Twitch reportedly suspends guitarist for playing his own music: The hypocrisy of DMCA

Recently, Twitch decided to delete VODs of hundreds of streamers from the platform. The streamers in question received a DMCA takedown message, notifying them about the infringement. While Twitch had stated that they will be automatically deleting the problematic content, quite a few streamers were left panicked.

This in turn has forced people to call Twitch out for their inability to protect their streamers. The platform has been receiving copyright claims from owners for months, and has responded by deleting years’ worth of VODs. In response, various streamers have come up with creative ways to survive the situation.

Image Credits: The SportsRush

Twitch reportedly suspends guitarist for playing his own music: The hypocrisy of DMCA

Considering latest events, it seems as if Twitch streamers are not the only ones who are panicking. The platform recently ended up temporarily suspending a guitarist, despite the fact that he was using his own band’s music. Herman Li is a British Chinese musician, and one of the two lead guitarists of power metal band DragonForce.

Image Credits: Riverfront Times

Of late, he had been using Twitch to connect with the band’s fans, as well as to have fun. He was recently seen streaming Among Us as well. However, on 27th October, the musician posted the following on Twitter.

As it turned out, he had been temporarily suspended on Twitch despite the fact that the music he was playing belonged to himself!

Herman Li had recently given permission to fellow Twitch streamers to go ahead and use DragonForce’s music on their channels.

While no specific reason has been confirmed for the move, users have speculated that he fell victim to the majorly automated DMCA takedown system. DragonForce, as a band, has a widespread fan following and was even nominated for a Grammy back in 2009.

It is no secret that quite a few decisions made by Twitch over the past few months have come under the scanner. The latest DMCA scandal appears to be the final straw, with quite a few streamer related decisions also being criticized.

Apart from bans meted out to content creators like Dr Disrespect, Leafy and Alisha 12287 have been openly criticized. At the same time, Twitch’s decision to make ‘child-grooming’ accused Onision a partner streamer was also seen as highly problematic. In such a scenario, the DMCA scandal has sparked off talk about a ‘streamer’s union’, and the way the situation has been handled has been criticized.