From what I understood, part of the contract that explicitly states that the person must disclose that it is a paid content deal was missing despite being part of a standard contract.Doctor Proctor said:At least Jim got the facts mostly right, unlike the Escapist Podcast. One thing he glossed over though was that the NDA that was a part of this deal did NOT prevent disclosure, it was just an NDA on the terms of the contract. In other words, they could've said "The following video is brought to you by Micosoft" or some such thing, but just weren't supposed to talk about how much money they were receiving per 1000 views. This is fairly standard and exists even in the journalism side, as I'm sure you'd find out if you asked someone at The Escapist what their contract terms were for the commercials that they're currently running in front of their videos.
In other words, MS was never preventing anyone from disclosing the existence of the deal, and neither was Machinima. It was the YouTubers themselves who failed to inform their audience, which to my knowledge is still illegal in the US since you are required by the FTC to disclose paid sponsorships (which is why it says "Paid Spokesperson" in fine print at the bottom during testimonial style commercials). So regardless of how you feel about MS and Machinima in this, the lion's share of the blame is on the YouTubers themselves, and I wouldn't trust a word that comes out of the mouths of any of those who didn't disclose this.
Thanks for the question and answer. Was wondering myself. At first I thought it was Alpha Protocol.SwimmingRock said:I believe you're inquiring about Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta. It's on Steam and shit. Jim did a video on it on his YouTube page and I've tried it myself. Didn't get far, because I encountered a game-breaking glitch that was sort of fixed later, but I'd already uninstalled the game by that time.Bribase said:Just out of interest, what game in the video had the guy in the rucksack on the quad bike? it looks awful.
Yeah, it tends to happen when there's big news that happens in the week, and he just wants to cover it while still fresh. He did one in November when people figured out every game out for Xbox One had a paywall in it somewhere, and another extra episode back in July when Phil Fish left gaming. So not common, but it happens when there's enough to talk about.Scrumpmonkey said:I don't think so. Our lord and savior Jim blesses us with additional Jimquisitions as he sees things that incur his wrath. But there have been a few double Jimquisition weeks of late so we are a bit spoiled.Alcamonic said:Does anyone know if a Double Jim a week will be standard from now?
The Jim giveth and the Jim taketh away.Scrumpmonkey said:I don't think so. Our lord and savior Jim blesses us with additional Jimquisitions as he sees things that incur his wrath. But there have been a few double Jimquisition weeks of late so we are a bit spoiled.