A Russian Company is Taking Twitch to Court
Twitch is being sued by Rambler, a Russian tech company for 180 billion Rubles (2.87 billion dollars). Rambler has claimed that Twitch has allowed its users to re-stream some of their content. This footage is usually of soccer (football) matches which are originally broadcasted by Okko Спорт, a company which is owned by Rambler.
Rambler has said that over 36,000 matches of UK Premier League games have been re-streamed on Twitch. Something that Rambler has exclusive broadcasting rights over in Russia. Rambler has asked for 5 million Rubles in compensation for each instance of re-streaming. Rambler has gone so far as to request that the Russian government ban Twitch outright within Russia.
However, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) does not apply to Russia which has allowed streaming services to navigate this problem without the threat of credible legal ramifications. Until now.
Action has been taken to try and remove these streams of soccer (football) matches. But it has proven very difficult due to the sheer amount of games that are being streamed. Users who were caught illegally streaming games of UK Premier League games were banned from the platform without a single warning.
The case will be heard by the Moscow City Court this Friday. It is unlikely that this lawsuit will gain much traction or that the sum of money that Rambler is asking from Twitch will be much lower than the original asking price.
There were no formal complaints from Rambler up until this point which is going to be a strong point of defense. Some could also argue that a streaming service as large as Twitch simply can’t be as vigilant as some companies want them to be. We will have to wait and see what the court says on Friday.