YouTube Question A creator is harassing and threatening me! What can be done?

[BenLeo]

Hi everyone! Hope you're doing well.
Now I won't be mentioning the exact name of the channels just yet but believe that what I am saying is true and that I really need your help!

I run a gaming channel on YouTube and I am writing this to help out my fellow creator friend. Let's call him "Matt".
It all started when a creator started copying Matt's content. Let us call him "Tom". Now I understand there's nothing really wrong or bad about copying content, it happens all the time. It all escalated when Matt politely asked Tom to not copy his content (like a total carbon copy), Tom didn't like this and started abusing Matt on his public livestreams. He started spamming his own video links in Matt's comment sections. For a while Matt acted like he didn't care, hoping that Tom would let this all go but it didn't happen. What Tom did instead was, he asked his subscribers to do the same. Tom basically asks his followers, subscribers and just about anybody who follows him to write abusive comments on Matt's videos. This really doesn't help the channel grow. This can still be managed. What is serious though is that after a while when all of Tom's attempts failed to bother Matt, he started abusing and even threatening Matt and his family.
This has of course taken a toll on Matt's mental health. He can't focus and is not able to make any content. We've got several screenshots and video clips which have Tom abusing Matt in them. And the dirty comments that his followers leave on Mattes videos. I thought a lot when finally the idea of contacting YouTube directly about this popped up. I need your guidance on how to go about this entire situation. What should I do? Should I content YouTube, I doubt they'll reply on twitter. I just want some advice.
Thank you so much in advance!

Warm Regards,
Ben.

 

[DebuJalanan]

I don't know how things work in your country. But in my country, we can call the police if someone like Tom really do things like you said.
And since you have all those evidence, you really have a strong case.

 

[MattCommand1]

BenLeo,

There are two issues I see. I am not sure exactly what you mean about "copying". In the U.S., you can "copy/use" someone else's comment to the degree you use it to educate about it, comment on it, make criticisms, transform it, etc. It is the principle of "fair use".

HOWEVER, if the "copying" is taking someone's video and then making a few changes to it and calling it your own, that is problematic and can cause very upset reactions that you are seeing here. It is called plagiarism.

Perhaps you friend needs to re-evaluate the nature of his "copying" to see if it is valid or invalid. If this is a singular incident AND he feels it was inappropriate, perhaps, he can take it down and offer an apology to defuse the situation.

But clearly, your friend is now a target. He is going to have to learn how to deal with this.

Sometimes these online threats are pretty empty. But since your friend is being affected by this, he is going to have to figure out what is important and focus on YT going forward.

Being a YT creator, you have to be thoughtful of the impact of the video might have on others. Your friend is learning the hard way one consequence of "copying" from the wrong person.

No easy answers here.

 

[Planet Quiz]

I'm a newcomer here so I'm still learning too.