CubeWorks Controversy

"The Struggle is Real!"The following section is incomplete and currently in construction. Please keep this in mind while reading, as we are working on finishing it. Feel free to edit and add more!

   This article details the events surrounding the **CubeWorks controversy and rebranding**.

In early 2017, an MCN known as PowerTV contacted Rain Olaguer, the owner of a small *Minecraft* animation channel called Radapedaxa. PowerTV was notorious for misleading and pressuring small creators into agreeing to contracts that allowed their network to receive the majority of the creator's ad revenue. In an event that angered Rain's fanbase, PowerTV forced Rain out of his own channel and rebranded it as CubeWorks.

## Personal information

### Based in

Scottsdale, Arizona

**Alex Edson** is a self-described ‘serial entrepreneur’ and the founder and CEO of PowerTV (defunct), MailTag.io and eBrands Partners, Inc (defunct). He is based in Scottsdale, Arizona. According to his profile, he is approximately 24 years old.

In late 2016, Edson and his multi-channel network PowerTV came under fire for its misleading and manipulative practices by several YouTubers including AltanticCraft,, Keemstar, ReigningRavens, and Minute Minecraft Parodies (MMP). According to MMP, Edson pressured him into signing misleading contracts, failed to hold up their end of agreements and falsely accused MMP of threatening him, threatening legal action against MMP. Minecraft Minute Parodies was unfortunately unable to take action against PowerTV’s practice, but was released from the network and began helping other YouTubers such as Rainimator to recover after being deceived by PowerTV.

Edson left PowerTV in January 2018 and founded eBrands, a defunct digital investment management firm and a Chrome extension called MailTag.io which customers described as a scam. He is currently the CEO of Business Casual, an educational YouTube channel with 1.16M subscribers which was started in 2016. In a video with over two million views, he announced he was suing YouTube and news channel Russian Today for copyright infringement with the lawyer Ron Coleman, but the lawsuit lost. Outlets *Tubefilter* and *TechDirt* highlighted "how truly *bad* the legal arguments are" (see their articles for more information on the lawsuit). Since Edson acquired it, Business Casual has ceased to post content and has not uploaded any other videos other than this one.

### Magnates Media Fiasco

*Note: All references at the end of this section.*

Around the beginning of May 2023, Alex Edson would go on to land a triple copyright strike against Documentary YouTube channel MagnatesMedia. The reasoning for this was alleged to center around a a trio of 2 ~ 3 second animated images taken from a 1910 photograph of the Carneige Steel Plant, edited and utilized in one of his videos. Edson threatened a lawsuit unless action was taken and did not respond for any future emails, prompting MagnatesMedia to post a public thread on their Twitter to expose the situation, albiet with reluctance. MagnatesMedia was successful in drumming up enough support in order to remove at least one copyright strike, yet the other two are still present on the channel as of the posting of the video.

Rain did not make any public posts about the situation, however he was shown and indirectly mentioned in several parts of the video around the 9:15 ~ 9:31 and another instance at 14:06 ~ 14:17. It is therefore likely that Rain or someone who knew of the situation did reach out but chose not to be further involved.

Many popular reaction and commentary YouTubers posted videos in support of MagnatesMedia, including penguinz0, Ludwig's Mogul Mail, Asmongold and SomeOrdinaryGamers.

*For more information about this event, please see this video and this twitter thread.*

## Events

### Negotiations between Radapedaxa and PowerTV

   In a point in early 2017, Alex Edson, the CEO of PowerTV, contacted Rain Olaguer via Twitter. Rain's channel Radapedaxa had several thousand subscribers and several of his *Minecraft* animated music videos were almost at or had surpassed 1M views. Rain accepted the $35,000, believing it would be a 'good investment for rebranding rights'. He was unaware that PowerTV would later revoke the agreement, force him out of his channel and claim control of it. Rain also said he had hired a lawyer to assist with retainment and refunding the payment.

On July 12, 2017, after Rain asked to further discuss with PowerTV, he reported that Edson had deleted all of his messages. He asked his followers to retweet the screenshot to 'spread the [word about the] fraud of PowerTV'. Rain began a new channel called Rainimator and joined with the Freedom! MCN.

### 2017 Rebranding

"The Struggle is Real!"The following section is incomplete and currently in construction. Please keep this in mind while reading, as we are working on finishing it. Feel free to edit and add more!
After PowerTV began to control Rain's channel, they 'rebranded' it into CubeWorks: Digital Studios. They posted compilations of previous videos.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 https://about.me/alexedson
2. ↑ https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/community/threads/build-a-1-2mm-company-at-18-y-o-ama.80693/
3. ↑ https://twitter.com/atlanticcraft/status/884824301731557376
4. ↑ https://twitter.com/keemstar/status/805179508542283776
5. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDrF76XMokI
6. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLfd9wAbvuA
7. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4E-GUARG5E
8. ↑ https://www.superbcrew.com/an-interview-with-mailtag-io-ceo-alex-edson-track-your-emails-in-real-time/
9. ↑ https://www.techdirt.com/2022/12/09/guy-who-sued-youtube-because-someone-else-copied-a-bit-of-his-youtube-video-loses-again/
10. ↑ https://www.tubefilter.com/2022/08/22/business-casual-lawsuit-youtube-copyright-russia-today/
11. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/@BusinessCasual

1. ↑ https://twitter.com/MagnatesMedia/status/1656164668342259712?s=20
2. ↑ https://youtu.be/aJLdLb9dwAY
3. ↑ https://twitter.com/Rainolaguer/status/884809764387127296
4. ↑ https://twitter.com/Rainolaguer/status/884812547492282369
5. ↑ https://twitter.com/Rainolaguer/status/884804592806047744
6. ↑ https://twitter.com/Rainolaguer/status/912238610631421952