Dragonforce’s Herman Li Banned From Twitch

Dragonforce guitarist Herman Li has been banned from Twitch for unknown reasons, the esports news site Dexerto reports.

According to GameRiv, Li had more than 140,000 followers at the time of the ban. This means the Twitch channel was likely a pretty solid source of income for the iconic power metal shredder (by way of comparison, Trivium’s Matt Heafy has roughly 180,000 followers, and he considers Twitch to be his second job).

For the sake of privacy, Twitch does not comment on moderation decisions, and a rep for Dragonforce tells us that Li “has no additional information at this time.” But Dexerto does hypothesize as to why Li’s account may have been suspended:

“Speculation… is that the artist has been banned as part of the new wave of DMCA [Digital Millennium Copyright Act] strikes that have been sweeping across Twitch. As a musical streamer, DMCA makes the lives of musicians particularly difficult. Many have and may be banned in the future due to these new regulations – even if they are playing their own music.”

Indeed, earlier this summer, Li reportedly assured streamers that DMCA strikes would not be issued for the use of Dragonforce music. And yet it is entirely possible that this is why Li cannot currently utilize the service.

We’ll let you know when/if this is resolved. In the meantime, Li will be streaming on Dragonforce’s YouTube channel today at 1pm PDT / 4pm EDT / 8pm GMT.

Earlier this month, Li sat down for MetalSucks and watched a playlist of Dragonforce fan covers from YouTube. His reactions were originally streamed on his now-suspended Twitch channel; you can watch highlights below.