If you’ve ever watched Kids React or Elders React on YouTube before, chances are good that you’ve heard of the Fine Bros before. Well, during the weekend, the Fine Bros were at the center of a controversy as they announced that they will be expanding their “React” empire by way of trademarking the word “react”.
In an official video announcement that has since been taken down, the Fine Bros announced that with their new “React World” platform, people who participate in their platform would be able to create “React”-style videos with some assistance from the Fine Bros itself. Participants of the “React World” platform would be required to give a share of their profits to the Fine Bros in order to leverage the platform.
This announcement did not sit well with many popular YouTube content creators as they see this platform as a method to utilise YouTube’s own slipshod Content ID system to flag down videos that the Fine Bros claim to be “similar” to their own React videos. Indeed, various reports on Reddit claims that the Fine Bros have flagged various small YouTube channels for making similar reaction videos. Redditors have also dug through the Fine Bros own Twitter page to discover that they have claimed that Ellen DeGeneres stole the React format for her own show.
The massive fallout from the Fine Bros shady attempt to stifle content creation led to a second video of them trying to better explain the “React World” platform. Unfortunately for them, many see this video as insincere and insulting to YouTube content creators as a whole.
From that video onwards, the subscriber count for the Fine Bros started rapidly dropping. Not only that, various popular YouTubers began to parody the Fine Bros “React World” announcement. One lawyer has even went on YouTube to declare that he will be offering pro bono help to content creators who were affected by the Fine Bros attempt to take down content.
With this controversy spreading to mainstream news portals such as the BBC, the Fine Bros finally decided to pull the plug on their trademark attempt late last night. According to the lawyer whose video was posted above, the Fine Bros have since abandoned their trademark applications for their React series as well as various other series that are presumably in the pipeline.
Source : Ars Technica, Reddit
