The fiasco with Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7 created a fresh opportunity for the Internet to make fun of the situation, and we’ve seen some humorous jabs at the company in the last couple of weeks. Some people have put their creativity to work in slightly more involved ways, such as a “GTA 5” modder who put the phone in the game as an explosive weapon.
The mod, which adds the Galaxy Note 7 in the game, lets players throw it like a grenade, causing the phone to explode for some serious damage. It immediately got a lot of attention on YouTube, where various videos were uploaded showing the mod in action.
Sites like reddit quickly took notice of the mod as well, and we’ve seen countless GIFs and videos shared over the last few days related to it. However, Samsung apparently weren’t quite fond of the idea, as the company has reportedly issued a takedown notice for at least one video showcasing the mod.
The video was immediately taken down by YouTube’s automated system, which blocks videos targeted by DMCA requests until the situation has been cleared up. According to some, Samsung have no right to issue a request like that, since the depiction of their phone in such a way in the game was the type of parody that falls under fair use.
After all, the mod simply makes fun of the fact that the Galaxy Note 7 is prone to explosions – a fact confirmed multiple times by Samsung themselves – and other than the possibility of some copyrighted images (such as the phone’s default wallpaper), we can’t see a good reason for Samsung to claim a copyright violation in that video.
However, thanks to the “Streisand Effect”, the takedown of the video was actually a huge boost to the mod’s popularity. People swarmed to download it to see what the fuss is about, as it usually happens in highly controversial situations like this.
Samsung may have wanted to save their reputation (or what’s left of it, after the way they handled the Note 7 situation), but they managed to bring a lot more negative attention on themselves with one small move.
In addition, some claim that this situation has highlighted the major issues with YouTube’s automated content management system. It’s far from the first time we’ve seen this discussion among gamers and content creators in general though, but it’s still not clear when Google are finally going to take some action.
The way their system currently works significantly favors copyright trolls and other malicious entities. If a video receives a takedown request, YouTube will automatically remove it. The uploader of the video can then contest the DMCA notice, and if they are successful, the video will be put back up.
But due to the way YouTube works, this often causes a huge loss for prominent content creators. Many active YouTubers rely on the surge of traffic that their channel gets in the first few hours after posting a video.
And when that video is taken down shortly after being posted, and kept locked away for days or weeks on end, it can ultimately render the uploader’s hard work useless by the time people are allowed to see it. This is particularly true for cases concerning time-sensitive videos, such as one advertising the release of a new game or mod.