If a video ist paid for by Kabam, it is required by law in most countries that this is disclosed.
If a creator is just a member of a Creator Program, there is no reason to believe Kabam is influencing the videos. I myself am in several Creator Programs of huge developers and publishers, and have been for several years, and not even once has one of them even attempted influencing my opinions or scripts.In that case, I do not see why it should be required to disclose a partnership
Hi thanks for your message.
It's about being in a content creator program, it's "are they employed by Kabam"
What is your opinion about it if the content creator is a member of staff for Kabam in some capacity?
Doesn't change the argument. As long as Kabam doesn't actively influence the videos or pay for them, no.
Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
You're asking an unintentionally bizarre question. Let's start with the fact that i would argue none of those people are in fact members of the CCP.
The CCP is a program originally created to work with content creators (originally, Youtube video creators) by offering them early access to upcoming content (originally, new champions, but later all sorts of content) so that they could work on video content related to that MCOC content and be prepared to release it when that MCOC content itself released. This way the content creators could be talking about what new stuff was happening in the game as it happened at a higher quality, which benefitted the content creators and the game. The program consists of three main parts: an NDA agreement which governs what the content creators can disclose and when (it is the primary means of enforcing embargos on new content information), access to the beta test server where things like new content and new champions can be granted and tested without altering live accounts, and access to the CCP discord, where content creators can discuss the game and the content directly with the developers.
No employee of Kabam would need to be a member of the CCP to gain access to any of these things. Employees are already non-disclosed as part of their employment contracts. Employees can probably request beta access directly. And employees obviously already have access to the devs: they can just walk up to them and chat. Those four individuals might have been members of the CCP at one time, but I think that their status changed when they became employees. Assuming MSD is an employee: I don't recall if he explicitly stated he was or not (he could be a contractual hire).
There's no handbook or anything governing this, but one thing CCP members are supposed to is disclose the fact that they are members of the CCP whenever they make content using information received through the program. This is often implicit when they simply state that their footage came from the CCP server, but technically they are supposed to say that. Furthermore, there's a general rule that they are not supposed to state or imply that they are Kabam employees or officially represent Kabam in their content. Obviously, a Kabam employee can't honor that stipulation because they actually are employees, so (presumably) employees have separate terms spelled out to them if they happen to be (or become) public facing content creators. Most companies like this have rules against astroturfing, for example.
The CCP is a program for outsiders to gain access to Kabam. It would be somewhat nonsensical for a Kabam employee to also be a member of the program since the CCP program can offer them nothing they don't already have. Content creators who previously operated within the CCP have gone on to become employees, but as there is no Avengers moment when Tony Stark promoted them, I can see how that distinction might not be obvious.
Why this matters when discussing disclosure is I believe to the extent any ethical standard exists, the employee relationship takes precedence. In other words, it would not be a proper disclosure for a Kabam employee to disclose they were a CCP member and not an employee. There are exceptions and caveats to that, but I believe in general an employee saying their information came from the content creator program would be misleading.
I say there are caveats because there's a huge difference between the dude working in the mail room failing to identify themselves as a Kabam employee on their twitch channel and one of the champion designers doing the same while reviewing one of their own designs, say. But those nuances would be very difficult to identify from the outside.
Thanks for your response and contribution.
I think one of the things that's come out of this thread is that there's a number of mitigating, and aggravating factors:
1. The spectrum of what constitutes a "Kabam employee" and the duration and/or number of hours you do for Kabam.
2. There's also debate about how big your YouTube channel is and whether your sphere of influence beaches the threshold.
3. Then there's also the discussion around the nature of your YouTube content - i.e. are you protecting Kabam and carefully curating what messaging you put in front of your audience (or hide from them)? Or conversely, do you just make guides on his to beat content? E.g. MCOC NOOB type content
To conflate being an employee with just being a member of the CCP diverts focus away from the core issue - "Should an influential MCOC YouTuber who works for Kabam in a meaningful way disclose to viewers to mitigate the effects of a conflict of interest?"
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
They tried to keep it hidden. But it got out. And then they all came out. There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now. -Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos. -Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
If a video ist paid for by Kabam, it is required by law in most countries that this is disclosed.
If a creator is just a member of a Creator Program, there is no reason to believe Kabam is influencing the videos. I myself am in several Creator Programs of huge developers and publishers, and have been for several years, and not even once has one of them even attempted influencing my opinions or scripts.In that case, I do not see why it should be required to disclose a partnership
Hi thanks for your message.
It's about being in a content creator program, it's "are they employed by Kabam"
What is your opinion about it if the content creator is a member of staff for Kabam in some capacity?
Doesn't change the argument. As long as Kabam doesn't actively influence the videos or pay for them, no.
Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
Think of it this way: if you worked for BMW sales department and you had a YouTube channel with 25k subscribers making content about which "contact executive car" is the best in a shootout between BMW, Mercedes, Audi.. but every the BMW 3 series just seems to mysteriously come out as the winner all the time (as well as other categories of car where BMW models win every time). That's a more accurate analogy IMO.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
You're asking an unintentionally bizarre question. Let's start with the fact that i would argue none of those people are in fact members of the CCP.
The CCP is a program originally created to work with content creators (originally, Youtube video creators) by offering them early access to upcoming content (originally, new champions, but later all sorts of content) so that they could work on video content related to that MCOC content and be prepared to release it when that MCOC content itself released. This way the content creators could be talking about what new stuff was happening in the game as it happened at a higher quality, which benefitted the content creators and the game. The program consists of three main parts: an NDA agreement which governs what the content creators can disclose and when (it is the primary means of enforcing embargos on new content information), access to the beta test server where things like new content and new champions can be granted and tested without altering live accounts, and access to the CCP discord, where content creators can discuss the game and the content directly with the developers.
No employee of Kabam would need to be a member of the CCP to gain access to any of these things. Employees are already non-disclosed as part of their employment contracts. Employees can probably request beta access directly. And employees obviously already have access to the devs: they can just walk up to them and chat. Those four individuals might have been members of the CCP at one time, but I think that their status changed when they became employees. Assuming MSD is an employee: I don't recall if he explicitly stated he was or not (he could be a contractual hire).
There's no handbook or anything governing this, but one thing CCP members are supposed to is disclose the fact that they are members of the CCP whenever they make content using information received through the program. This is often implicit when they simply state that their footage came from the CCP server, but technically they are supposed to say that. Furthermore, there's a general rule that they are not supposed to state or imply that they are Kabam employees or officially represent Kabam in their content. Obviously, a Kabam employee can't honor that stipulation because they actually are employees, so (presumably) employees have separate terms spelled out to them if they happen to be (or become) public facing content creators. Most companies like this have rules against astroturfing, for example.
The CCP is a program for outsiders to gain access to Kabam. It would be somewhat nonsensical for a Kabam employee to also be a member of the program since the CCP program can offer them nothing they don't already have. Content creators who previously operated within the CCP have gone on to become employees, but as there is no Avengers moment when Tony Stark promoted them, I can see how that distinction might not be obvious.
Why this matters when discussing disclosure is I believe to the extent any ethical standard exists, the employee relationship takes precedence. In other words, it would not be a proper disclosure for a Kabam employee to disclose they were a CCP member and not an employee. There are exceptions and caveats to that, but I believe in general an employee saying their information came from the content creator program would be misleading.
I say there are caveats because there's a huge difference between the dude working in the mail room failing to identify themselves as a Kabam employee on their twitch channel and one of the champion designers doing the same while reviewing one of their own designs, say. But those nuances would be very difficult to identify from the outside.
Thanks for your response and contribution.
I think one of the things that's come out of this thread is that there's a number of mitigating, and aggravating factors:
1. The spectrum of what constitutes a "Kabam employee" and the duration and/or number of hours you do for Kabam.
2. There's also debate about how big your YouTube channel is and whether your sphere of influence beaches the threshold.
3. Then there's also the discussion around the nature of your YouTube content - i.e. are you protecting Kabam and carefully curating what messaging you put in front of your audience (or hide from them)? Or conversely, do you just make guides on his to beat content? E.g. MCOC NOOB type content
To conflate being an employee with just being a member of the CCP diverts focus away from the core issue - "Should an influential MCOC YouTuber who works for Kabam in a meaningful way disclose to viewers to mitigate the effects of a conflict of interest?"
In my opinion, only two things matter (well, three, but hold that thought). One: conflict of interest. Two: appearance of impropriety.
It would be an actual conflict of interest to be an employee of Kabam and present yourself to the audience as a neutral third party. I’m not saying an employee can’t be objective or critical, but even the most objective person alive would be subject to certain skews of perspective as an employee. They would be privy to information no outsider would have access to that would influence their opinions about things like, say, whether Kabam was doing enough to fix an issue. It would be hard to believe they were not doing enough when all your friends were working overtime on it, for example. Disclosing that relationship allows viewers to make up their own minds as to whether to judge your opinions reasonably free of bias.
Even if you are an employee and disclose that fact, there are still conflicts of interest possible that can require further disclosure. If I were DLL, for example, I would make it a point to disclose when I was making a video about a champion i myself explicitly designed (which is a thing I’m pretty sure he actually does), separate from reviewing something that was not my own work, to further disclose any specific source of bias.
Completely separate from that, even if there is no actual conflict of interest there can be the appearance of one, and those should be disclosed purely from a credibility perspective. If you don’t disclose and then one day it comes to light, it will be much more difficult to argue no actual conflict existed, when you elected not to disclose. There will be, in the eyes of many, a presumption of a conflict if it was perceived as actively hidden.
I don’t believe how many subs you have matters. I don’t believe the reach of individual creators matters. I think those are generalities that matter within the larger discussion of whether disclosure should happen in general. Content creators in general have a reach, they in general have influence, and they in general have the trust of a significant percentage of their viewership. Because of these generalities, all of them should follow the same ethical guidelines, because they themselves cannot be an objective judge of whether the rules should apply to themselves.
There is, of course, a third thing that enters into the discussion, and that is the legal or regulatory environment. That’s a much more complex discussion. In general, however, the CCP members are not financially compensated, and thus would avoid most of those requirements in general. Employees are a different matter, but that’s a legal grey area.
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
They tried to keep it hidden. But it got out. And then they all came out. There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now. -Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos. -Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
The real Kabam John is not a YouTuber 🤨 that channel is just a random dude using his name
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
You're asking an unintentionally bizarre question. Let's start with the fact that i would argue none of those people are in fact members of the CCP.
The CCP is a program originally created to work with content creators (originally, Youtube video creators) by offering them early access to upcoming content (originally, new champions, but later all sorts of content) so that they could work on video content related to that MCOC content and be prepared to release it when that MCOC content itself released. This way the content creators could be talking about what new stuff was happening in the game as it happened at a higher quality, which benefitted the content creators and the game. The program consists of three main parts: an NDA agreement which governs what the content creators can disclose and when (it is the primary means of enforcing embargos on new content information), access to the beta test server where things like new content and new champions can be granted and tested without altering live accounts, and access to the CCP discord, where content creators can discuss the game and the content directly with the developers.
No employee of Kabam would need to be a member of the CCP to gain access to any of these things. Employees are already non-disclosed as part of their employment contracts. Employees can probably request beta access directly. And employees obviously already have access to the devs: they can just walk up to them and chat. Those four individuals might have been members of the CCP at one time, but I think that their status changed when they became employees. Assuming MSD is an employee: I don't recall if he explicitly stated he was or not (he could be a contractual hire).
There's no handbook or anything governing this, but one thing CCP members are supposed to is disclose the fact that they are members of the CCP whenever they make content using information received through the program. This is often implicit when they simply state that their footage came from the CCP server, but technically they are supposed to say that. Furthermore, there's a general rule that they are not supposed to state or imply that they are Kabam employees or officially represent Kabam in their content. Obviously, a Kabam employee can't honor that stipulation because they actually are employees, so (presumably) employees have separate terms spelled out to them if they happen to be (or become) public facing content creators. Most companies like this have rules against astroturfing, for example.
The CCP is a program for outsiders to gain access to Kabam. It would be somewhat nonsensical for a Kabam employee to also be a member of the program since the CCP program can offer them nothing they don't already have. Content creators who previously operated within the CCP have gone on to become employees, but as there is no Avengers moment when Tony Stark promoted them, I can see how that distinction might not be obvious.
Why this matters when discussing disclosure is I believe to the extent any ethical standard exists, the employee relationship takes precedence. In other words, it would not be a proper disclosure for a Kabam employee to disclose they were a CCP member and not an employee. There are exceptions and caveats to that, but I believe in general an employee saying their information came from the content creator program would be misleading.
I say there are caveats because there's a huge difference between the dude working in the mail room failing to identify themselves as a Kabam employee on their twitch channel and one of the champion designers doing the same while reviewing one of their own designs, say. But those nuances would be very difficult to identify from the outside.
Thanks for your response and contribution.
I think one of the things that's come out of this thread is that there's a number of mitigating, and aggravating factors:
1. The spectrum of what constitutes a "Kabam employee" and the duration and/or number of hours you do for Kabam.
2. There's also debate about how big your YouTube channel is and whether your sphere of influence beaches the threshold.
3. Then there's also the discussion around the nature of your YouTube content - i.e. are you protecting Kabam and carefully curating what messaging you put in front of your audience (or hide from them)? Or conversely, do you just make guides on his to beat content? E.g. MCOC NOOB type content
To conflate being an employee with just being a member of the CCP diverts focus away from the core issue - "Should an influential MCOC YouTuber who works for Kabam in a meaningful way disclose to viewers to mitigate the effects of a conflict of interest?"
In my opinion, only two things matter (well, three, but hold that thought). One: conflict of interest. Two: appearance of impropriety.
It would be an actual conflict of interest to be an employee of Kabam and present yourself to the audience as a neutral third party. I’m not saying an employee can’t be objective or critical, but even the most objective person alive would be subject to certain skews of perspective as an employee. They would be privy to information no outsider would have access to that would influence their opinions about things like, say, whether Kabam was doing enough to fix an issue. It would be hard to believe they were not doing enough when all your friends were working overtime on it, for example. Disclosing that relationship allows viewers to make up their own minds as to whether to judge your opinions reasonably free of bias.
Even if you are an employee and disclose that fact, there are still conflicts of interest possible that can require further disclosure. If I were DLL, for example, I would make it a point to disclose when I was making a video about a champion i myself explicitly designed (which is a thing I’m pretty sure he actually does), separate from reviewing something that was not my own work, to further disclose any specific source of bias.
Completely separate from that, even if there is no actual conflict of interest there can be the appearance of one, and those should be disclosed purely from a credibility perspective. If you don’t disclose and then one day it comes to light, it will be much more difficult to argue no actual conflict existed, when you elected not to disclose. There will be, in the eyes of many, a presumption of a conflict if it was perceived as actively hidden.
I don’t believe how many subs you have matters. I don’t believe the reach of individual creators matters. I think those are generalities that matter within the larger discussion of whether disclosure should happen in general. Content creators in general have a reach, they in general have influence, and they in general have the trust of a significant percentage of their viewership. Because of these generalities, all of them should follow the same ethical guidelines, because they themselves cannot be an objective judge of whether the rules should apply to themselves.
There is, of course, a third thing that enters into the discussion, and that is the legal or regulatory environment. That’s a much more complex discussion. In general, however, the CCP members are not financially compensated, and thus would avoid most of those requirements in general. Employees are a different matter, but that’s a legal grey area.
If a video ist paid for by Kabam, it is required by law in most countries that this is disclosed.
If a creator is just a member of a Creator Program, there is no reason to believe Kabam is influencing the videos. I myself am in several Creator Programs of huge developers and publishers, and have been for several years, and not even once has one of them even attempted influencing my opinions or scripts.In that case, I do not see why it should be required to disclose a partnership
Hi thanks for your message.
It's about being in a content creator program, it's "are they employed by Kabam"
What is your opinion about it if the content creator is a member of staff for Kabam in some capacity?
Doesn't change the argument. As long as Kabam doesn't actively influence the videos or pay for them, no.
Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
Think of it this way: if you worked for BMW sales department and you had a YouTube channel with 25k subscribers making content about which "contact executive car" is the best in a shootout between BMW, Mercedes, Audi.. but every the BMW 3 series just seems to mysteriously come out as the winner all the time (as well as other categories of car where BMW models win every time). That's a more accurate analogy IMO.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
Then your problem is you thinking that the developer will always, without fail, influence the videos of the creators. That is just incorrect. My analogy is far more accurate to how life actually works. Your analogy falls off when in such a comparison, the employee would more likely choose the BMW simply because they know the car better than the Audi or Mercedes. That's like asking an MCOC YouTuber to choose between MCOC or, I don't know, Sonic Forces. They will choose MCOC because they know the game better and they like it, not because they work with the developer.
As I said: Does the developer actively pay for the video? Then you are required by law to disclose that you got paid for it. If the developer does not pay for the video, there is no reason to assume every video is steered into some direction simply because the developer said so. Developers who tried that fell on their noses.
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
They tried to keep it hidden. But it got out. And then they all came out. There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now. -Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos. -Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
Who's "they?"
Dave actually publicly joined Kabam long ago: he made it a point of mentioning he was moving to take the job. Then he went off to work on a different Kabam title and stopped making MCOC videos. And now he's back with MCOC. But at no time do I recall Dave actively attempting to hide his employment status with Kabam. Quite the opposite.
KarateMike started off making champion highlight videos. He *obviously* couldn't hide the fact that he was working for Kabam, because his actual work product was as public as public gets. I don't recall him actually stating explicitly "I am being paid to make content for Kabam to release officially" but anyone who thought he was doing that voluntarily or that Kabam would allow someone to do it voluntarily doesn't understand how this works. Kabam would *have* to pay him to guarantee his work was covered by work for hire.
MSD literally announced the fact he had gotten a job (of some kind) doing work for Kabam in a public video. Doing Mike's old job, actually, since Mike has since been promoted to straight man for Dave.
I don't recall precisely when DLL became employed with Kabam, so I cannot directly address the precise disclosure circumstances there, but it has been public knowledge that he works for Kabam for quite some time. I do not believe he disclosed that fact as part of some mass disclosure.
By the way, as far as I am aware the Kabam tag is voluntary. No game company forces their employees to out themselves in their games like that, except when using special accounts for official reasons.
If a video ist paid for by Kabam, it is required by law in most countries that this is disclosed.
If a creator is just a member of a Creator Program, there is no reason to believe Kabam is influencing the videos. I myself am in several Creator Programs of huge developers and publishers, and have been for several years, and not even once has one of them even attempted influencing my opinions or scripts.In that case, I do not see why it should be required to disclose a partnership
Hi thanks for your message.
It's about being in a content creator program, it's "are they employed by Kabam"
What is your opinion about it if the content creator is a member of staff for Kabam in some capacity?
Doesn't change the argument. As long as Kabam doesn't actively influence the videos or pay for them, no.
Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
Think of it this way: if you worked for BMW sales department and you had a YouTube channel with 25k subscribers making content about which "contact executive car" is the best in a shootout between BMW, Mercedes, Audi.. but every the BMW 3 series just seems to mysteriously come out as the winner all the time (as well as other categories of car where BMW models win every time). That's a more accurate analogy IMO.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
Then your problem is you thinking that the developer will always, without fail, influence the videos of the creators. That is just incorrect. My analogy is far more accurate to how life actually works. Your analogy falls off when in such a comparison, the employee would more likely choose the BMW simply because they know the car better than the Audi or Mercedes. That's like asking an MCOC YouTuber to choose between MCOC or, I don't know, Sonic Forces. They will choose MCOC because they know the game better and they like it, not because they work with the developer.
As I said: Does the developer actively pay for the video? Then you are required by law to disclose that you got paid for it. If the developer does not pay for the video, there is no reason to assume every video is steered into some direction simply because the developer said so. Developers who tried that fell on their noses.
No - the BMW salesman who runs a YouTube channel didn't declare the BMW 3-series the winner because he knows the car better.. he's bias towards the company he works for..
Look up Organizational Commitment Theory: Affective Commitment. It's often the driver for subconscious bias.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
As DNA explained perfectly, an actual employee can't be impartial.
(Hence my previous answer about full-time employment)
A person in the CCP who doesn't work for Kabam is impartial, clearly.
A person who is essentially a self-employed freelancer, that may work on occasion for Kabam is somewhere between the two; and you'd be foolish to consider them either 100% impartial, but equally foolish to think they are significantly compromised.
If they were sponsored to produce a particular video, it should be disclosed. If they weren't sponsored for a particular video, viewers should be safe to assume that it's largely free from undue influence.
But surely you/we should also have the intelligence to recognise that online Influencers are never going to be completely free from being Influenced themselves, after all.
Anyone going to YouTube for a completely unbiased opinion is going to have a challenging search.
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
They tried to keep it hidden. But it got out. And then they all came out. There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now. -Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos. -Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
The real Kabam John is not a YouTuber 🤨 that channel is just a random dude using his name
I followed him back in the day. Rofl, somewhat helpful too. big oopsie. So he won't have the kabam tag.
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
They tried to keep it hidden. But it got out. And then they all came out. There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now. -Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos. -Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
Who's "they?"
Dave actually publicly joined Kabam long ago: he made it a point of mentioning he was moving to take the job. Then he went off to work on a different Kabam title and stopped making MCOC videos. And now he's back with MCOC. But at no time do I recall Dave actively attempting to hide his employment status with Kabam. Quite the opposite.
KarateMike started off making champion highlight videos. He *obviously* couldn't hide the fact that he was working for Kabam, because his actual work product was as public as public gets. I don't recall him actually stating explicitly "I am being paid to make content for Kabam to release officially" but anyone who thought he was doing that voluntarily or that Kabam would allow someone to do it voluntarily doesn't understand how this works. Kabam would *have* to pay him to guarantee his work was covered by work for hire.
MSD literally announced the fact he had gotten a job (of some kind) doing work for Kabam in a public video. Doing Mike's old job, actually, since Mike has since been promoted to straight man for Dave.
I don't recall precisely when DLL became employed with Kabam, so I cannot directly address the precise disclosure circumstances there, but it has been public knowledge that he works for Kabam for quite some time. I do not believe he disclosed that fact as part of some mass disclosure.
By the way, as far as I am aware the Kabam tag is voluntary. No game company forces their employees to out themselves in their games like that, except when using special accounts for official reasons.
- Dave visited Kabam and saw some behind the scenes stuff which was really exciting, shortly after that he got a job at Kabam and we were super happy for him (though sad to see less of him on YouTube making music 🎵). He was very transparent about it all and I believe he moved house with his family for it?
- Mike was asked a lot directly in streams but didn't confirm until maybe a week later when he made a community post I believe (along with an apology for doing "mercing" - back when it wasn't as toxic with the community). The disclosure seemed to come shortly after a YouTuber called KT1 found that Mike was seemingly working for Kabam.
- DLL was next to disclose he worked for Kabam, I believe shortly after the Mike situation had concluded. He did it of his own volition without any rumor of it beforehand, the timeline adds up, because his first champ hadn't even been released at that time yet - he was a new hire. The format of the disclosure I believe was a video.
- MSD made a video which described at length what his role at Kabam would comprise of and what content he would no longer be able to post, so that his viewers would be apprised of the change.
To date that's the only Kabam staff that have sizeable, influential YouTube channels and I've listed them chronologically.
If a video ist paid for by Kabam, it is required by law in most countries that this is disclosed.
If a creator is just a member of a Creator Program, there is no reason to believe Kabam is influencing the videos. I myself am in several Creator Programs of huge developers and publishers, and have been for several years, and not even once has one of them even attempted influencing my opinions or scripts.In that case, I do not see why it should be required to disclose a partnership
Hi thanks for your message.
It's about being in a content creator program, it's "are they employed by Kabam"
What is your opinion about it if the content creator is a member of staff for Kabam in some capacity?
Doesn't change the argument. As long as Kabam doesn't actively influence the videos or pay for them, no.
Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
Think of it this way: if you worked for BMW sales department and you had a YouTube channel with 25k subscribers making content about which "contact executive car" is the best in a shootout between BMW, Mercedes, Audi.. but every the BMW 3 series just seems to mysteriously come out as the winner all the time (as well as other categories of car where BMW models win every time). That's a more accurate analogy IMO.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
Then your problem is you thinking that the developer will always, without fail, influence the videos of the creators. That is just incorrect. My analogy is far more accurate to how life actually works. Your analogy falls off when in such a comparison, the employee would more likely choose the BMW simply because they know the car better than the Audi or Mercedes. That's like asking an MCOC YouTuber to choose between MCOC or, I don't know, Sonic Forces. They will choose MCOC because they know the game better and they like it, not because they work with the developer.
As I said: Does the developer actively pay for the video? Then you are required by law to disclose that you got paid for it. If the developer does not pay for the video, there is no reason to assume every video is steered into some direction simply because the developer said so. Developers who tried that fell on their noses.
No - the BMW salesman who runs a YouTube channel didn't declare the BMW 3-series the winner because he knows the car better.. he's bias towards the company he works for..
Look up Organizational Commitment Theory: Affective Commitment. It's often the driver for subconscious bias.
The only one biased here is you. That's the harsh truth. You believe that an employee is always biased towards their employer, but that's really not how life works. You are not even considering the option that I may be right, yet I am actually working with several developers directly myself. I know how this works, I live it, and you still believe you know better. This also makes it clear that you are not seeking opinions, but rather people who agree with you. Have fun with that.
If a video ist paid for by Kabam, it is required by law in most countries that this is disclosed.
If a creator is just a member of a Creator Program, there is no reason to believe Kabam is influencing the videos. I myself am in several Creator Programs of huge developers and publishers, and have been for several years, and not even once has one of them even attempted influencing my opinions or scripts.In that case, I do not see why it should be required to disclose a partnership
Hi thanks for your message.
It's about being in a content creator program, it's "are they employed by Kabam"
What is your opinion about it if the content creator is a member of staff for Kabam in some capacity?
Doesn't change the argument. As long as Kabam doesn't actively influence the videos or pay for them, no.
Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
Think of it this way: if you worked for BMW sales department and you had a YouTube channel with 25k subscribers making content about which "contact executive car" is the best in a shootout between BMW, Mercedes, Audi.. but every the BMW 3 series just seems to mysteriously come out as the winner all the time (as well as other categories of car where BMW models win every time). That's a more accurate analogy IMO.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
Then your problem is you thinking that the developer will always, without fail, influence the videos of the creators. That is just incorrect. My analogy is far more accurate to how life actually works. Your analogy falls off when in such a comparison, the employee would more likely choose the BMW simply because they know the car better than the Audi or Mercedes. That's like asking an MCOC YouTuber to choose between MCOC or, I don't know, Sonic Forces. They will choose MCOC because they know the game better and they like it, not because they work with the developer.
As I said: Does the developer actively pay for the video? Then you are required by law to disclose that you got paid for it. If the developer does not pay for the video, there is no reason to assume every video is steered into some direction simply because the developer said so. Developers who tried that fell on their noses.
No - the BMW salesman who runs a YouTube channel didn't declare the BMW 3-series the winner because he knows the car better.. he's bias towards the company he works for..
Look up Organizational Commitment Theory: Affective Commitment. It's often the driver for subconscious bias.
The only one biased here is you. That's the harsh truth. You believe that an employee is always biased towards their employer, but that's really not how life works. You are not even considering the option that I may be right, yet I am actually working with several developers directly myself. I know how this works, I live it, and you still believe you know better. This also makes it clear that you are not seeking opinions, but rather people who agree with you. Have fun with that.
Apologies, I misinterpreted what you were actually trying to say. I've re-read your comment in a different light and understand it properly now. Thanks for coming back to correct me - it was needed! 😅
Also - I've found out a load of opinions, arguments, counter-arguments, which I've tried to sum up earlier to DNA3000. Much of those points i would've never thought of before this thread.
I've adjusted my lens to include the fact that the employees may not be bias at all - so it can just be the perception, which doesn't translate to anything material, in reality.
Every creator in the CCP who is employed by Kabam in any way is known to the community. There are no "secretly employed" content creators.
I do agree there needs to be a disclosure of that, though. But there always has been.
Wow! Thanks for this info!
So if a YouTuber who is in the CCP does work for Kabam in any way it's known - nobody secretly works for them aside from who we already have been informed of.
Has this always been the case? Because I know when Karate Mike was doing work for Kabam he was asked directly about it in streams and didn't respond, it was only subsequently that he did a post officially announcing it. I feel like he was the first person that has it happened to.
Aside from Karate Mike, which other members of the CCP are also employees? I know you said it's known to the community. Is there a list of all CCP members and from that a list of CCP members who also work for Kabam? I only know of:
- Dork Lessons - Karate Mike - Daddy Long Legs - Metal Sonic Dude
Can you add any more?
They tried to keep it hidden. But it got out. And then they all came out. There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now. -Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos. -Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
Who's "they?"
Dave actually publicly joined Kabam long ago: he made it a point of mentioning he was moving to take the job. Then he went off to work on a different Kabam title and stopped making MCOC videos. And now he's back with MCOC. But at no time do I recall Dave actively attempting to hide his employment status with Kabam. Quite the opposite.
KarateMike started off making champion highlight videos. He *obviously* couldn't hide the fact that he was working for Kabam, because his actual work product was as public as public gets. I don't recall him actually stating explicitly "I am being paid to make content for Kabam to release officially" but anyone who thought he was doing that voluntarily or that Kabam would allow someone to do it voluntarily doesn't understand how this works. Kabam would *have* to pay him to guarantee his work was covered by work for hire.
MSD literally announced the fact he had gotten a job (of some kind) doing work for Kabam in a public video. Doing Mike's old job, actually, since Mike has since been promoted to straight man for Dave.
I don't recall precisely when DLL became employed with Kabam, so I cannot directly address the precise disclosure circumstances there, but it has been public knowledge that he works for Kabam for quite some time. I do not believe he disclosed that fact as part of some mass disclosure.
By the way, as far as I am aware the Kabam tag is voluntary. No game company forces their employees to out themselves in their games like that, except when using special accounts for official reasons.
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream. I was subbed to most of the English speaking top AW alliance players at that time. DLL made his own video that he works for kabam as a designer. It did happen after karatemike. Msd is new one, can't be bundled with the older reveals. And good for him too.
Thought they gave the whole team the kabam tag. Good to hear that it's voluntary. That's how most of the community found out nah is a dev. I saw him in various streams but never knew. Many from the team were playing BGs to hand out kabammed emoji, that's how I got mine.
Thanks for your input. I'm also interested to know what you think of the "conflict of interest" argument. Does what the YouTuber wants trump it? Or is conflict of interest not really a factor?
Not trying to change your mind, just asking for more info. I do have my mind changed on things if/when I get new/more information.
Whatever working relationship Kabam has with content creators can be a 1 off project, so any declaration is simply too much red tape for content creators who aren't answerable to viewers
So just a 1-off project shouldn't be disclosed? Understood. What about if the 1-off project lasted 12 months, would that then qualify?
Also, are you saying 2 separate 1-off projects would be the point that viewers should be told?
(Also just wanted to mention, it can just be a post on their community tab "Hi all, wanted to share some great news that I'm doing some work with Kabam" - really doesn't need to involve a ton of red tape)
Finally, content creators don't have to answer to their viewers, that's true - but it'll end up in them losing their viewers as they would alienate them.
Content creators don't have legal obligations to tell you if the food they just reviewed was sponsored by the restaurant
Similarly MCOC youtubers don't have to tell you that they have been invited to an exclusive event at the Kabam HQ where they get exclusive news about the game and any benefits they get from Kabam
Bcos they signed non disclosure agreement with Kabam
Viewers have no legal standing to demand any disclosure or information from the content creators
That's not what NDA is. You can say you signed an NDA. That does not violate NDA.
Technically, there are NDAs that restrict who you can disclose that you even have such a relationship with, in effect barring those who sign the NDA from disclosing that they are operating under an NDA. Kabam does not, to the best of my knowledge, have such clauses in their NDAs (none I've seen) but they do exist, and I am a party to a few of them in other contexts (which is a thing I am legally allowed to say, provided I do not specify the details or parties involved).
These usually exist when you are doing work of a sensitive or confidential nature. Even saying "I am doing work of a sensitive or confidential nature for this company but it is super secret and I'm not allowed to talk about it" is in and of itself something the company does not want you to reveal. But of course, when your work is public, this type of clause doesn't make sense as it would place the party to the NDA in an untenable situation.
It doesn't bother me either way if they get paid by Kabam. I watch what I find enjoyable or I can learn from.
All youtubers have an agenda, they are either trying to get youtube money or Kabam money and target their videos to what gets the most clicks. With that realistic thought process i watch stuff that is helpful to me ie jason voorhees or is funny to me ie seatin.
No matter how someone makes their video if it is all doom and gloom on game i won't watch it on the flip side if it is all this game has no problems i won't watch that either.
I have my own opinions as this game is overall great (been here since beta with multiple accounts) but has some flaws
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream.
The fact that Mike did not want to discuss the details of his relationship with Kabam does not change the fact that he was contributing content to videos being released by Kabam in its official channel. He couldn't hide that fact, and that fact meant he had a paid professional relationship with Kabam.
This thread is primarily focused on content creators releasing content on their own personal channels. Whether they have a relationship with Kabam, and if so what is the nature of that relationship. But once Karatemike stared making content for Kabam's channel, on a regular basis, it can be inferred at that point he was working for Kabam, either on a contractual basis or as an employee. There's no other reasonable possibility.
The reason why this is inevitable has to do with the fact that Kabam would not allow someone to create content they themselves released on their own official channel under their name for official purposes without actually paying them, because legally speaking they would want the legal rights to that content. Under US law, creators gain "copyright at birth" - the doctrine that a creator owns their work the instant they create it, without having to do anything to assert that legal right. Nor can you simply give that right away. Copyright can only be transferred legally under a certain set of circumstances. The easiest in this situation is to not have to do that in the first place, by either contracting for the work as a work for hire project, or as asserting work for hire as work product from an employee. In either case, Kabam would then own the legal rights to the content.
In Canada, things are (as far as I am aware, I am more familiar with US copyright law) even more strict. The automatic doctrine of work for hire does not exist in Canada, so to own the rights to the work in Canada Kabam would have to spell this out contractually, either in an employment document or in the work contract. But either way, the point is absent these protections, Mike could assert copyright on all those videos and demand compensation or ask they be taken down, even if he was not the sole contributor to them. No company would allow such a situation to occur.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
My question is, what is the end goal of this line of questioning?
That's a great question, thanks for asking it!
Initially it was just to see at a glance what the community thought about this topic, and why they may think it is/is not an issue.
I'd say, for me, personally - 5 things emerged. The first three have happened (or are due imminently), and the last two are subsequent actions that logically it may lead to.
1) Gathering qualitative data: Loads of progress has been made already about what factors are relevant when deciding whether a disclosure would be appropriate - so headway has already been made.
2) We've had SlayerOfGods stating there's list of CCP members and employees that have a YouTube channel already, so that'll hopefully be posted soon.
3) Gathering quantitative data: We've got a representation of what the community preference is - albeit with a small sample size, hopefully more people will vote and help make it more representative. At the moment it looks like the majority of votes are inclined to want transparency, so that's further progress.
4) Hopefully Kabam will give their position on this and it may stimulate policy creation, if none already exists to strengthen their framework of making the company ethical in all that it does.
5) Any other YouTube content creators who do work for Kabam who are currently not being transparent about the nature of their relationship with Kabam to take steps to remedy this - akin to an amnesty. (Or for Kabam to confirm that no other popular YouTubers other than those who are known and haven't yet disclosed).
It would be great to get some official input from Kabam, and for this thread to act as an agent of change, for the betterment of all Kabam stakeholders.
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream.
The fact that Mike did not want to discuss the details of his relationship with Kabam does not change the fact that he was contributing content to videos being released by Kabam in its official channel. He couldn't hide that fact, and that fact meant he had a paid professional relationship with Kabam.
This thread is primarily focused on content creators releasing content on their own personal channels. Whether they have a relationship with Kabam, and if so what is the nature of that relationship. But once Karatemike stared making content for Kabam's channel, on a regular basis, it can be inferred at that point he was working for Kabam, either on a contractual basis or as an employee. There's no other reasonable possibility.
The reason why this is inevitable has to do with the fact that Kabam would not allow someone to create content they themselves released on their own official channel under their name for official purposes without actually paying them, because legally speaking they would want the legal rights to that content. Under US law, creators gain "copyright at birth" - the doctrine that a creator owns their work the instant they create it, without having to do anything to assert that legal right. Nor can you simply give that right away. Copyright can only be transferred legally under a certain set of circumstances. The easiest in this situation is to not have to do that in the first place, by either contracting for the work as a work for hire project, or as asserting work for hire as work product from an employee. In either case, Kabam would then own the legal rights to the content.
In Canada, things are (as far as I am aware, I am more familiar with US copyright law) even more strict. The automatic doctrine of work for hire does not exist in Canada, so to own the rights to the work in Canada Kabam would have to spell this out contractually, either in an employment document or in the work contract. But either way, the point is absent these protections, Mike could assert copyright on all those videos and demand compensation or ask they be taken down, even if he was not the sole contributor to them. No company would allow such a situation to occur.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
Plus I think a postmortem on what happened in the past, and finger pointing doesn't really serve any purpose.
What's more important is any possible next steps that may emerge from the ideas raised in this thread to raise the ethical bar and be a trailblazing organisation with unrivalled ethics standards.
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream.
The fact that Mike did not want to discuss the details of his relationship with Kabam does not change the fact that he was contributing content to videos being released by Kabam in its official channel. He couldn't hide that fact, and that fact meant he had a paid professional relationship with Kabam.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
You can keep bringing leagal points in this as much as you want Mr. 3000, it will not change the fact that he was not happy admitting he was working for kabam at that time. Good for him for getting the job. And he is working full time now. Also Great! Just like anybody else. DLL, msd, you name it. The bias towards work is natural and it's okay.
I didn't pay attention to the small text(ign) on the deep dives. So it was not obvious, to most players especially to his subs for months. I was subbed to him at that time too. He made his own content, he did live streams, tier lists, champion showcases, crystal openings, offer reviews. And in the end it came down to transperancy with his subs. Why would anybody be against someone who is working for kabam. People wanted a disclosure, if that was true. ... I don't think I have ever seen a creator do any kind of kabam advertisement. If they were getting paid, they would put the video as sponsored.
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream.
The fact that Mike did not want to discuss the details of his relationship with Kabam does not change the fact that he was contributing content to videos being released by Kabam in its official channel. He couldn't hide that fact, and that fact meant he had a paid professional relationship with Kabam.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
You can keep bringing leagal points in this as much as you want Mr. 3000, it will not change the fact that he was not happy admitting he was working for kabam at that time. Good for him for getting the job. And he is working full time now. Also Great! Just like anybody else. DLL, msd, you name it. The bias towards work is natural and it's okay.
I didn't pay attention to the small text(ign) on the deep dives. So it was not obvious, to most players especially to his subs for months. I was subbed to him at that time too. He made his own content, he did live streams, tier lists, champion showcases, crystal openings, offer reviews. And in the end it came down to transperancy with his subs. Why would anybody be against someone who is working for kabam. People wanted a disclosure, if that was true. ... I don't think I have ever seen a creator do any kind of kabam advertisement. If they were getting paid, they would put the video as sponsored.
You don't speculate about whether the guy manning the drive thru at McDonalds is an employee or a volunteer performing community service. That's not a legal point. That's common sense. The legal point just backs up the common sense that most people with a brain are supposed to possess.
Yes - we should ideally be told they do work for Kabam
I'm surprised so many people look at the question as a legal "can they keep it to themselves" instead of conscientious "should they warn the viewer". Imo legal issues are not the question here, plus legally it can be different for different countries and laws may change in any selected country. And as they may be biased or interested to present the information in one way or another, it's only honest for them to tell the viewers out of respect to those viewers how they're involved with kabam. All the youtubers (3 in total) I watch who do reviews for PC games always even mention if they get a free game from the developer to review, and that does let me put more trust to what they say. They are not obliged to, but imo it's a right thing to do
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream.
The fact that Mike did not want to discuss the details of his relationship with Kabam does not change the fact that he was contributing content to videos being released by Kabam in its official channel. He couldn't hide that fact, and that fact meant he had a paid professional relationship with Kabam.
This thread is primarily focused on content creators releasing content on their own personal channels. Whether they have a relationship with Kabam, and if so what is the nature of that relationship. But once Karatemike stared making content for Kabam's channel, on a regular basis, it can be inferred at that point he was working for Kabam, either on a contractual basis or as an employee. There's no other reasonable possibility.
The reason why this is inevitable has to do with the fact that Kabam would not allow someone to create content they themselves released on their own official channel under their name for official purposes without actually paying them, because legally speaking they would want the legal rights to that content. Under US law, creators gain "copyright at birth" - the doctrine that a creator owns their work the instant they create it, without having to do anything to assert that legal right. Nor can you simply give that right away. Copyright can only be transferred legally under a certain set of circumstances. The easiest in this situation is to not have to do that in the first place, by either contracting for the work as a work for hire project, or as asserting work for hire as work product from an employee. In either case, Kabam would then own the legal rights to the content.
In Canada, things are (as far as I am aware, I am more familiar with US copyright law) even more strict. The automatic doctrine of work for hire does not exist in Canada, so to own the rights to the work in Canada Kabam would have to spell this out contractually, either in an employment document or in the work contract. But either way, the point is absent these protections, Mike could assert copyright on all those videos and demand compensation or ask they be taken down, even if he was not the sole contributor to them. No company would allow such a situation to occur.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
Can't they volunteer and kabam will still hold IP rights of the videoss created by karathemiike? Without paying him, provided he is okay with it as his work is volunteering, unpaid in nature? Or is it not allowed under US/Canadian laws
Everyone knew about dave, but no one knew about karatemike. Mike kept it secret and didn't answer the question on his live stream.
The fact that Mike did not want to discuss the details of his relationship with Kabam does not change the fact that he was contributing content to videos being released by Kabam in its official channel. He couldn't hide that fact, and that fact meant he had a paid professional relationship with Kabam.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
You can keep bringing leagal points in this as much as you want Mr. 3000, it will not change the fact that he was not happy admitting he was working for kabam at that time. Good for him for getting the job. And he is working full time now. Also Great! Just like anybody else. DLL, msd, you name it. The bias towards work is natural and it's okay.
I didn't pay attention to the small text(ign) on the deep dives. So it was not obvious, to most players especially to his subs for months. I was subbed to him at that time too. He made his own content, he did live streams, tier lists, champion showcases, crystal openings, offer reviews. And in the end it came down to transperancy with his subs. Why would anybody be against someone who is working for kabam. People wanted a disclosure, if that was true. ... I don't think I have ever seen a creator do any kind of kabam advertisement. If they were getting paid, they would put the video as sponsored.
You don't speculate about whether the guy manning the drive thru at McDonalds is an employee or a volunteer performing community service. That's not a legal point. That's common sense. The legal point just backs up the common sense that most people with a brain are supposed to possess.
I don't want to rile you up Mr.3000. I'm just a uncommon man with low common sense backed by less functioning brain. I need things to be dumbed down for me to understand. I would prefer to know if someone is working for a company, even from word of mouth
Do we know the drive through guy has a McD fastfood eating/review youtube channel, or any amount of influence over his viewership? Normal people coming to the window don't need to know anything. 'Shouldn't' his subscriber community be aware of the paid/unpaid work?
And I think, It's great when we have actual active players from community hired in the team. Just like having DLL in the team, its helpful to the community.
In the 10th anniversary Live Stream, you can see who are the content creators, because they appear for some seconds to congrats Kabam on a video inside the live.
If they are "paid" to promote the game, its a win/win for both sides...
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Think of it this way: If you worked for BMW and decided to buy a 3-Series out of free will, would you put a sticker on it saying "employed by BMW"?
I think one of the things that's come out of this thread is that there's a number of mitigating, and aggravating factors:
1. The spectrum of what constitutes a "Kabam employee" and the duration and/or number of hours you do for Kabam.
2. There's also debate about how big your YouTube channel is and whether your sphere of influence beaches the threshold.
3. Then there's also the discussion around the nature of your YouTube content - i.e. are you protecting Kabam and carefully curating what messaging you put in front of your audience (or hide from them)? Or conversely, do you just make guides on his to beat content? E.g. MCOC NOOB type content
To conflate being an employee with just being a member of the CCP diverts focus away from the core issue - "Should an influential MCOC YouTuber who works for Kabam in a meaningful way disclose to viewers to mitigate the effects of a conflict of interest?"
There is a kabam tag on thier profiles now.
-Kabam john is youtuber. I used to watch all his videos.
-Nah is youtuber.
I don't follow any mcoc youtuber now. I search for particular things and that's about it.
Effectively are viewers being steered (pun intended), into thinking more favorably about the product that the company makes, which the content creator works for as an employee.
It would be an actual conflict of interest to be an employee of Kabam and present yourself to the audience as a neutral third party. I’m not saying an employee can’t be objective or critical, but even the most objective person alive would be subject to certain skews of perspective as an employee. They would be privy to information no outsider would have access to that would influence their opinions about things like, say, whether Kabam was doing enough to fix an issue. It would be hard to believe they were not doing enough when all your friends were working overtime on it, for example. Disclosing that relationship allows viewers to make up their own minds as to whether to judge your opinions reasonably free of bias.
Even if you are an employee and disclose that fact, there are still conflicts of interest possible that can require further disclosure. If I were DLL, for example, I would make it a point to disclose when I was making a video about a champion i myself explicitly designed (which is a thing I’m pretty sure he actually does), separate from reviewing something that was not my own work, to further disclose any specific source of bias.
Completely separate from that, even if there is no actual conflict of interest there can be the appearance of one, and those should be disclosed purely from a credibility perspective. If you don’t disclose and then one day it comes to light, it will be much more difficult to argue no actual conflict existed, when you elected not to disclose. There will be, in the eyes of many, a presumption of a conflict if it was perceived as actively hidden.
I don’t believe how many subs you have matters. I don’t believe the reach of individual creators matters. I think those are generalities that matter within the larger discussion of whether disclosure should happen in general. Content creators in general have a reach, they in general have influence, and they in general have the trust of a significant percentage of their viewership. Because of these generalities, all of them should follow the same ethical guidelines, because they themselves cannot be an objective judge of whether the rules should apply to themselves.
There is, of course, a third thing that enters into the discussion, and that is the legal or regulatory environment. That’s a much more complex discussion. In general, however, the CCP members are not financially compensated, and thus would avoid most of those requirements in general. Employees are a different matter, but that’s a legal grey area.
Thank you for your thoughts - awesome post! 🙌👏
As I said: Does the developer actively pay for the video? Then you are required by law to disclose that you got paid for it. If the developer does not pay for the video, there is no reason to assume every video is steered into some direction simply because the developer said so. Developers who tried that fell on their noses.
Dave actually publicly joined Kabam long ago: he made it a point of mentioning he was moving to take the job. Then he went off to work on a different Kabam title and stopped making MCOC videos. And now he's back with MCOC. But at no time do I recall Dave actively attempting to hide his employment status with Kabam. Quite the opposite.
KarateMike started off making champion highlight videos. He *obviously* couldn't hide the fact that he was working for Kabam, because his actual work product was as public as public gets. I don't recall him actually stating explicitly "I am being paid to make content for Kabam to release officially" but anyone who thought he was doing that voluntarily or that Kabam would allow someone to do it voluntarily doesn't understand how this works. Kabam would *have* to pay him to guarantee his work was covered by work for hire.
MSD literally announced the fact he had gotten a job (of some kind) doing work for Kabam in a public video. Doing Mike's old job, actually, since Mike has since been promoted to straight man for Dave.
I don't recall precisely when DLL became employed with Kabam, so I cannot directly address the precise disclosure circumstances there, but it has been public knowledge that he works for Kabam for quite some time. I do not believe he disclosed that fact as part of some mass disclosure.
By the way, as far as I am aware the Kabam tag is voluntary. No game company forces their employees to out themselves in their games like that, except when using special accounts for official reasons.
Look up Organizational Commitment Theory: Affective Commitment. It's often the driver for subconscious bias.
(Hence my previous answer about full-time employment)
A person in the CCP who doesn't work for Kabam is impartial, clearly.
A person who is essentially a self-employed freelancer, that may work on occasion for Kabam is somewhere between the two; and you'd be foolish to consider them either 100% impartial, but equally foolish to think they are significantly compromised.
If they were sponsored to produce a particular video, it should be disclosed. If they weren't sponsored for a particular video, viewers should be safe to assume that it's largely free from undue influence.
But surely you/we should also have the intelligence to recognise that online Influencers are never going to be completely free from being Influenced themselves, after all.
Anyone going to YouTube for a completely unbiased opinion is going to have a challenging search.
- Mike was asked a lot directly in streams but didn't confirm until maybe a week later when he made a community post I believe (along with an apology for doing "mercing" - back when it wasn't as toxic with the community). The disclosure seemed to come shortly after a YouTuber called KT1 found that Mike was seemingly working for Kabam.
- DLL was next to disclose he worked for Kabam, I believe shortly after the Mike situation had concluded. He did it of his own volition without any rumor of it beforehand, the timeline adds up, because his first champ hadn't even been released at that time yet - he was a new hire. The format of the disclosure I believe was a video.
- MSD made a video which described at length what his role at Kabam would comprise of and what content he would no longer be able to post, so that his viewers would be apprised of the change.
To date that's the only Kabam staff that have sizeable, influential YouTube channels and I've listed them chronologically.
Also - I've found out a load of opinions, arguments, counter-arguments, which I've tried to sum up earlier to DNA3000. Much of those points i would've never thought of before this thread.
I've adjusted my lens to include the fact that the employees may not be bias at all - so it can just be the perception, which doesn't translate to anything material, in reality.
I was subbed to most of the English speaking top AW alliance players at that time.
DLL made his own video that he works for kabam as a designer. It did happen after karatemike. Msd is new one, can't be bundled with the older reveals. And good for him too.
Thought they gave the whole team the kabam tag. Good to hear that it's voluntary. That's how most of the community found out nah is a dev. I saw him in various streams but never knew.
Many from the team were playing BGs to hand out kabammed emoji, that's how I got mine.
These usually exist when you are doing work of a sensitive or confidential nature. Even saying "I am doing work of a sensitive or confidential nature for this company but it is super secret and I'm not allowed to talk about it" is in and of itself something the company does not want you to reveal. But of course, when your work is public, this type of clause doesn't make sense as it would place the party to the NDA in an untenable situation.
All youtubers have an agenda, they are either trying to get youtube money or Kabam money and target their videos to what gets the most clicks. With that realistic thought process i watch stuff that is helpful to me ie jason voorhees or is funny to me ie seatin.
No matter how someone makes their video if it is all doom and gloom on game i won't watch it on the flip side if it is all this game has no problems i won't watch that either.
I have my own opinions as this game is overall great (been here since beta with multiple accounts) but has some flaws
This thread is primarily focused on content creators releasing content on their own personal channels. Whether they have a relationship with Kabam, and if so what is the nature of that relationship. But once Karatemike stared making content for Kabam's channel, on a regular basis, it can be inferred at that point he was working for Kabam, either on a contractual basis or as an employee. There's no other reasonable possibility.
The reason why this is inevitable has to do with the fact that Kabam would not allow someone to create content they themselves released on their own official channel under their name for official purposes without actually paying them, because legally speaking they would want the legal rights to that content. Under US law, creators gain "copyright at birth" - the doctrine that a creator owns their work the instant they create it, without having to do anything to assert that legal right. Nor can you simply give that right away. Copyright can only be transferred legally under a certain set of circumstances. The easiest in this situation is to not have to do that in the first place, by either contracting for the work as a work for hire project, or as asserting work for hire as work product from an employee. In either case, Kabam would then own the legal rights to the content.
In Canada, things are (as far as I am aware, I am more familiar with US copyright law) even more strict. The automatic doctrine of work for hire does not exist in Canada, so to own the rights to the work in Canada Kabam would have to spell this out contractually, either in an employment document or in the work contract. But either way, the point is absent these protections, Mike could assert copyright on all those videos and demand compensation or ask they be taken down, even if he was not the sole contributor to them. No company would allow such a situation to occur.
We can debate whether someone has to assert strongly enough to everyone what their relationship is in these situations, but when the relationship is obvious, as it is here, I don't think there's a significant ethical dilemma.
Initially it was just to see at a glance what the community thought about this topic, and why they may think it is/is not an issue.
I'd say, for me, personally - 5 things emerged. The first three have happened (or are due imminently), and the last two are subsequent actions that logically it may lead to.
1) Gathering qualitative data: Loads of progress has been made already about what factors are relevant when deciding whether a disclosure would be appropriate - so headway has already been made.
2) We've had SlayerOfGods stating there's list of CCP members and employees that have a YouTube channel already, so that'll hopefully be posted soon.
3) Gathering quantitative data: We've got a representation of what the community preference is - albeit with a small sample size, hopefully more people will vote and help make it more representative. At the moment it looks like the majority of votes are inclined to want transparency, so that's further progress.
4) Hopefully Kabam will give their position on this and it may stimulate policy creation, if none already exists to strengthen their framework of making the company ethical in all that it does.
5) Any other YouTube content creators who do work for Kabam who are currently not being transparent about the nature of their relationship with Kabam to take steps to remedy this - akin to an amnesty. (Or for Kabam to confirm that no other popular YouTubers other than those who are known and haven't yet disclosed).
It would be great to get some official input from Kabam, and for this thread to act as an agent of change, for the betterment of all Kabam stakeholders.
What's more important is any possible next steps that may emerge from the ideas raised in this thread to raise the ethical bar and be a trailblazing organisation with unrivalled ethics standards.
Good for him for getting the job. And he is working full time now. Also Great! Just like anybody else. DLL, msd, you name it. The bias towards work is natural and it's okay.
I didn't pay attention to the small text(ign) on the deep dives. So it was not obvious, to most players especially to his subs for months.
I was subbed to him at that time too. He made his own content, he did live streams, tier lists, champion showcases, crystal openings, offer reviews. And in the end it came down to transperancy with his subs. Why would anybody be against someone who is working for kabam. People wanted a disclosure, if that was true.
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I don't think I have ever seen a creator do any kind of kabam advertisement. If they were getting paid, they would put the video as sponsored.
Do we know the drive through guy has a McD fastfood eating/review youtube channel, or any amount of influence over his viewership?
Normal people coming to the window don't need to know anything. 'Shouldn't' his subscriber community be aware of the paid/unpaid work?
And I think, It's great when we have actual active players from community hired in the team.
Just like having DLL in the team, its helpful to the community.
If they are "paid" to promote the game, its a win/win for both sides...
Why not?