The Official HdE Does Anime Thread

Heads up! Something quite SUBSTANTIAL will be appearing on my channel withn the hour (all being well.)

The quality is a bit rough, and its clear that I have some things to learn yet about creating this kind of content, but if you fancy seeing me play through the first 30 minutes of GOD OF WAR on my (t)rusty stock PS4, you''ll be able to very soon!
 
And lo! It's up!
HdE plays 30 minutes of God of War on PS4

This video got INSTANTLY copyright claimed by a bogus channel that clearly has no affiliation to Sony. I was never going to make any money from this video through Youtube itself, so I'm not bothered on that score, but it does show that Youtube haven't really addressed the issue of false claims on their platform.

The bigger thing is, shower this thing with likes and views! Its not really up to the quality of presentation I'd like, but working on it gave me a lot of stuff to consider for future content.
 
Good gawd - I think my Judge's helmet must have real power. That copyright claim was almost instantly dropped after I filed a dispute.

Seems the culprit was some Indonesian kid trying to pull a fast one. I've already escalated the matter to reporting his channel and seeking its termination.

Yes folks - you heard it here first. Where false claims are concerned, I do NOT f*** around!
 
Kotaku did this with another channel with a monster hunter video claiming that they'd copied their own video when the content claimed was a cut scene they had no legal claim of copyright over, so none of this has been fixed (because safe harbour protection, they have to take action on all claims regardless of the legality of the claim) and you can easily still be hit by the automated demonetization hammer as well.

Also Twitch + Streamlabs for donations in the early days might be another option (and if I remember correctly, streamlabs doesn't take anything from donations made through their platform) if you want to move from standard lets play videos to livestreaming.
 
demonix said:
Kotaku did this with another channel with a monster hunter video claiming that they'd copied their own video when the content claimed was a cut scene they had no legal claim of copyright over, so none of this has been fixed (because safe harbour protection, they have to take action on all claims regardless of the legality of the claim) and you can easily still be hit by the automated demonetization hammer as well.
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Sad but true. Thankfully, the monetization aspect of Youtube isn't something I have to worry about for now.

Something I can share from experience, however, is that it's MUCH easier to get claims dropped now. It appears that the usual suspects are still trying it on, but a sternly worded dispute that invokes the burden of proof seems to work wonders now. Basically, telling the guilty party 'I'm fairly certain you don't own this, I know for a FACT that you don't own my uniquely transformative elements of the content, and if you feel differently, I expect you to present compelling proof of ownership before I escalate this matter further.'

Boom. So far, it works every time.

demonix said:
Also Twitch + Streamlabs for donations in the early days might be another option (and if I remember correctly, streamlabs doesn't take anything from donations made through their platform) if you want to move from standard lets play videos to livestreaming.
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Sadly not an option for me, as I'm having to work within certain limitations. Live gameplay isn't really something I want to do a lot of, to be honest. That God of War Let's Play is really just placeholder while new content and further plans start to take shape. Which is kind of a sore subject, as more info's come to light lately that throws everything up in the air again.

Oh, what fun...
 
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Something like this:
Must be a nightmare.

He only found out because he has a large enough fan base. If you were a smaller site you might never find out, so someone would be living off your hard work!
 
Yeah - it's CRAZY how open to abuse Youtube is to facilitate that kind of thing.

There's actually one particular channel I'm aware of - Alien Theory, a channel devoted to discussion of the Alien movie franchise and all its related media - that has had videos ripped off wholesale with the narration replaced in a different language. When the culprit was called out, he had the front to insist the content was entirely his own. Unbelievable!
 
This whole YouTube copyright takedown abuse is absolute bloody nonsense. You should have to prove you're the actual copyright holder before you can claim against anyone, certainly before anyone takes down your videos and blocks your revenue.

Are any of the other video hosting sites better? I mean I know YouTube has such a massive market share, but I feel like if enough big names got fed up of it and migrated en masse to another site they could probably have enough weight to at least get YouTube to use, y'know, actual people to assess copyright infringement claims instead of an AI.
 
ayase said:
Are any of the other video hosting sites better? I mean I know YouTube has such a massive market share, but I feel like if enough big names got fed up of it and migrated en masse to another site they could probably have enough weight to at least get YouTube to use, y'know, actual people to assess copyright infringement claims instead of an AI.
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I'm hearing a lot of stuff that seems to indicate Youtube are being forced to go that way. They've already bolstered their number of personnel who handle actual moderation of disputes. But, as usual with Youtube, they prefer to focus the efforts of actual people on channels that are already raking in significant views and revenue. The little guys simply aren't worth their time, apparently.

Other video hosting sites all come with snags attached, unfortunately. Amazon Prime Video Direct is looking like it will be the platform that takes over from youtube as the market leader, as it already has a massive user base built in, and Prime members are becoming more plentiful. But it's still a far from perfect platform, and they're definitely geared more toward professionally produced content.

Basically, EVERYTHING sucks. So until one of Youtube's rivals appears and steals the viewer base, content creators are stuck.

That said, there are some interesting shifts occurring on the landscape (which actually dictate to why I'm trying out an experimental approach with videos NOW as opposed to when things have settled - which is what a sane businessperson would do.) High profile content creators are indeed jumping ship from Youtube, citing their business model and dubious site algorithms as the reason. As they migrate to other platforms and enough creators follow suit, that's bound to suck a substantial number of viewers away from Youtube.

There's some chatter as well about alternative methods of monetization on Youtube besides reliance on ad revenue, and it remains to be seen whether those - when they appear - will be accessible to smaller channels. I also hear that the creators of Vid.me - which was originally where I intended to launch new content before the site closed - are working on a new product to address what they learned from the Vid.me failure.

Basically, the only way to do this kind of thing right now is to source revenue outside of Youtube's ad system. So I'll be keeping an eye on what other alternative methods come to light.
 
Who wants a sneak peek at the direction things are going in?

Here's one - subject to a few tweaks, most likely, as I'm not AT ALL happy with how audio is being transcoded by Youtube. It sounds lovely on my final rendered videos but horribly wooly on Youtube itself.

Watch and be overawed by early 1980s graphics as I do a hideously late-to-the-party review of ASTEROIDS on the Atari 7800!

Incidentally, this video isn't viewable anywhere else but here for the time being. It's VERY likely to be further edited and spruced up. So if anyone has any observations or feedback, please do jump in with them.
 
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Okay guys - things are ramping up over here, but before I start committing to final renders of new video, I could use some specific feedback.

Audio quality has been a bit of a sticking point for me just lately. I recently made the transition from using a Blue Yeti USB mic to a hands-free lavalier set up. But changing things up comes at the cost of learning how to re-process my commentaries.

I've discoverd a weird foible of my set-up which means that commentaries such as the one int he video above sound DREADFUL when I play them back on my laptop after uploading them. Almst as if the commentary is stuck in a plastic tube with a load of cotton wadding around the sides. I'm limited in terms of having other devices I can listen to it on, so I've reached out to other folks who all tell me the audio is crisp and clear. BIZARRE!

I've had ONE report that the audio is coming over at a greatly reduced volume to other Youtubers, which is a puzzle. I don't think anybody else has mentioned this before.

At the moment, nailing down audio properties is one of the last obstacles in my way before I start spitting out videos. Can anybody corroborate if the audio levels seem unusually quiet?

Your input helps a great deal, folks - after all it's you Joe Public types I'm creating this content for!
 
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Phobos said:
@HdE Having watched on my iPhone 6s running latest iOS I didn’t experience any weirdness with the audio. It was of good quality.
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Thanks, Phobos - that's useful info.

I've since determined that the weird audio issues are squarely down to my laptop. In fact, boosting the volume slightly on a re-rendered video helps to alleviate it.

What I'm primarily concerned with now is making sure the audio volume level is consistent with other Youtube channels. Once I've worked out if there's an issue there, I can start fine tuning, and then finalizing some videos.

What I really want to avoid is a situation where folks find a video after watching something else on Youtube, click on mine, and then have to fumble with their volume slider. That's a performance killer.
 
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