The Star Citizen community was in an uproar on May 14th, when small Youtuber Greasy Khaleesi released a video titled ‘Med Runners suck’ pertaining to their presence in the video game. This video would soon enough be taken down by the now ironically-titled ‘Med Runners Rescue Services’ with a copyright strike, for supposedly using their logo in the video. This action, according to fellow content creators, falls directly under ‘Fair Use’, as the logo was being used merely in commentary. This call to nuclear option proved controversial, as the move to take down the video was only made after the video was already released, and not before any contact was made with the creator of the video.
The MedRunners and Greasy Khaleesi later resolved the issue, with the Med Runners issuing an apology and removing the strike from Khaleesi’s video. As expected, the move caused irate responses towards the Med Runners from other content creators, as everyone was unsettled by the fact that a copyright strike had to be used first rather than making contact with the video creator and addressing the issue in an adult way.
Montoya from Test Squadron released a video discussing the whole situation, which emphasized the importance of communication and honest conversation in tackling controversies. The Test Squadron is considered one of the biggest organisations in the Star Citizen community, so when Montoya issued the video, it was taken as an example of how to resolve these issues. The nuclear option should be truly the last move to consider, rather than the first one. Despite getting embroiled in controversy, the Med Runners decided to listen to the community and retracted the copyright strike. Hopefully this event will be an example of how fruitful communication can be in conflicts.