Twitch streamers were recently hit with a wave of DMCA takedown notices for featuring copyrighted music within their streams. As part of this push, several high-profile Twitch stars have had their videos deleted by the service without prior warning. However, popular streamer xQc has decided to personally remove past videos in what’s apparently an effort to satisfy “corporate billionaires.”
Speaking in a tweet posted just earlier today, xQc said he deleted all of the VODs from his Twitch channel. He also said that “years [of] memories [are] all gone” owing to the platform’s crackdown of videos containing copyrighted content.
Just deleted what is probably dozens of terabytes of clips including all my past vods from my twitch channel. Years or memories all gone. Don't worry corporate billionaires, I am now complying with the laws to make sure you have enough pocket change for ice cream today ❤️
— xQc (@xQc) October 23, 2020
Of course, in this instance his videos were deleted voluntarily. Still, he clearly couldn’t help but take a jab at the corporations enforcing DMCA takedowns. He posits that he loss of his years’ worth of memories amounts to “pocket change” for such companies.
Some users have questioned if the streamer backed up his videos locally, or perhaps on another cloud service. xQC responded by saying it’s both easier and “satisfying” to have all of the videos in one place. And there’s also the obvious: Fans have no way to watch the videos he has saved to local drives. However, he did say his videos were backed up through other means. That at least leaves hope that they’re not gone forever.
While this move may seem perplexing, it’s not unwarranted. When Twitch started removing videos earlier this week, streamers were sent a “one-time warning to give [them] the chance to learn about copyright law.” With years of VOD streams available on his channel, xQc would be potentially be in danger of further DMCA notices, channel deletion, or worse. It’s a proactive move, then, and chances are good he won’t be the last streamer to purge a large number of past streaming content.
