Ad revenue, video games and copyright on YouTube is still a bit of a touchy subject. 'Let's Plays' are making some YouTubers a ridiculous amount of money, but since there's never been anything like it in the past, no one knows exactly how to deal with it. The content creators believe that they should receive all of the profits, while the developers behind the games don't want people making money off of their games without getting a piece. Put simply, no one has any idea what they're doing.
Nintendo has been at the forefront of the issue for some time now, as the publisher announced in 2013 that it would be claiming all ad revenue for all Nintendo games across all of YouTube. It sparked a huge outcry among the YouTube community, and for good reason: while some content creators don't put much effort into their videos, there are just as many who put hours upon hours of work into their content - and Nintendo was essentially negating all of their effort.
Now, after over a year of back-and-forth, Nintendo has finally announced the 'Creators Program' - which would end up being the perfect solution for the whole problem.
Back in 2013, Nintendo started making copyright claims on videos with Nintendo content. Those videos could be saved, but only if a Nintendo advertisement was added - which seemed like a decent solution, but only Nintendo and YouTube would receive the ad's revenue, not the content creator. Basically, Nintendo was making money off of the creators' work without giving anything back.
Now, the Creators Program will divide the ad revenue between the content creators and Nintendo. For the average channel, the split will be 60% user, 40% Nintendo - which isn't actually that bad, all things considered. For entirely Nintendo-based channels, the percentage jumps to 70% for the user and 30% for Nintendo.
Either way, it's a lot better than 100% Nintendo...
There are some major catches, however: all videos must now feature a disclaimer stating that it contains Nintendo content, Nintendo can claim ownership to any video containing its titles and the publisher can remove videos with 'questionable content'...whatever that means.
As of now, the Creators Program is still in beta, but sign-ups are available. All that's needed is your YouTube channel's information - just know that the program won't launch in full until May 27.
