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SK Telecom T1 clear up YouTube VOD takedown issue

"We would like to apologise for our initial approach."

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Korean team SK Telecom T1, who compete in the League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK) have posted a statement about YouTube VOD takedowns on Twitter, shedding some light on recent events and their stance towards the issue as a whole.

"We would like to talk about the recent YouTube VOD takedown incident," the statement reads. "We, SKT, have been finding ways to enhance the welfare of our players. Through many years of practice, we felt confident that we can generate additional revenue for our players through personal streaming and VOD management. As a result, as you all know, SKT started live streaming with Twitch. Furthermore, we are also preparing our own 'SKT T1 YouTube Channel', which will be filled with SKT related various contents."

"While operating such streaming and VOD business, we faced some critical issues. Fans were left confused between official SKT stream channel and third-party streamers, causing the split in viewership and ultimately damaging our player income. Also, content creators were creating VODs with inappropriate advertisements on soloQ plays, leveraging SKT player contents to earn profits."

"While addressing this situation, we would like to apologise for our initial approach without fully understanding the copyrights of LoL contents and rushed takedowns of VODs [and] that we have not communicated with the legitimate IP holders of the contents, Riot Games. In the future we will carefully review the VODs that may cause serious brand or monetary loss to SKT and its players, and request for takedown only through Riot Games. Riot Games will also provide support by setting a firm guideline for which VODs will be screened or not. After such guideline is set, we will make sure to revive those VODs that do not fall in the criteria of the new guideline."

This statement came after an alleged email from SKT towards Reddit user Catfish_BILLY emerged online, where they aggressively insisted that they remove videos with SKT in. SKT confirmed this was them, despite doubts online that it was fake, and this statement seems to indicate that Riot Games will be the party responsible for issuing these warnings in future (as they did with a SpectateFaker stream in 2015).

Do you think SKT were right to rush to the defence of their players, or were they too hasty?

League of Legends

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