 million views and was in a significant better video quality.

Later on, I checked OP's profile and he posted to /r/freelance_forhire/ advertising his services to boost your website's position in search engine results.

[–]Meepster23 3ポイント4ポイント  (4子コメント)

That one looks like it might just be the usual spammers that we get, although it's entirely possible. The third party licensed ones usually end up in "compilations" of clips and the like. They are then uploaded to random channels and we get a few week old accounts mod mailing us wondering why their (obviously spam) posts won't show up.

[–]breakno 1ポイント2ポイント  (3子コメント)

hey now that you mention it, my submission doesn't appear r/videos/new queue, the last time i posted was a live video of NASA Mars announcement from Skynews channel on youtube, could you guys tell me what rules i broke.

[–]Meepster23 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

I was just reading through mod mail and about to answer yours. Congrats, your video is licensed by Jukin media and was removed! One of the first specific removals due to this I've seen. Also your Mars announcement was never removed..

[–]breakno 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

ok thanks

[–]AdamDaze[M] 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Here's a pretty classic example of what the sticky is all about. User innocently enquires about a video, but look at what playlist the vids in. "Suggested by Jukin Media". The number of times this was happening (usually from spam accounts, although this user seems more legitimate) was skyrocketing.

[–]mandrous 22ポイント23ポイント  (14子コメント)

.......

Well, this ought to be interesting.

[–]rws531 7ポイント8ポイント  (4子コメント)

I don't even know how to identify this sort of thing.

[–]Meepster23 5ポイント6ポイント  (1子コメント)

90% of the time you can look at the description on YouTube or the like and it will say something about contacting some company for licensing info.

[–]terpin 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

You're going to have to go look at the specific video and make sure it's not licensed or "available for licensing" by a third party before you post it. I think if they're going to do this they need to have a list of common accounts that are licensing accounts so people know who to avoid.

[–]jhc14158 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

The problem with that is that once those people see they are on the list, they will stop using them and go to a different account.

[–]AdamDaze[M] 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Unfortunately it's going to hurt a few content owners (especially the "one shot wonder" uploaders who prematurely licence content) until the word gets out. But c'est la vie. We believe that short term loss is the lesser of two evils in this situation.

[–]Sorkijan -1ポイント0ポイント  (7子コメント)

I can't wait for the shitshow this starts when admins undoubtedly step in because of the almighty dollar.

Companies try to leverage legal action against reddit, reddit admins are forced to make mods comply.

Hold my popcorn I'm going in.

Edit: I have no doubt that the right decision was made, and I'm sure it was not a decision made rashly at all. I in no way meant this as an attack on reddit's principles necessarily (especially the /r/videos mod team). But we have seen similar things happen in the past - granted some of it is speculative.

I just would not be surprised if these particular companies tried to make life a little harder for reddit in general. How far will it go? Time will only tell.

Downvote me if you wish but the mod themselves said I had valid concerns.

[–]Atheist101 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

Reddit Revolt Rebooted or RRR for short?

[–]AdamDaze[M] 2ポイント3ポイント  (2子コメント)

These are valid concerns Sorkijan. There is a reason we did not accuse specific companies in a list. We do have evidence to support our other claims regarding a high ratio of "gaming" from these sorts of entities however. This wasn't an overnight decision without some groundwork prep.

I think Reddit would be up for a challenge, should someone kick up a fuss about this. I also think you'll find most of these companies are violating various TOS of youtube etc in the first place, (ie, spamming comments on vids to advertise their services) so they wouldn't have much of a leg to stand on.

[–]Sorkijan 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

I also think you'll find most of these companies are violating various TOS of youtube etc in the first place, (ie, spamming comments on vids to advertise their services) so they wouldn't have much of a leg to stand on.

Oh I have no doubt that the right decision was made, and I'm sure it was not a decision made rashly at all. I in no way meant this as an attack on reddit's principles necessarily (especially the /r/videos mod team). But we have seen similar things happen in the past - granted some of it is speculative.

I just would not be surprised if these particular companies tried to make life a little harder for reddit in general. How far will it go? Time will only tell.

[–]AdamDaze[M] 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

I just would not be surprised if these particular companies tried to make life a little harder for reddit in general.

Bring it.

[–]Meepster23 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

And what legal grounds do they have exactly? "Boohoo that privately run website that we violated the TOS multiple times on stopped us posting our content".. That'll go over real well with a judge..

[–]Sorkijan -2ポイント-1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Don't be naive.

Edit: The simple fact is that jurisprudence is never that clear cut or black and white. There are companies all over the world and several scenarios where these companies could due whatever is in their power to make live harder for reddit. If you think it's an open and shut case, then you need to look at it from all angles.

[–]Boxxi 12ポイント13ポイント  (1子コメント)

Prepare for the agency upvote bots to be pretty pissed about this and switch over to downvote mode on/in this thread.

[–]shit_tornado 10ポイント11ポイント  (1子コメント)

Stay based mods

[–]MageeDisease 12ポイント13ポイント  (3子コメント)

JukinMedia and Break contacted me through YouTube to have one of my videos licensed and I told them to go fuck themselves.

[–]OBLIVIATER[M] 8ポイント9ポイント  (0子コメント)

Not making any specifics as to if they were the main reason this rule went out or not but.... good for you!

[–]AdamDaze[M] 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

I would be interested in getting a copy of their approach. Already got a few, it seems to vary.

[–]whateverBRIANwhatever 6ポイント7ポイント  (6子コメント)

I'd like to give some feedback on this. I'm a professional YouTuber. I am not represented by any of these 3rd party companies (The big ones that come to mind are Viralhog, Jukin, Break, Viral Spiral). I do have a lot of experience licensing my own clips on my own directly to news / tv shows etc.

The thing is, the people who actually upload the content to YouTube - aren't the ones who post it to reddit. Most of these 3rd party licensing companies probably use reddit (and other sites) to find these videos, which is why we see a lot of the videos that get on the front page of /r/videos eventually being represented by these 3rd party companies. I don't think Joe Schmoe will hear of the "word getting out" (in reference to a response from OBLIVIATER - all due respect). Joe Schmoe just uploaded that cute video of his cat or something else interesting happening to YouTube. Chances are he isn't on or doesn't even know of Reddit. There is no way to get the "word" to Joe Schmoe because in 99% of cases, he isn't the one submitting it to Reddit.

This isn't going to deter the 3rd party licensing companies. So by doing this, they now have to choose between being able to represent the clip and then it being banned from reddit but be able to monetize it through every other medium - or not represent it and make no money or have one of their competitors get it. Yes it will suck for them that the extra traffic from Reddit may be no more, but it's not going to stop them.

I've seen some of these companies deal terms for representation, and while there is no way I would agree to those terms (mostly because I do video production for a living and can handle basic licensing deals on my own and wouldn't want to split the $) - my understanding is through their agreements with the content creator, they negotiate and execute for the licensing of the clip. Typical offering from most media companies will be anywhere from $100-$500 (but this can be negotiated up). Now, to Joe Schmoe he might not know how to even interpret the licensing agreement the media company sent him (usually 1-2 pages of legalese). Now here is where he can get screwed. If he isn't careful, he might be granting exclusive rights, or the right for the company to sub-license the clip without any further compensation to the original content creator or EVEN assigning the copyright / ownership of the clip. It may cost $200-$300 to have an attorney review the licensing agreement. If the license is only offering that much, it's not worth it. Since it's all these 3rd parties do, they have insight on fair licensing amounts and since they do SO MUCH licensing, they have relationships and MAY be able to pitch a clip (but in reality, if a content creator puts their licensing@x.com email in the description - I'd say majority of the time, any licensing deals were procured through discovery of the clip and not "sold" by the 3rd party - but I don't know that part of the business so it's only speculation - I could be wrong). Basically, my understanding of how the 3rd parties work and their benefit is as follows: They will save you the time of having to deal with contracts / negotiating. They may be able to negotiate for a better fee (but remember the $ split), They may be able to procure additional licensing opportunities since they have connections.

Instead of Joe Schmoe having to read over contracts and make sure he isn't getting screwed, he doesn't have to worry about that if he is being represented by one of these 3rd parties, as they handle all of that. Although content creator has to be careful his contract with them isn't bullshit either.

Anyways, it may seem like I'm trying to advocate for the 3rd party licensing companies, but I could care less. This will ultimately hurt Reddit, and hurt the content creators. The collateral damage will be that genuinely good content will be nuked right away or subsequent to them signing a licensing deal.

Now, in regards to the vote manipulation, that should be squashed absolutely. If you identify vote manipulation of a video represented by a 3rd party, absolutely nuke it. But if there is no vote manipulation, then I don't think it should matter if it's represented by a 3rd party licensing company.

[–]relic2279 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

and make no money or have one of their competitors get it.

I'm not sure I understand. A person with a youtube account can sign up for an adsense account (to make money from ads) and place those ads on their videos at any time. This is what a vast majority of people do. There are more people doing this, by orders of magnitude, than people getting their content licensed by 3rd party companies.

This will ultimately hurt Reddit, and hurt the content creators.

I disagree here. 3rd party companies operating on youtube's infrastructure are a relatively new phenomena. Amazing content existed long before them, and will continue to exist long after the industry changes and makes them obsolete. I mean, before 2-3 years ago, I had never heard of a 3rd party licensing agency and I've been a moderator in this subreddit for nearly a half decade. So saying this will somehow hurt reddit or this subreddit is really a non-starter with me. This subreddit was extremely popular and flush with fresh, new and interesting content long before they came along with their toxicity.

3rd party licencee content also represent an insignificant portion of our videos. Out of 100 random videos that get submitted here, I'd say 1-3 are licensed by a 3rd party (maybe less). That's a number that will go unnoticed in the greater scheme of things. While at the same time, saves us a lot of headaches of people getting scammed, having the 3rd party license companies scam us mods (they've tried several times now), them engaging in blatant vote manipulation (which probably happens daily but we don't have the tools to combat it so only the incredibly obvious ones get detected) and everything in between. We want the playing field to be fair for everyone. They've proven they won't play by the rules time and time again.

I do understand a little of the value they bring, but overall, they're still extremely predatory. They're also ruthless and will resort to any method to attain their goals. We've experienced this first hand with them. Anyone who engages in that kind of behavior doesn't get a second chance. That's well beyond shadowban behavior.

Again, we just want things to be fair for everyone. They don't. It's really is as simple as that unfortunately. :(

[–]whateverBRIANwhatever 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

I'm not sure I understand. A person with a youtube account can sign up for an adsense account (to make money from ads) and place those ads on their videos at any time. This is what a vast majority of people do. There are more people doing this, by orders of magnitude, than people getting their content licensed by 3rd party companies.

I clarified above, but that's in reference to the 3rd party companies, not the content owner.

As for everything else, I'm not a mod so I don't know all the details, but it sounds like there is some fishy stuff going on (the link you included).

If I can give an example, this funny cat video is represented by Jukin.

This video with nearly 40,000,000 views is represented by Jukin.

And then this video currently at the top of /r/videos - the owner is almost certainly going to be approached by these companies, and I wouldn't be surprised if he signs a deal (well, he does film vertical).

Jokes aside, these are all great videos and heck I'm pretty sure that train kick video blew up because of reddit. But according to the new policy, the first 2 videos are banned.

[–]relic2279 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

But according to the new policy, the first 2 videos are banned.

Hmm, not necessarily. That is really only the case if the content creators say yes. That has to happen first. And they would be saying yes or no after it already got popular and reached the front page of /r/videos. By the time the video has reached its peak on reddit, the 3rd party companies will catch the trailing end of its popularity. Unfortunately for them, after 24 hours, the views & hits coming from reddit drops off significantly, to practically nothing. They're basically too late to reap the bulk of the rewards. Reddit is too dynamic for anything that doesn't happen relatively instantly (within 2-10 hours).

More than that, with better informed content creators, the chances of them saying yes drop off pretty significantly. That's kind of what we're hoping to do here. Have some dialogue and let people know about these 3rd party companies because as of now, there's very little information about them.

However, if someone wants to have their video licensed by Jukin or another 3rd party company after it already got popular on reddit, it's win-win for them. They already received the huge traffic bump & popularity and now everything that comes after is gravy for them. It's not like they're going to resubmit that same video to /r/Videos every single day thereafter. :) Having their videos licensed after the fact effects very little on our end.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

First off I'd like to say thanks for writing out a lengthy response which you obviously put some thought in to.

I don't think Joe Schmoe will hear of the "word getting out"

I disagree to an extent although I can appreciate that concern. We get mod mails from channel owners fairly frequently if they hear that their subscribers have issues posting to /r/videos. Usually it's an issue with the user, not the channel, but we still hear about it a surprising amount.

or not represent it and make no money or have one of their competitors get it

That isn't really true though as they can license it themselves, and use YouTube ads / monetization on their own and make money just the same.

I'd say majority of the time, any licensing deals were procured through discovery of the clip and not "sold" by the 3rd party - but I don't know that part of the business so it's only speculation

I'd agree with you and that follows pretty closely with our observations on how it's worked. They seem to crawl /new and /rising quite a bit as well.

The collateral damage will be that genuinely good content will be nuked right away or subsequent to them signing a licensing deal.

While that is a risk, the actual amount of content that does sit on the front page is unlicensed. The risks of doing nothing about the situation is also quite high. We have companies basically waging war to get eachother's content taken down. We have company's pretending to be the OP soliciting votes, then turning "the op" (really themselves) in, just because they didn't get the licensing rights. We have them setting up dozens of spam channels to try and evade our bots. We have them literally trying to bribe mods. It's just not something we can sit back and do nothing about. Sure this solution isn't perfect, but it was the best, and most importantly, fairest, solution we could come up with that was any where feasible to enforce.

We have given them second and third chances. None of the licensing companies have kept to the rules and have continually tried to game the sub.

[–]whateverBRIANwhatever 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Fair enough. In regards to:

That isn't really true though as they can license it themselves, and use YouTube ads / monetization on their own and make money just the same.

Maybe a miscommunication, I was referring to 3rd party licensing companies rather than content creators. The 3rd party licensing companies aren't going to stop trying to sign content owners just because of this new policy. Their (3rd party licensing company) options now are A) represent the clip and in so doing don't get Reddit traffic / exposure but still be able to monetize via every other medium or B) don't represent the clip and make no money at all.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Ah, yeah gotcha. We aren't trying to "go after" the third party companies in any way, we are just sick of their interference with the subreddit. We aren't going to be able to do anything to stop them doing what they do, but we can limit their impact on /r/videos at least.

[–]299314 5ポイント6ポイント  (2子コメント)

I'm happy that you're using your mod powers to try to do some real good on the internet today. You're still generally a bunch of power tripping bastards who think you're martyrs for doing the thankless work of imposing your own tastes on everyone else for free, but at least you're no sellouts. This is a good step towards improving the quality of content on the internet. Don't let anyone stop you.

[–]doopercooper1 -2ポイント-1ポイント  (1子コメント)

[removed]

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

You keep saying that you have some proof of something. Care to share it finally?

[–]BadboyBandito 10ポイント11ポイント  (5子コメント)

Let the shilling begin.

Top shill talking points (so far):

  • This will bring down the quality of the subreddit, as all the best videos get licensed
  • This is unfair on content creators, as they deserve to get paid for their videos
  • Nah uh, shilling never happens! It's just other redditors posting and upvoting these licensed videos
  • I made $200 from a video, therefore third party entities are good for everyone

[–]AdamDaze[M] 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Funnily enough, these (satirical) talking points were all discussed among the team, as valid concerns / user viewpoints.

[–]OBLIVIATER[M] 5ポイント6ポイント  (3子コメント)

I know you are being sarcastic/satirical, but I'll answer some of these points in case anyone actually thinks this.

  1. While this is currently true, we are hoping to bring people's attention to these shady companies and hopefully stop supporting them! At first a lot of videos will get pulled, but after the word gets out, more and more people will stop using them.

  2. Content creators are still more than welcome to sell the rights of their videos to anyone privately such as news stations and such, they just can't use these companies to do the hard work for them, in the end if you put in the work, you'll be able to get MORE out of your videos! Plus you can still make good money off of ads.

  3. We have confessions and other conclusive evidence that proves at least 2 of these companies have been using either bots or other people to upvote content that they want upvoted, and downvoting other content.

  4. Easy money is nice, I know, but its not healthy to the reddit community.

[–]BadboyBandito 2ポイント3ポイント  (2子コメント)

Well said. I'm glad you made this because I did think about writing a list refuting the shill talking points but it's way easier to just be snarky.

[–]life-form_42 3ポイント4ポイント  (1子コメント)

You know, there's always a market for snarkiness. Why don't you license your snark to me and I'll help you make some money?

[–]dancing_raptor_jesus 4ポイント5ポイント  (1子コメント)

This should be stickied, otherwise it's gonna disappear faster than a video protected by a 3rd party licensing agency.

[–]amphetaminesfailure 3ポイント4ポイント  (15子コメント)

Personally, I disagree with this ban.

It should be left up to the users here to decide if they want to support a third party licensed video.

If enough people have a problem with them, then they can downvote them, regardless of whether they actually enjoyed the content.

If you're against the practice, don't support the video.

If other's are supporting it, explain why they shouldn't in the comments. Spread your views on it.

Eventually, if the idea of licensed videos being posted here is disliked by enough people, and they stop reaching the front page of the sub, then companies will stop posting them here and focus on other media outlets.

However, if enough of the subscribers here don't care....then that's that. You may not approve, but the majority of others do.

Obviously every sub needs certain rules and guidelines enforced by moderators, but I see this as overstepping.

The users should be given as much power as possible over what is and isn't seen.

Leave it up to them to decide if they want licensed videos at the top of this sub.

[–]Meepster23 1ポイント2ポイント  (12子コメント)

So what if someone tries to get an unfair advantage? Because that's what these licensing people have done. This isn't some moral crusade against third party licensing. This is a protection from the gaming and manipulating they have been participating in.

[–]amphetaminesfailure 0ポイント1ポイント  (11子コメント)

So what if someone tries to get an unfair advantage?

In what way?

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (10子コメント)

It was implied in the post, but maybe it didn't go into enough detail on what exactly happened. Here's another comment I made on just one of the many situations we had.

[–]amphetaminesfailure -1ポイント0ポイント  (9子コメント)

I would say, in the type of situation you referred to in that post, taking action war warranted.

There was very calculated and specific manipulation being done within this sub.

If videos are simply being posted here by licensing agencies.....I don't think that's the business of the moderators.

The users should be the ones to decide if they want to support that specific content or not.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (8子コメント)

I think we are in agreement then. This wasn't decided because they were simply being posted here. We had noticed the trend and didn't really care about it up until we started catching them gaming the subreddit, which resulted in todays post and rule change after a LOT of discussion.

[–]amphetaminesfailure -1ポイント0ポイント  (7子コメント)

My thought though is that if a specific agency is gaming the sub in a way, then you should take action.

If a 3rd party licensed video is simply being posted here and you have no evidence that there is any manipulation, it should be allowed.

[–]Meepster23 1ポイント2ポイント  (5子コメント)

If we find a third party licensing company that hasn't attempted to game /r/videos we may consider allowing them. That has been proven to be impossible to date though.

[–]amphetaminesfailure -1ポイント0ポイント  (4子コメント)

Well, I guess that works.

What happens to a "normal" user though who posts a video hosted by one these agencies unknowingly?

Let's say it gets to the top of the page before a moderator notices it.

It's going to be automatically removed?

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (3子コメント)

Yup, as explained in the sticky, it will be removed.

[–]AdamDaze 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

If a 3rd party licensed video is simply being posted here and you have no evidence that there is any manipulation, it should be allowed.

We have a lot of evidence, by a lot of the agencies. Enough to satisfy the team (with a 16 to 1 vote) that a blanket ban is appropiate.

[–]AdamDaze 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

If enough people have a problem with them, then they can downvote them, regardless of whether they actually enjoyed the content.

This doesn't work when fake accounts are being used to upvote / resubmit content again and again.

I get your points, but you don't see behind the scenes. Another mod here has said

We literally had one company pose as an OP soliciting votes, had another employee report it to get it removed, and then tried to bribe us to unban their licensing after we caught them, all because an OP wouldn't sell the rights to the video to them..

[–]amphetaminesfailure 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Well, I just mentioned in a response to him that there should be a distinction.

If a specific agency is gaming the sub in a way, then you should take action. If a 3rd party licensed video is simply being posted here and you have no evidence that there is any manipulation, it should be allowed.

Edit: You're right though, I don't see behind the scenes, so I admit I could be completely wrong here and this decision is appropriate.

From an outside perspective though, I feel differently.

[–]olivicmic 7ポイント8ポイント  (1子コメント)

This is great. Other subs should crack down on shills. /r/news would fall apart.

[–]VincentRAPH 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

Never will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.

[–]Mutt1223 3ポイント4ポイント  (16子コメント)

Imagine I'm a bumbling incompetent of monumental proportions and I want to share my favorite Spice Girls video that I found on youtube. How will I know which ones break the new rule and which ones don't?

[–]Meepster23 5ポイント6ポイント  (15子コメント)

90% of the time you can look at the description on YouTube or the like and it will say something about contacting some company for licensing info. The other 10% is normal spam, or channels that are owned by those licensing companies. We might publish that list of channels, but we are a little hesitant because that lets them know which channels we know about and remove.

[–]Mutt1223 1ポイント2ポイント  (6子コメント)

Ah, thanks!

[–]OBLIVIATER[M] 7ポイント8ポイント  (5子コメント)

To confirm, the description or annotation in the video will probably say something like: "For licencing or ____ please contact insert shitty scam company here at shittyscamcompany@gmail.com"

or something to that effect.

[–]stickyickyden 0ポイント1ポイント  (3子コメント)

Uh huh okay and for music videos or videos with copyrighted music in general, what do? These are typically owned by major music labels off the bat, is posting this sort of stuff still feeding the dirty capitalist pigs? I WANNA HELP CLEAN UP THE SYSTEM TELL ME WHAT TO DO, what kind of content can I enjoy freely without feeling like a sellout?

[–]Meepster23 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

That brings up a good point that probably could stand some clarification. By third party licensing agencies, we mean those companies that is their entire business. We don't mean someone saying "hey contact this gmail address to license my video", or, as in your example, a record company posting their license information. Although most of the record label stuff is taken care of under specific licenses by YouTube already if I recall correctly.

Does that make sense?

[–]AdamDaze[M] 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

If major labels are gaming this sub, they are being far, far more subtle about it. We have no issue banning larger companies. GOPRO was banned for a long, long time here (still is, I believe) for shady tactics on this sub.

[–]OBLIVIATER[M] 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Those videos should be fine. Only these home videos that get bought by 3rd party licensing companies. Anyone professional wouldn't fall for these scams and therefore wouldn't use them.

[–]Pesceman3 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

But can you really expect the average user to know and do this?

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

It's no different than running into any of our currently banned YouTube channels. And this rule you can actually check yourself, we don't publish the banned channels list.

[–]WoodzEX 6ポイント7ポイント  (6子コメント)

Everyone is talking about it being unfair for one side or the other. I'm just afraid that it will result in a big decrease in new content.

[–]relic2279 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Licensed content actually makes up less than 5% of the content that gets submitted here. So at worst, there will be 5% less content. In truth, it might be closer to <3%. It just doesn't make up a significant portion of our content.

[–]I_Burned_The_Lasagna 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

5%

<3%

Mmmhmm, yes, where are you getting these numbers from?

[–]relic2279 -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

Mmmhmm, yes, where are you getting these numbers from?

I've been moderating this subreddit every single day, for nearly a half a decade. So those numbers are from my personal experience. :)

[–]awxvn 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

I don't like this change but if I speak up then I'll just be shouted down for being a "shill" and the mod team seems dead set on carrying it through, so what's even the point of disagreeing? Well, I'll share my opinion anyway.

Speaking from the perspective of someone who likes watching random videos on this subreddit, I've seen a lot of random amusing home videos that are licensed that I would never have encountered otherwise. A lot of licensed videos are these types of home videos, most don't get popular and they seem to be bought pretty randomly.

A quick example would be https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6L2X8VzWwYs (from another thread), which can not be posted here since it's licensed. Is it "quality content"? Maybe, maybe not. Is it something that people might be amused to see? Probably, the .gif of this was pretty popular.

I can't speak for vote manipulation and other shenanigans since that's a mod team issue, but as someone who just wants to discover some interesting/amusing videos, I see this as only limiting the content that will show up here.

[–]AdamDaze[M] 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

You may see that one video, on that one channel. What you don't see is that video may have been uploaded to 30 different channels, and all are trying to spam/game the sub. You don't see that the video may be 5 years old, but recently re-uploaded to try and ride that "new video" buzz/wave. Or bought from the original owner then re-uploaded away from their original channel for the same purpose, while also removing revenue from the content creators own youtube monetization.

They only want/need one to blow up.

[–]Meepster23 -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

It's not that we have any inherent issue with "licensed" content, it's just been the repeated behavior of the companies that are doing it. Not a single licensing company hasn't been caught attempting to game /r/videos at one point or another and we've finally just had to say, enough is enough.

It would be awesome if these companies didn't behave this way and gave content creators a real good, and safe avenue to monetize their content. But we've been proven too optimistic too many times now unfortunately.

[–]Ghostparasyte 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Weird, I had nothing but a good experience when my video was licensed out. Few thousand dollars that I wouldn't have otherwise seen. I understand the decision here though.

[–]Dr_Coathanger 3ポイント4ポイント  (3子コメント)

So, question. Once I posted a video and then later was contacted by a couple of companies. I wound up licensing with Break and they had me put the licensing info in the description. If this happened again, would the post get pulled after the fact? I mean, if someone offers me money for a video that I posted, I shouldn't be punished for taking it, should I?

[–]Meepster23 4ポイント5ポイント  (2子コメント)

Yes the video would be removed. This isn't trying to punish you in any way, and it's unfortunate that we even have to do this in the first place, but the licensing companies have been repeatedly trying to manipulate /r/videos, and the only way we see to keep things fair is to remove them all and try and nip it in the bud.

[–]Dr_Coathanger 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

It seems like this might be hard to police. But, I guess it'll be a question of what's worth more, karma or dollars.

[–]Meepster23 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

It won't be easy, but we have stuff in place that we are hoping will make our lives easier, and more than one of us (myself included) are software developers / programmers of some sort, so bots will probably end up duking it out.

[–]hayleyschaef 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

YES! Another reason why I love reddit. #1stamend #webfreedom #fucktheman

[–]doopercooper1 -1ポイント0ポイント  (1子コメント)

[removed]

[–]OBLIVIATER 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

If we can get conclusive proof that these companies are using fake accounts to vote manip, then yes we will.

[–]Shagro 0ポイント1ポイント  (4子コメント)

From this day forward any and all videos "rights licenced" by a 3rd party entity are banned from being submitted from this subreddit.

isn't that going to hurt the quality majorly? Especially new videos. Take Ronnie Pickering, it was initially posted to /r/PublicFreakout and then to here, after it got posted here the description of the video changed to 'rights owned by viralhog' I looked at the original uploaders channel and someone from one of these 3rd party companies had contacted him - he was asking advice on whether to sell the rights for $150 dollars or something. It seems this is pretty much going to hapen to most videos as they start to go viral. If /r/videos removes stuff like this then content will suffer.

[–]BadboyBandito 7ポイント8ポイント  (0子コメント)

There is enough content on the internet that isn't owned by these third party entities that it won't be a problem.

For specific viral videos (like the Ronnie Pickering one) it might mean they can't be posted, but that's a small price to pay to clean up the system.

[–]Meepster23 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

isn't that going to hurt the quality majorly?

We don't believe so.

It seems this is pretty much going to hapen to most videos as they start to go viral.

Plenty of them aren't licensed, and some are. The people considering it will just have to weight whether they want their video to remain on /r/videos or not.

[–]SplendidZebra -3ポイント-2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Exactly. Also, I made a video a while ago and sold the rights to storyful... Honestly, I'm very happy with the decision. They're monetizing a video I honestly had no intention on making any revenue from. Though it's not a video to likely go 'viral'- I still made over $200 CDN from just posting a video to youtube that I made with a buddy in my spare time. This new rule sounds a little unfair.. I dunno

[–]AdamDaze 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

If that video had gone viral, off it's own back, your $200 would have been a pitiful payout. If it goes viral only because of their spam efforts, the video didn't really earn/deserve it in the first place, and you still won't see a cut of it.

[–]SnizzPants 1ポイント2ポイント  (5子コメント)

It sounds to me like you guys are going to have a huge dip in content, and especially, good content.

I had a video go viral because of this site last year. This one. 38 Million views to date. And guess what? It was licensed from the very start and it wasn't even me that uploaded it to Reddit. It was another redditor.

I hope you guys had some serious deliberation over this decision. Because as someone that has been behind all these things you're talking about, I couldn't disagree more.

[–]OBLIVIATER 4ポイント5ポイント  (2子コメント)

We've been working on and discussing this decision for months now, and it took a 16 to 1 vote to finally pass it.

[–]Meepster23 9ポイント10ポイント  (0子コメント)

This has been a situation that's been on going for a good 6 or more months. We literally had one company pose as an OP soliciting votes, had another employee report it to get it removed, and then tried to bribe us to unban their licensing after we caught them, all because an OP wouldn't sell the rights to the video to them..

[–]AdamDaze 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

..and how much did you make from it?

[–]SquigglyWizzleTeeth 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

So what happenes if I post a video that I see on my friend's facebook, then HE licenses it later? Do I at least keep my karma from when the video was clean and pure?

[–]OBLIVIATER -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

If you're worried about karma this shouldn't affect you much. Once something gets removed you get to keep all the karma that you had (you just won't get any more from that post after it gets removed) this is mainly to stop people from trying to make quick easy cash off of /r/videos

[–]MstrPoptart 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Bottom line: 3rd party licensing agencies have been using vote manipulation and other deceptive tactics to gain an unfair advantage over other original content creators in /r/videos and we plan to put an end to it.

With 2 "TL:DR's" and 3 bolded statements, you'd think one of them would have been this, actualy informitive line.

[–]AdamDaze[M] 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

You're quite right. The sticky got passed around a few times so it's a little wordy.

[–]spgreenwood 1ポイント2ポイント  (4子コメント)

I think you all have the right intentions and I'm interested to see what effect this has.

I'm one of the guys that was brought on as an admin to help shape the future of what Reddit does with video – I think long-term, the whole 3rd party rights-licensing thing is something I'm interested in helping evolve. I'd really like us to think about how we can extend the resources of Reddit (the company) to help protect and represent our users and the people that gain popularity through communities like this one, so that firms like this have less ability to interfere with the nature of why this community was created in the first place.

Let's keep this conversation going!

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Hello there admin :)

Feel free to drop us a line whenever. I'm a developer myself and would love to see a better technological solution to these rights and licensing issues, but it would definitely be something that would have to come from Reddit or YouTube itself to be able to be workable.

[–]AdamDaze 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

help shape the future of what Reddit does with video

Reddit hires someone to direct future video management and this is how the mods of /r/videos find out about it? Alllllllllllrighty then.

Whelp, interested to see what the future holds. For this sub in particular. Some of the new mod features have already vastly helped (like modmail muting).

[–]OBLIVIATER 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Howdy, just as a quick question, do you think this solution is a good short term, or long term one? Ideally these actions wouldn't be required, but the vote manipulation has been unstoppable from them.

[–]AdamDaze 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

The best solution for content creators is for these entities to quit the gaming, because we're all for people getting more $$ for their content. That question can only be answered over time, I think. Everything is open for review.

[–]kvachon 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Any plan to remove submissions of stolen videos?

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

We do to an extent as it's usually considered "spam", but feel free to check out /r/videos_discussion as there are some threads there on the topic.

[–]Mentioned_Videos 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Videos in this thread:

Watch Playlist ▶

VIDEO COMMENT
Kicked in the head by a train 2 - It sounds to me like you guys are going to have a huge dip in content, and especially, good content. I had a video go viral because of this site last year. This one. 38 Million views to date. And guess what? It was licensed from the very start and i...
Chocolate Fountain DISASTER 2 - I don't like this change but if I speak up then I'll just be shouted down for being a "shill" and the mod team seems dead set on carrying it through, so what's even the point of disagreeing? Well, I'l...
Alrighty then 1 - help shape the future of what Reddit does with video Reddit hires someone to direct future video management and this is how the mods of /r/videos find out about it? Alllllllllllrighty then. Whelp, interested to see what the future holds. For this...
(1) Gato malo (2) Dogs don't understand our language my ass! 1 - I'm not sure I understand. A person with a youtube account can sign up for an adsense account (to make money from ads) and place those ads on their videos at any time. This is what a vast majority of people do. There are more people doing th...

I'm a bot working hard to help Redditors find related videos to watch.

Info | Chrome Extension

[–]Listen_up_buddy 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

I like this, thanks for cleaning up the video section.

[–]GuruMeditationError 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

A lot of short funny one day hits are licensed by the time people see them. This should be an interesting experiment...

[–]MechaStewart 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

So what if you post your own original video hoping people may like it enough to share and watch it, that when the licencing people offer to represent it, would those videos be removed after the fact? Assume it's because you should use adsense instead of giving up the licence?

[–]AdamDaze 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yes, they would be removed once the description is updated. We very much wish these companies weren't playing silly games, because ultimately helping creators access more revenue streams would be a good thing.

In the meantime, on youtube their own ads would be your best bet.

[–]ANTIVAX_JUGGALETTE 0ポイント1ポイント  (10子コメント)

Any alternate sub recommendations for these licensed videos?

[–]BadboyBandito 5ポイント6ポイント  (1子コメント)

I just invited you to be a mod of /r/shillvideos, a subreddit for all your licensed content.

[–]OBLIVIATER 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Haha thats a great sub.

[–]Meepster23 3ポイント4ポイント  (1子コメント)

Depends on the video really, although I wouldn't be surprised if other subs start getting flooded with the same issues we were having if they don't ban them as well.

[–]OBLIVIATER 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Honestly, there are very other few subs devoted to video content. I'd be interested to see if any other subs rise because of this one little thing.

[–]scgustin -1ポイント0ポイント  (3子コメント)

The best videos get licensed. You're basically banning all good videos. In an attempt to protect the integrity of this subreddit, you're going to lose a lot of quality content. I guess we'll see if it was a good move.

[–]OBLIVIATER 5ポイント6ポイント  (2子コメント)

Realistically, the best videos get licensed BECAUSE of reddit. If a video gets big on reddit these scamming companies try to grab the rights before anyone else in order to make a couple thousand bucks off of it by licensing it to ad networks and such. Now we are banning them so they will have to go elsewhere to steal their content.

[–]Plorntus 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Asking a genuine question here, surely if its that popular on reddit then someone licensing after its already gone viral wouldnt really make any difference to them?

Someone will have taken the top video off /r/videos before its removed and posted it to their facebook/twitter/g+(heh)/other such sites and therefore still earn the licenser money when it eventually goes viral over there (assuming its a good video licensed or not).

It just seems like that would cause those that browse /r/videos to be out of the loop when it comes to popular videos. Not a major deal I guess if your previous comment about it being 5% of total videos is correct.

Edit: This is also assuming your main concern with the content was about the licensor gaining money off the back of /r/videos and not about the drama associated with whats going on with puppet accounts etc.

[–]OBLIVIATER 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

While your 100% correct in essence, we are hoping that users will realise that these companies are harmful and therefore stay away from them in the future. It's going to be a learning curve for sure, but the end result will hopefully be more and more people being educated in the subject matter.

In response to your edit, it's actually a mixture of both. I hate to see content creators scammed out of their money, but the real reason these companies are getting banned is BECAUSE of sock puppet vote manipulation. Honestly if it came down to it, I would be fine with allowing these companies if there wasn't conclusive evidence of them gaming reddit.

[–]TheOriginalMyth 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Well this isn't good.

[–]Litig8 -4ポイント-3ポイント  (3子コメント)

Wow, I do not support this, at all. Nothing worse than when a moderator decides their personal politics and feelings should shape the content of a subreddit. Keep your politics out of this subreddit please.

[–]Meepster23 8ポイント9ポイント  (2子コメント)

when a moderator decides

This was literally a unanimous decision by the mod team.

personal politics and feelings should shape the content of a subreddit.

That is actual the literal purpose of moderators.

Keep your politics out of this subreddit please.

This isn't about politics. This is about them trying to game the system. Speaking of which..

I find it very interesting that most of your comments on /r/videos are on videos that are licensed by Jukin media. Is there any particular reason for that coincidence?

[–]Litig8 -1ポイント0ポイント  (1子コメント)

See, this is what your paranoia breeds. I'm just a normal user with no skin in the game, yet you think I'm some sort of shill. Maybe take a step back a realize you are letting your power get to your head.

[–]Meepster23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

And every likelyhood is you are just a random user, who decided to brashly declare this as a singular mods action and somehow "personal" politics. That doesn't change the fact when the head of a licensing company tried to bribe a mod during a phone conversation.

[–]doopercooper1 -3ポイント-2ポイント  (0子コメント)

[removed]