Twitch streamer Imane ‘Pokimane’ Anys has responded following a series of videos, including one from PewDiePie himself, calling her out for allegedly falsely striking YouTube videos which use her content.
The controversy is around what is becoming known is being dubbed as ‘copystriking’, after fellow streamer Alinity claimed she would ‘copystrike’ PewDiePie simply because he used the term ‘thot’.
YouTube’s copyright claim system allows users to claim almost any video, and should their claim be illegitimate, only the claimant themselves can decide to release the it, with YouTube almost never intervening in matters of copyright disputes.
The perceived increase in the number of videos being falsely claimed prompted PewDiePie, the most subscribed channel on the platform with over 80 million subs, to make a video entitled ‘STOP DOING THIS’.
In the video, he calls out Pokimane by name, after the streamer ‘striked’ a video which was a reupload of a Twitter argument between herself and Drama Alert host KEEMSTAR. PewDiePie sympathized with Pokimane to an extent, as the video had received a high view count and was bringing more exposure to a small issue.
As Pokimane states in her response: “The reupload of the Twitter beef, wasn’t transformative content, so I was able to get it taken down through my MCN. But, PewDie was in the right – trying to hide all that drama, only ended up bringing more attention to it.”
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Pokimane also responds to a second video from YouTuber ‘Fainted’, titled “The Dark Side of Pokimane”, in which Fainted points to when she had said on stream that she planned to take down videos from a Twitch clip compilation channel, because they included her.
“In those specific scenarios I will take down videos – when it’s a straight reupload of my stream, and when it’s like a gross and misleading title,” Pokimane explained. “That was an entirely different situation, where I was well within my right to take down his content, but I shouldn’t have had that conversation on stream.”
The response to Pokimane’s apology and explanation has been generally positive and understanding, however some feel that she dodged certain accusations, including reacting to others’ content herself while live streaming on Twitch, essentially using other creators’ content.