Copyright Issues In Video Games Live-streaming

The current video game live-streaming market is booming,and the profits are high,but the copyright issues also follow.With the "Douyu" trail,debates concerning the video game live-streaming started among the academic community,which mainly focuses on:Is video game screen copyrightable work?What are the rights of the parties in the video game live-streaming?Whether the players' play,especially those with a competitive purpose,constitutecreations in the copyright law?Is the use of the live-streaming screen limited?Does it constitute a fair use?Determining these issues is of great importance to the distribution of benefits in this field.To make the above mentioned issues clear,this Article makes expanded explanations of relevant concepts under the existing legal framework of China and introduced international conventions and extraterritorial judicial practice for settlement,and answers the questions above.Firstly,this Article breaks through the“Shooting”requirement in China's Copyright Law and combines the barely mentioned commentary by game live-streamers,and constitute works to which are assimilated works expressed by a process analogous to cinematography.Secondly,this Article makes decomposition of the opinions that the players do not create while playing games and break through the competitive purpose and the set by game developers,accord the status of author to players or performers.Last but not the least,in the evaluation of fair use,we can learn from the“four elements" of the practice of the United States.