Machinima Lays Off 42 Employs Amid Restructuring

According to a tweet made by the Senior Editor of The Wall Street Journal, Machinima has laid off 42 of their employees. This comes after a report earlier today that Warner Bros. led an investment round of $18 million for the online video game entertainment network.

There has been a lot of criticism of the policies going on at Machinima, as of late. Due to the way that Youtube has implemented Content ID and have changed how copyright claims are affected by managed and affiliate partnerships, some within the company have been vocally critical of how they have been treated, including the infamous blowup made by Youtuber Clash.

Additionally, there was a confirmed report that proved the existence of a paid incentive campaign to promote the Xbox One, between Machinima and its partners. Those who were willing to tag their video with a special tag (seen only by Machinima, its Youtube content creators and those who could create browser scripts to see these tags), promote the Xbox One positively or neutrally and show at least 30 seconds of footage were given a bonus in dollars per thousand page views. They could also not disclose the terms of their agreement to anyone. Many (including myself) found it as a breach of trust, as Youtubers were paid to promote a console without full disclosure to their audience.

With all that in mind, it is bad news whenever regular workers with no aspect of controlling company policies lose their jobs. Hopefully everybody gets settled somewhere else fairly soon.

(h/t NeoGAF)

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