Alex Mauer, a well known chiptune composer, has been issuing copyright strikes on various Youtube channels that featured videos covering Starr Mazer: DSP, claiming that she will only remove them if the affected content creators cover a news story about how the game’s developers owe her money for unpaid music work.

Ms. Mauer claims that the developers of Starr Mazer: DSP owe her US$ 10,000 from her work on the game’s soundtrack.

According to Ms. Mauer, Imagos Softworks owes her US$ 10,000 “for unpaid music work” (on Starr Mazer: DSP) and she is trying to use the DMCA strikes as a way to generate awareness about her situation. Sadly, this isn’t the intended purpose of the copyright strikes system, and innocent content creators are being punished when their only involvement in the matter has been that they published videos covering the independent roguelike shooter.

On the other side of the fence, an Imagos Softworks representative stated on a Kickstarter comment that his team does not owe anything to Alex Mauer, and that they have spent a considerable amount of time trying to resolve this situation in a way that is satisfactory for both parties but Ms. Mauer is not willing to engage in amicable negotiations.

Imagos has made several attempts to broker an amicable deal with Alex, including offering shared universal rights to the DSP soundtrack as well as an equity share of the game’s revenue. We have done this in good faith and in understanding of Alex’s health concerns.

Ms. Mauer has also issued strikes on smaller channels (such as Temmie Plays!) without asking for anything in return for their removal, and simply stating that a DMCA takedown achieved her aim of delisting videos that covered Starr Mazer: DSP. When the affected parties attempted to dissuade her from this behavior (since it’s illegal and it constitutes an abuse of the DMCA strikes system) she simply ignored their messages.