Scump’s CDL watch party seemingly taken down by DMCA from Activision

In yet another instance of Activision limiting the potential growth of the Call of Duty League, it appears that the company has filed a DMCA claim against CoD legend Scump’s watch party livestreams.

Both Scump’s Twitch and YouTube streams went offline shortly after CDL matches began today, as seen in the clip of the moments just before the stream went down this afternoon during the Miami Heretics vs. Vegas Legion matchup.

In the clip, Scump can be seen reacting as his YouTube stream is taken down, and his co-host Methodz simply reacts by saying “oh my god” several times before the Twitch stream went down as well.

The apparent takedown comes less than a week after The Flank host and former pro, ZooMaa, mentioned that there could be issues forthcoming between his show and Activision due to strict rules from the CDL and YouTube. Both The Flank and Scump’s watch parties have been unable to view live gameplay on Twitch thanks to the league’s current exclusivity partnership with YouTube, so today’s takedowns may be related.

ZooMaa’s Flank co-host Ben Nissim commented on the situation shortly after, saying they were recently notified by email from Activision “what would happen if you stream on Twitch even if you show no gameplay.”

Scump, CoD’s biggest competitive star, retired from pro play earlier this year and transitioned quickly into becoming a top streamer and host of watch parties for the CDL, bringing in more eyes than normal for the broadcasts each weekend.

When attempting to access the VOD of Scump’s watch party stream on YouTube today, a message now appears that says the video is unavailable and “is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Activision Blizzard.”

Now, though, it appears something has gone awry. Scump has yet to publicly comment on the situation, and his stream on both platforms has not come back up yet. Word of the takedowns spread quickly, and as the CDL matches continue today, the official chat is full of users spamming the message “FREE SCUMP.”

Scump routinely averages over 10,000 viewers, sometimes way more, during his watch party streams. It remains to be seen if they will return or if there is a larger issue at hand.