What could Funko possibly have that's copyrightable? Those chumps haven't had a single original thought in their lives. They make bland uncreative, uninspired, undetailed mulch based on other people's ideas.
I’m sure some fan game included them or something similar. That info isn’t available yet. But if the likeness / logo etc appeared then the AI bot found it and went way overzealous about it
So far it’s done nothing but a bad job. But it’s cheaper than employing humans and all corporations care about is the bottom line. So expect a lot more of it
Unless there are some very good failsafes, automatic algorithms that aren't perfect will cause problems. Even if they are 98% accurate you can still hit that 2% and cause some damage
Any of these watchdogs should have to physically look at sites that are flagged as possible patent infringing sites to prevent these types of illegitimate takedowns. The "AI" or algorithms are not sophisticated enough to do this wholesale. I'm waiting for someone to sue when the site is legitimate and the takedown caused income loss.
I have no feels. Outside of this weirdness. I don’t pretend to understand their appeal but if they make people happy good for them! We all need a little more happiness (but funko has to stop this current stupidity)
Time to decentralise and stop using hosting that doesn't bother to stand behind its clients until proven guilty. A takedown request isn't a warrant. Correct me if I'm wrong. Tell em to suck a lemon.
@@VideoGameEsotericaah I meant that the hosting was decentralised but I think I spoke before I thought 😅 Then again I think it might be useful to look at how sites like TPB kept themselves up for so long. Obviously itch isn't doing anything illegal, but I think we need to be more and more aware, and thinking of things we can put into place to protect ourselves from overzealous automated systems. Sites like TH-cam are heavy handed because it's the path of least resistance for their advertising stream. But for a site like itch and their host, what is the incentive to take the whole place down immediately? It really reminds me of things I've read about with debt collectors. They will use intimidation and the threat of legal action to force people to act when actually they have less legal power than people think. The same goes for private parking lots and their enforcers.
@@FlackonI don't unfortunately as I don't have a site. However if no companies offer this protection then a movement can be started to show this is a desired service.
This is literally the problem with the internet full stop: Human interaction is very much contextual to the humans involved. AI has no context...automation in general has no context (have you seen a 3d printer oopsie? It's a mess!)...and so the real solution is humans, but the money manking aspect is automation means LESS humans...so you have this constant push and pull over how many humans do we have to pay to make the automated parts not fall apart? The answer is an engineering issue which the solution is 'there is no solution'. Basically, it's the highway dilemma...in civil engineering, a clogged, traffic prone road is an issue. INSTINCT says 'make the road bigger'. But what actually happens is that the road being bigger invites more motorists. ANd this the problem is the same, but it's scope is larger. This is the same thing that's happening with social media/internet stuff like this. You increase the lanes, people think you can drive it, it suddently gets clogged just like the old road. Automation is not a solution, it's a road. Thus, how many lanes of traffic it serves, you need that much maintenance. It's a clear and obvious problem, but the cool thing about silicon valley is they're 'disruptors' and so the laws of society don't apply. LULZ.
Well, I kinda understand that AI bots sent tons of take down requests to the hosting provider. But who actually made the decision to take down the site? I highly doubt that it was an AI bot and that it was automatic.
@VideoGameEsoterica So this is what baffles me in the first place tbh. We can all talk about the evil AI and it's nasty bots till the cows come home, but to me this seems like we are kinda absolving absolutely real non-artificial intelligence people, who've made such an important decision as to shut down a site (especially as big and important as the one you're taking about), without even doing basic research into the evidence presented (if there even was any) and w/o confirming the possible transgressions stated in the bot's demands. If you think about it, this is not cool at all. Are we, as humanity, completely lost our collective spine and basic common sense? Will we also jump off a roof, if AI tells us to? What I'm seeing right now is - yes, we probably will and this is not normal.
I love that site. Glad they were able to get back up and running but there should be a cost to pay when these companies get it wrong. I wish the laws would change, but I have a feeling the only thing that's going to stop this is lawsuits. I'm really hoping 2025 is the year we get to see class action suits start to absolutely crater these companies.
I feel like 2025 is the year we will see this happen near constantly with a pushback in 2026 and maybe some suits. AI is going to end up making everyone angry in the next few years
@@VideoGameEsoterica Or maybe if there were enough smaller screw ups that someone could aggregate the data and show it added up to a big deal. Like a class-action suit claiming hundreds of millions or billions in damages would turn heads even if it's a bunch of small companies instead of one huge one.
New project for you. Review the first three Tetris: The Grand Master titles and one X360 spinoff. It's coz a fourth main title is coming on Steam next year. The series was mostly on the arcades. They all come from a legendary Japanese studio that was founded by ex Capcom staff. They did the Street Fighter EX series.
There is one crucial element missing from the story. Exactly who has the final say and authority to take the final step of taking the site down. I doubt that any independent app would have such power. But the human (assuming it is) is the one that actually took the decisive and important step that is not being focussed on.
I can't imagine that anyone's unfamiliar with itch at this point but if they are, it's not just for fan games, there is a wealth of interesting original experiences there including "a pet shop after dark," the best horror game ever made.
There might be an opportunity here, for domain registrars and web hosts to market/differentiate themselves by specifically not complying to this kind of bs by default, or is that already a thing?
@@VideoGameEsoterica yeah that’s kinda what I mean- like assuming this sort of phenomenon becomes increasingly prevalent, a registrar or web host could advertise themselves by saying “we don’t automatically comply to those types of bot-generated takedown requests”.
They are required by law to action on them sadly. You are protected if your users upload something they shouldn’t so long as you remove content upon validated request
@ that makes sense, but I wonder if that action necessarily has to mean they blindly trust the notifier to be correct in their assessment, vs flagging it and opening a dialog with the customer.
@VideoGameEsoterica she was originally a Phillip Morris exec, who then went to Xbox and screwed things up there, then to Wizard of the Coast and really screwed things up with them and now she is at Funko. There was a notorious live stream while she was at Wizard shortly before her departure where she had to look her main product up on Wikipedia. Completely clueless.
Ok apologies if this is posted twice but she is an ex Phillip Morris exec who did a stint with Xbox/Microsoft, and then took over as president of Wizard of the Coast and really caused a lot of problems over there. Most notoriously, she was on a live stream doing damage control about two years ago and at one point had to look up Magic the Gathering on Wikipedia. Not too long after that she left and landed at Funko. I think she also had a hand in sending the Pinkertons after leakers while at WotC.
"But the AI did it" is not going to be a good defense if a business is damaged. The people behind the deployment of destructive/interruptive AI are going to get sued into oblivion.
What's even more sad about this is this probably causes devs to lose motivation to continue whatever game they were currently working on. so if there was a game you've been eyeing for a long time now, chances are it's not gonna happen.
When comuter (AI) says no, and you're denied because of a computer. Not humans, like in the case of rogue and multiple take down notices that aren't supposed to affect you, then there really needs to be legal repercussions. Why? because what if someone creates a AI that just doesn't care about if it's legal or not, nor if the DMCA notices are real and just uses it purposely send rogue notices. You'll have a situation where it's perfectly legal to just use AI to spam take downs and nothing can be done against it. But do you really want to live in a world where the AI has more say in something than two humans talking to each other. Slowly over time being oppressed by the AI because everyone just accepts that the AI is correct all the time and it's owners that run it, are actually just a bigger company run by AI, owned by a bigger company that itself is just AI.
PSA: Download everything you can when you can.
Seriously it’s all getting weird lately
Sadly you need to be selective. Storage ain't cheap. That said everyone should always have the 90's consoles rom sets on hand😁
What could Funko possibly have that's copyrightable? Those chumps haven't had a single original thought in their lives. They make bland uncreative, uninspired, undetailed mulch based on other people's ideas.
I’m sure some fan game included them or something similar. That info isn’t available yet. But if the likeness / logo etc appeared then the AI bot found it and went way overzealous about it
@@VideoGameEsotericai know they're a boardgame publisher. Maybe they have a videogames branch under another name, or something related.
I’ll add it to the description when I find out more
Moral of the story: don't ever rely on ai for everything
It’s never gotten it right. And probably never will. But what it lacks in accuracy it makes up for in confidence and brute force
Too late. The real moral was don't let corporations and evil nerds run your society.
Crawling the web to automate copyright strikes is a perfect use case for "ai", though
And then let a human being review them before submission. Verify it. These companies are not
Sounds like it's grounds for a big lawsuit.
I’d be looking to recoup lost revenue for the period of time it was done for sure as it absolutely should not have happened
Honestly the idea of using AI to enforce IP law sounds like a REALLY bad idea.
So far it’s done nothing but a bad job. But it’s cheaper than employing humans and all corporations care about is the bottom line. So expect a lot more of it
Unless there are some very good failsafes, automatic algorithms that aren't perfect will cause problems. Even if they are 98% accurate you can still hit that 2% and cause some damage
Exactly. It needs a final human review to make sure it’s not missing the 2%
Ironic that a technology based on plagiarism is being used to stop plagiarism.
The perfect circle of crap
it's not based on plagiarism, xD
Any of these watchdogs should have to physically look at sites that are flagged as possible patent infringing sites to prevent these types of illegitimate takedowns. The "AI" or algorithms are not sophisticated enough to do this wholesale. I'm waiting for someone to sue when the site is legitimate and the takedown caused income loss.
We genuinely need laws that AI decisions need a “human last touch” before being actioned on
I swear, i hate, HATE, funko pops, overpriced bs.
I have no feels. Outside of this weirdness. I don’t pretend to understand their appeal but if they make people happy good for them! We all need a little more happiness (but funko has to stop this current stupidity)
And it's been that way for at least 8 years, I'm shocked whenever I run into a "fan" of their stuff IRL.
I guess it's a really good thing that I downloaded the free version of flow frames already. The Internet sucks now man lol
And it’s going to suck even more in 2025
Time to decentralise and stop using hosting that doesn't bother to stand behind its clients until proven guilty. A takedown request isn't a warrant. Correct me if I'm wrong. Tell em to suck a lemon.
The problem with decentralization is discoverability. We need sites like Itch so the “cream rises to the top” sort of speak
Do you know of any such hosting/ISP companies?
@@VideoGameEsotericaah I meant that the hosting was decentralised but I think I spoke before I thought 😅
Then again I think it might be useful to look at how sites like TPB kept themselves up for so long. Obviously itch isn't doing anything illegal, but I think we need to be more and more aware, and thinking of things we can put into place to protect ourselves from overzealous automated systems.
Sites like TH-cam are heavy handed because it's the path of least resistance for their advertising stream. But for a site like itch and their host, what is the incentive to take the whole place down immediately?
It really reminds me of things I've read about with debt collectors. They will use intimidation and the threat of legal action to force people to act when actually they have less legal power than people think. The same goes for private parking lots and their enforcers.
@@FlackonI don't unfortunately as I don't have a site. However if no companies offer this protection then a movement can be started to show this is a desired service.
The dead internet theory continues unabated.
Times are weird out there
This is literally the problem with the internet full stop: Human interaction is very much contextual to the humans involved. AI has no context...automation in general has no context (have you seen a 3d printer oopsie? It's a mess!)...and so the real solution is humans, but the money manking aspect is automation means LESS humans...so you have this constant push and pull over how many humans do we have to pay to make the automated parts not fall apart? The answer is an engineering issue which the solution is 'there is no solution'. Basically, it's the highway dilemma...in civil engineering, a clogged, traffic prone road is an issue. INSTINCT says 'make the road bigger'. But what actually happens is that the road being bigger invites more motorists. ANd this the problem is the same, but it's scope is larger.
This is the same thing that's happening with social media/internet stuff like this. You increase the lanes, people think you can drive it, it suddently gets clogged just like the old road. Automation is not a solution, it's a road. Thus, how many lanes of traffic it serves, you need that much maintenance. It's a clear and obvious problem, but the cool thing about silicon valley is they're 'disruptors' and so the laws of society don't apply. LULZ.
It’s all about the profits. The more AI the bigger the profit margins at the top
Well, I kinda understand that AI bots sent tons of take down requests to the hosting provider. But who actually made the decision to take down the site? I highly doubt that it was an AI bot and that it was automatic.
Some host saying “these warnings look scary” and hitting the off switch
@VideoGameEsoterica So this is what baffles me in the first place tbh. We can all talk about the evil AI and it's nasty bots till the cows come home, but to me this seems like we are kinda absolving absolutely real non-artificial intelligence people, who've made such an important decision as to shut down a site (especially as big and important as the one you're taking about), without even doing basic research into the evidence presented (if there even was any) and w/o confirming the possible transgressions stated in the bot's demands. If you think about it, this is not cool at all. Are we, as humanity, completely lost our collective spine and basic common sense? Will we also jump off a roof, if AI tells us to? What I'm seeing right now is - yes, we probably will and this is not normal.
Def not cool but also probably some poor person who’s salaried and works 80+ hours a week and was half asleep at the switch
ai bots detecting copyright be like (you get taken down and you get taken down)
Handing out take downs like Halloween candy
the fact that it can wipe out an entire domain is insanely powerful... no checks, balances, or anything, that's POWER
The ai trainer: IT WASN'T ME!
“We’ll see honestly it just worked TOO WELL. If anything I did too good of a job. Can I get a bonus now”?
A friendly reminder to whoever's running Funko that the public has run out of patience with evil CEO behavior.
🤣
funko pop the new nintendo
Def not on my 2024 bingo card haha
B-but """Giant evil company"""" told me that AI is good!
They also told us smokes were safe too 🤣
No company told you that. AI is a powerful tool. Like any other tool it can be used for good and bad.
Funko make some of the most aesthetically unappealing garbage I've ever seen.
I can’t say I’m into them at all but again I let people enjoy what they enjoy
I love that site. Glad they were able to get back up and running but there should be a cost to pay when these companies get it wrong.
I wish the laws would change, but I have a feeling the only thing that's going to stop this is lawsuits. I'm really hoping 2025 is the year we get to see class action suits start to absolutely crater these companies.
I feel like 2025 is the year we will see this happen near constantly with a pushback in 2026 and maybe some suits. AI is going to end up making everyone angry in the next few years
@@VideoGameEsoterica Yeah pushback is coming for sure. I hope we don't have to wait until 2026.
There just needs to be bigger AI screw ups. Itch doesn’t tip the scale enough. It’s gotta be a HUGE problem. Then it’ll get regulation
@@VideoGameEsoterica Or maybe if there were enough smaller screw ups that someone could aggregate the data and show it added up to a big deal. Like a class-action suit claiming hundreds of millions or billions in damages would turn heads even if it's a bunch of small companies instead of one huge one.
This is more of an HAL 9000 scenario than a Terminator one.
Replace the Terminator figure in the thumbnail!
HAL isn’t as fun in the thumb. I did consider it
New project for you. Review the first three Tetris: The Grand Master titles and one X360 spinoff.
It's coz a fourth main title is coming on Steam next year.
The series was mostly on the arcades. They all come from a legendary Japanese studio that was founded by ex Capcom staff. They did the Street Fighter EX series.
Problem is I’m crap at Tetris haha
Who would’ve thought Funko of all companies would go after a website? And a bot no less! How shocking!
Haha this one was very surprising
There is one crucial element missing from the story. Exactly who has the final say and authority to take the final step of taking the site down. I doubt that any independent app would have such power. But the human (assuming it is) is the one that actually took the decisive and important step that is not being focussed on.
That’s the one piece of information not publicly known; why did the registrar take the site down
I can't imagine that anyone's unfamiliar with itch at this point but if they are, it's not just for fan games, there is a wealth of interesting original experiences there including "a pet shop after dark," the best horror game ever made.
Yes it runs the gamut from fan games to interactive art experiences to full fledged games
First, we got WARNER BROS ANIMATION DECIMATION and now this!?!! 2:19 Please don't ruin DeviantArt and all my favorite furry websites!
the current AI technology is great for visualizing concepts, but too many people are using it as a crutch or even absolute end-point product.
They want those payroll payoffs now even if the AI models aren’t up to the task
There might be an opportunity here, for domain registrars and web hosts to market/differentiate themselves by specifically not complying to this kind of bs by default, or is that already a thing?
Honestly I think it just depends on the registrar
@@VideoGameEsoterica yeah that’s kinda what I mean- like assuming this sort of phenomenon becomes increasingly prevalent, a registrar or web host could advertise themselves by saying “we don’t automatically comply to those types of bot-generated takedown requests”.
They are required by law to action on them sadly. You are protected if your users upload something they shouldn’t so long as you remove content upon validated request
@ that makes sense, but I wonder if that action necessarily has to mean they blindly trust the notifier to be correct in their assessment, vs flagging it and opening a dialog with the customer.
I see Cynthia Williams is already working her magic at Funko.
That’s a name I’m not familiar with. Context?
@VideoGameEsoterica she was originally a Phillip Morris exec, who then went to Xbox and screwed things up there, then to Wizard of the Coast and really screwed things up with them and now she is at Funko. There was a notorious live stream while she was at Wizard shortly before her departure where she had to look her main product up on Wikipedia. Completely clueless.
Ok apologies if this is posted twice but she is an ex Phillip Morris exec who did a stint with Xbox/Microsoft, and then took over as president of Wizard of the Coast and really caused a lot of problems over there. Most notoriously, she was on a live stream doing damage control about two years ago and at one point had to look up Magic the Gathering on Wikipedia. Not too long after that she left and landed at Funko. I think she also had a hand in sending the Pinkertons after leakers while at WotC.
Ahh well that’s a pretty glorious track record 🤣 thanks for answering
@@VideoGameEsoterica she has the reverse Midas touch for sure.
"But the AI did it" is not going to be a good defense if a business is damaged. The people behind the deployment of destructive/interruptive AI are going to get sued into oblivion.
Yes it will ultimately be their responsibility when the AI screws up
What's even more sad about this is this probably causes devs to lose motivation to continue whatever game they were currently working on. so if there was a game you've been eyeing for a long time now, chances are it's not gonna happen.
Everything is discouraging in 2024 and I think 2025 is going to be even worse
We can still romance the cd's.
For now haha
I don't have any funko pops. I just have too many amiibo.
AI continues to show its' lack of humanity.
And it’s only going to get worse as time goes on
got my Rictor and Simon Belmont right here hiiiyaaaaaa
artwork's so damn good
I do use AI for upscaling and memes, but things like these makes me feel leery about corpos capitalising on it.
The AI belongs to someone, and is acting on the behalf of someone. Those someone's can be taken to court!
Yes the businesses are responsible for the model
This AI slop needs to stop NOW before its too late
Sadly I think it’s just going to get worse before it gets better
damnit I didnt get notified or anything, and I have a game on thereeeeeeeeeeee
Well it’s back up so hopefully didn’t effect you too much
I'm hoping this AI bubble bursts soon.
Me too. Me tooooo
Archive the archive.
Archive it all!
Another reason to hate Funko.
It's time to return to private servers.
Well this shouldn’t ever happen as far as the takedown was concerned
If there's no actual thinking involved, it's not valid. X(
Def not thinking
When comuter (AI) says no, and you're denied because of a computer. Not humans, like in the case of rogue and multiple take down notices that aren't supposed to affect you, then there really needs to be legal repercussions. Why? because what if someone creates a AI that just doesn't care about if it's legal or not, nor if the DMCA notices are real and just uses it purposely send rogue notices. You'll have a situation where it's perfectly legal to just use AI to spam take downs and nothing can be done against it.
But do you really want to live in a world where the AI has more say in something than two humans talking to each other. Slowly over time being oppressed by the AI because everyone just accepts that the AI is correct all the time and it's owners that run it, are actually just a bigger company run by AI, owned by a bigger company that itself is just AI.
Eventually guardrails will need to be put in place
Everyone on earth needs to stop buying Nintendo products immediately
Well at least in this one instance Nintendo wasn’t involved haha
If the average person did that they would get in t rouble immediately and yes it is i l-legal.
Very true
I'm judging you for owning them. Funko Pops are a blight on humanity.
I never said I owned them?
Why do you talk like this?