BBP wrote:There's a difference between a playthrough and a commercial. It was made with the purpose of making money.
YouTube's profits and costs are kept secret by YouTube and are up for debate, but in April 2009 Credit Suisse estimated a loss of $450 million. RampRate estimated more conservatively at a $174 million loss. These are the last known figures and it would be in Google's interest to keep losing figures a secret.
They DID use Tim Curry's voice for the first few bits nicked from the game, they're identical to the game ones, and the ambience difference between the original and the later lines is obvious.. Like I said I'm not sure about his arrangements, who owns those voice files. I do know he likes to get royalties (he still gets a percentage off Rocky Horror).
EDIT: To be clear, I am NOT trying to say you're wrong or change your mind. Just explaining more.
You say that walk thrus are different; and this was made for the purpose to "make money."
I disagree with both accounts. The walk thrus are not different. For example, for my Neverending Nights youtube channel - Youtube offered me the ability to make money by placing ads at the beginning of my videos. I'd get "X" amount of money for every ad clicked. I had to decline, myself, because in the end, while the story, voices, and music are all original content - the filming is done within a game I do not have copyrights to. (Being in good standing with Bioware and Atari, who let us get away with this, I didn't want to upset that balance). So technically, someone who makes a GK walk thru, and gets that email from Youtube and agrees to it; can begin making money off material they clearly don't own the rights to.
As for that video being made with the purpose of making money; I also disagree with that. The video was made with the purpose to create a buzz. That's it. And it's with content that she originally worked on and created. It's not like she used content from Space Quest to promote it (or Curse of Monkey Island) or something else. She used her own work. Yes, it belongs to Sierra (we assume). But her own work, none the less. I am pretty sure the intention was to show work that SHE is personally responsible for, being used. Something people would clearly recognize as Jane Jensen. For example, the GK promo is nowhere on her "fully released" site now. It was used to create buzz and interest, and that's it. It's not being used to help sell Gray Matter 2, or any other game that Jane is currently working on. It could easily be a "thin" line, but on this one, I see it as creating a buzz, not as a money maker.
And according to Collector's post; it's pretty much sounding like what I suspected. If her company does well, she will bargain for the rights to create future GK games.