Should Fan Art Be Illegal?
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Hope so :/
Cool
nice
Why did you put a furry in the thumbnail? _WHY?_
I've never even heard of whatever that is
When I was a child, I drew a crayon picture of Mario.
In response, Nintendo personally sent lawyers to my house to burn the picture and beat me within an inch of my life.
That was So Sad.
And they'd do it again if it means making a single dollar. nintendo would commit crimes against humanity if it meant making a profit.
@@thecosmicrefrigerator2622 that’s how most large corporations operate
@@ericsilver9401 Yeah but also Nintendo is one of the biggest offenders. They started taking down let’s plays. I’d say that’s pretty far.
@@lazyproductions8005 mfw actively taking down people trying to promote your work
the problem with waiting for something to become "public domain" is it never will.
Take for instance Disney, whenever one of their works (such as the characterised mouse) is about to expire they lobby the government with a boatload of money to extend copyright law to last another 50 years because (insert reason here)
It wouldn't surprise me if they did it again but last time that was about to happen they did no lobbying at all and the public domain has actually started moving forward again. Disney instead took the approach of saying that they still used old Mickey's design as a way of protecting him, which is why they launched that 90th anniversary campaign a few years back.
@@GandWuser The clock is ticking. In 2024 the first incarnation of Mickey Mouse will be public domain.
So far they haven't lobbied for another extension. I think that Disney and other big companies know that they'll get heavy pushback if they try to pull that stunt again.
Now if only we could lobby the government to retroactively shorten the length of copyrights...
@@GandWuser @ThePooper3000 aha I wasn't actually aware of this, here's hoping they stop and it can be reversed
I'm a bit of a copyright abolitionist myself but that's a whole other can of worms though.
@@WasatchWind you won't be able to use it. Mickey is the face of Disney and so will be covered under trademark which already never ends.
See i guess I'm different. Everytime someone makes fanart of me, I get so excited that someone took personal time out of there day to go out of their way to make something for me. I would never dream of considering illegal or bad
Every creator deals with this differently, and there is all kinds of fanart. I agree with Nintendo in some cases (not all though) and with Lucas Arts/Disney about the KOTOR game. But a lot of lawsuits and cease & desist letters are overkill.
you definitely are different
What if said person who made the fanart used the character in a pitch for a show and is now making money off of it that way?
Too extreme of an example? OK how about if they are selling dolls or fan merchandise off your character and you're not getting anything from it?
I get why companies don't mind fan art for the most part because it's too big to control but once something becomes and outlier or is directly competing with the companies IP it's easy to see them taking action. Also consider that if companies were able to control every fan artist and have them charges __ cents for every drawing regardless if the artist is putting it out for free or not, artists would be furious. Luckily piracy is the counterbalance to that scenario, the system we have right now isn't perfect but it could be a hell of a lot worse.
@@NoxideActive ehh id still be accepting of it, saying "the system isnt perfect but it could be a hell of a lot worse" really seems like a cope, i dont really understand the whole mindset of limiting what other people can do with their creativity and skills, the world would legit be a better place if the world wasnt so caught up in seeing concepts as properties, but of course this would require a greater societal change, as the system of some who own capital, to live off, and most work to live doesnt work with that, as the system is selfreinfocing, through waste for example 1/3 of all the food garbage in europe and america could feed all of humanity, but if everyone is feed, there are noone to exploit through hunger, and thus the system seeks out to create waste and missery
I feel like it depends on the type of work they make..
And also it depends on whether you see it as a way for people to see it as your general audience
Hearing the creator of Fox in Space was a pleasant surprise. Great guy and he does great work.
Couldn't agree more.
@@austinmcconnell hello
Same. Love AFIS
All I want is more Fox in Space.
hey it's emperortigerstar
Now, I'm not informed enough to offer suggestive tweaks to current laws, but from what I've experienced, I think they're mostly alright the way they are, as long as measures are taken to parody or distance the fan work from the original IP.
One thing I've noticed with 90% of the shut-down fan projects, is that the names of these fan projects contained the names of the IP's. Examples like "Super Mario Brothers Z," "Super Mario 64 HD Remake," "Pokemon Uranium," "Another Metroid 2 Remake." All of these projects that were "Cease and Desist"'ed have titles that make them sound like something coming from Nintendo.
For example, change the name "Another Metroid 2 Remake," over to "Sammy the Bounty Huntress in Space: The Sequeling." Instead of "Star Fox: The Animated Series," just call it "A Fox in Space." You have to change it up, alter the characters a bit, or make it parody. When you use the original IP's title in the name of your fan work, you're just asking for trouble.
Thanks again for letting me be a part of this!
Seconded, it's hard out here for creative fans for now.
Yeah, like how Mother 4 had to rebrand to Oddity
Regarding Super Mario Bros Z, Nintendo didn't shut it down for being a fan project. It got shut down because the creator made a Patreon and tried to profit off of it.
Fan Art is what gives fans what they want
5:50 best part
"it's illegal to sell fan art"
Fan artists that sell at conventions: *carry on like normal*
Companies can take down stuff online but they sure can't take stuff away from things physically made in this world...Unless they want to go down the right of confiscation & martial law way of going into other people's house to confiscate stuff (Some people should be lucky Japan can't send police officers to japan to arrest people in america and such).
The next time one of my children draws a disney character/ copyrighted work I'm going to call the police.
Keep it in the family, my guy.
good
@@ericsilver9401 said Disney
This whole thing is why you take down online kindergarten art of ‘Gunshoe Gooper’ in Hypnospace Outlaw. Gotta make sure to copyright strike actual toddlers 👍
Small correction: copywrite isn't actually a thing, though probably related to copywriters who are people that wrote for promotional purposes. What you're referring to is copyright
Even before he died and his works fell into public domain, H.P. Lovecraft was famous for allowing authors to use his monsters in their stories and give shoutouts to others' in his works. If only there was a creator who was interested in making a universe that was not only beloved but easy to contribute to without a bunch of legal entanglements.
Lovecraft died in poverty, if anything, his story is proof of copyright usefulness.
@@leeseiberg2408 can you be sure that if he hadn't given people permission to use his works, the situation would have been different? Maybe he would have died in poverty anyways?
@@kacperfilipek8461 if he received a check whenever other writers mentioned Cthulhu? Yeah I’m pretty sure he’d be rich
Scott Cawthon, the creator of Five Nights at Freddy's, is like that too.
@@leeseiberg2408 I don’t think Disney is gonna starve
Thanks for making a video about this! ^^
I'm glad more people are being made aware of the legal situation and the anxiety that follows fan creations and creators of fan projects.
I really wish you'd mentioned the situation surrounding compulsory licensing and cover songs though.
It's definitely a weird exception, but it's a pretty huge, weird exception, and very worth mentioning.
Compulsory cover song licensing has protected cover bands for decades, and with more indie/self-publishing services recently (past 5 years or so) branching into cover song licensing, that protection has recently enabled passionate fans and creators to create musical tributes to their favourite IPs and to legally license and publish these works.
It's for instance enabled an entire community of Video Game Cover Musicians to grow and thrive.
As a musician who can make a living due to cover song licensing, I'm definitely 100% biased, and it's not a perfect solution for every situation, but I think compulsory licensing can be a great way for artists to honor an IP that's close to their heart. while also giving back to the owner of the IP, both in terms of revenue and awareness. I realize that there's a difference between making a high budget fan film (using several established characters, settings and lore) and making a song cover (it's definitely an inherently limited format in terms of storytelling), but I still think compulsory licensing could be a step in the right direction for more art forms.
I personally believe that as long as everyone's getting paid for their hard work, and there's a clear distinction between fan works and works by the IP holder, people should be able to make fan-art in all shapes and scopes.
Oh well, sorry for the lengthy comment!
Been watching your videos for a long time. Always a pleasure to watch them!
Keep up the great work! c:
yeah
Dude I discovered your covers on Spotify in like 2018 or so, didn't expect to get the chance to say thanks. You make some great stuff.
:O
Very interesting stuff, fam 🙂
:0
It’s really interesting to see how different companies handle things made by fans. Nintendo is famously awful for it, but there’s a ton of stuff that falls into a gray area. One instance I heard of that was actually really cool involved the creator of Five Nights At Freddy’s. Instead of shutting down people’s fan games and such, he’s actively supported the development of them, gotten their creators merch deals and ports to major consoles, and other cool stuff. In a perfect world, it would be neat for other large companies to do similar things and support their fans and their creations.
Yh Scott actually did that which is a pretty chad move
“chad move”
that's just how Japanese companies behave, it's pretty normal behaviour
Well independent developers are more accepting of fan games than large companies are
@@tsencho7161 sega seems to allow fan games
The year is 2057. Small groups of artists are hiding out in underground studios while the large corporations hunt down those who would infringe their trademarks. Mickey Mouse is now a dystopian tyrant.
...
Is that canon? Sorry, but I only watch the anime. Is that from the manga?
@@Entity-ls7wn unfortunately it's not fiction, the mouse has been hunting down fan art for years, stealing art from others, and other aggressive corperate activities (like buying out 20th-century fox).
@@Zarcondeegrissom so....canon but actually serious?
@@Entity-ls7wn that van in 'onward' yeh, was a tad bit of a legal dispute with the owner of the actual van on that one, just google "disney van lawsuit". yes, serious, not canon, real life.
@@Zarcondeegrissom Jesus Christ.
The irony is most of the original creators of many IP's are long dead, sold, or lost the rights to their creations and are in the hands of unrelated parties. A vast majority of corporate products are technically just funded fanfiction given a license of approval by a corporate entity.
^ This. I'm all for artists and creators being able to profit from their work, but I'm not for zombie copyrights. The twisted half-life of the Disney corporation for example.
Honestly? the whole concept of IP is a scam. It serves solely to protect the interests of companies, for creators are the very first people to have the rights over their labour stripped away.
Piracy is reclamation. I'm dying on this hill.
@@CarlosMZ12268 Hell yeah. Copyright infringement is praxis ☭
in Germany, companies can't actually own Copyright (although foreign companies can if they can do so in their home country)
it actually goes so far that Copyright is untransferable and always owned by the person who actually created it (there is no "work for hire" doctrine like in the US)
@@CarlosMZ12268 What a load of rubbish.
If you want to get negative press real quick and repellant for customers, yes. It's literally free advertising and unpaid content creation.
It's pretty stupid that these companies do this, especially Nintendo.
Exactly. I'm recalling MattPat's video about how Fortnite (and I think maybe Minecraft too?) fared better than most when TH-cam first applied its demonetization bot because those were the few games which went under its radar, so those games got more "earned media".
Well having your face in the internet is free advertisement for you, too, but I bet you'd like to control what your face is used for online :P That's just human nature. And what about big companies stealing stuff? Should the law be different to them? If I make a Mario clone, should I be left unpunished if I try to make money out of it? What about if Epic put a Mario skin in Fortnite without paying anything to Nintendo? :D Is that also free advertisement or does that sound more like Epic is trying to lure the Mario fanbase to spend their money on a different company?
@@Lattamonsteri
I guess it somehow feels different when it's a case of two corporations butting heads vs. a clearly asymmetrical case of a high and mighty megacorp picking on an independent fan who's clearly mainly working out of love to the media. I can imagine it isn't exactly easy for blind justice to make the distinction between a fan artist and an opportunistic copycat, which is probably a problem.
Though then again, I guess an optimistic company could interpret another company incorporating their intellectual property into their work as free product placement. And I guess this would be less of a problem if the law said this sort of thing was allowed so long as the original I. P. owner got to glean some of the profit from the fan artist.
@@jaschabull2365 well put :D
PS. (Just rambling thoughts)
This reminds me:
Movies and tv often replace brand names unless they are specifically sponsored. Like a Coca-Cola can will be taped over just in case Pepsi wants to have an ad during the show. Or Coke that matter. Both have to pay to get advertised. A good deal all around. And if a Budweiser is held by a guy who goes and kills someone in a show while driving under influence, Budweiser wont like that. Apparently they might sue. But it's probably cuz of the harm done to the brand, not the copyright infringement itself. Or?
Can and will companies with trademarks sue for using their brand in a tv show? What if it's a documentary? Or maybe this is a completely different topic ._.
In all honesty fan creations are crucial in the modern day, and companies should incorporate them better.
Like Valve
@@caleb_artzs2533 or sega
or Scott Cawthon
(pls don't hate me)
I never will get why companies don't like when fans create something, I mean, it's basically free advertisement of your I.P, created, perpetuated, and maintained, by fans, for fans, with no cost associated to yourself.
Sega's way ahead of you.
They even hired Fan devs!
Interesting how fanart is illegal, but many studios and rights holders still promote it on social media
Sue them
@@cartoonfantasy4541 Shouldn't the studio sue the artists?
It's definitely a gray area and an overall civil issue, not criminal issue. If these companies start suing aggressively they'll lose fans and new audiences. They allow the fan stuff if it's not done in a major industry level, which the Apeiron fan game was toeing the line. You can sell fan stuff and still not get into trouble provided you're disclaiming, it's not in an industry level type of production and the credits still go to the ones who have it as an intellectual property. Some fan artists actually get hired professionally to do work for these companies. Still certain areas are grey and there's no guarantee. So most bottomline is if it's free or small scale, you're okay.
@@lesteryaytrippy7282 fanarts indicates how well the market ecosystem for the said property, it is a positive feedback because it means the property is merchandizable or expandable beyond the original intent (the best example for this is warcraft and dota) however when too many fanarts transforms more than just an art into a full fledged project, even without the profit there is potential losses if the fanart either becomes more famous than the original or if it somehow fck up, the whole property brand is smeared and these artists is not liable, the sh!t is on the hand of the original owners who had nothing to do or control in the first place, so actually there are more than jst simple profits in the argument
@@archingelus Just curious, wouldn't fanart becoming more famous than the original give the IP holders incentive to essentially up their game, resulting in more profit? Or if the fanartist is within their reach they could try to hire them. And when a person/part of a community does something that fucks up the property, usually they are "disowned" and get a lot of backlash from that community.
Everytime I see a badly made officially licensed game, I feel a surge of jealousy of all the talented people who deserve a shot at the IP
Yeah, but that's the point. If they control who can and cannot make a game, they can cut corners in excess, hire and underfund a development studio, and if the game is shit, there's nothing passionately crafted to compare it to and so it can fall into the trap of "better than nothing!"
The talented people are working on the real projects in all fields. It’s almost always outside interference that gets in the way.
Like Breath of the Wild
If they handed it to the fans it probably wouldn't have been a flaming mess of a game
@Bob Wow time isn't the only factor though... you can give someone all the time in the world, and that doesn't necessarily mean the product won't come out shit... (Cyberpunk2077, need I say more?). Or in contrast, someone can be on a time crunch, but make a surprisingly good, or at least, interesting game... (just take a look at... literally any Game Jam.)
Yes, having more time helps, the more time you have, the longer you have to test, polish, think things up... and just work on the game.
...but I'd argue that time is most definitely not the only- or even the main factor here. Not even close.
@@demonicthan742 What the hell are you talking about
I remember when Wattpad and AO3 writers had to put a “THESE ARENT MY CHARACTERS” disclaimer before every fic bc everyone was scared they’d get arrested.
fanfic writers still do that oof
@@kingsleydied
And apparently it isn't even a valid court defence to point out you did so.
@@jaschabull2365 big oof for the writers :(
They weren't scared they'd get arrested. They're scared of C&Ds, which DID happen back in the day. Some authors are rather infamously completely against fanfiction of any kind, like Diana Gabaldon (who compared people writing fanfiction of her characters to people breaking into her house and stalking her real life children???), Ann Rice, and George RR Martin. Bunch of scumbags. People like them are the reason AO3 has an entire team of lawyers to help them keep fics safe on their website.
@@jellyfishi_ There’s being clear about boundaries and there’s comparing fanfic writers to stalkers and rapists for... writing stories. There’s being clear about boundaries, and then there’s sending lawyers after children for writing stories. There’s being clear about boundaries, and then there’s saying other authors are perfectly reasonable for putting fictional characters on the same level as their real life children. They’re scumbags.
This is part of why I have so much respect for the people running Archive of our Own. They put in so much time and effort into making sure people can still make and share fanfics and fanart without having to fear that corporations will come scare creators into scilence. Either way imo the world is a better place because people make fan creations and it's truly a shame that it's technically illegal.
I kinda just wanted to push this comment up but I love ao3 so much, fandom and fan works have helped me through hard times and I don’t know where I’d be without them. The fact that big brands are sometimes so against the people that love and adore them just boggles me. Yeah of course some fan works aren’t going to fit the creator’s original vision, but what it means is that you impacted someone enough that they were brave enough to spread that love. Maybe it’s just me but I think that’s an amazing thing and ao3’s work to protect this is wonderful.
So many people who read my fanfic said it was a "traditional book" quality and they would buy it and it kinda sucks, working overnights at McDonald's and having all these people offer to buy my writing - but not being able to sell this book because it is a fanfiction. I started writing an original novel to publish now that I know people actually like what I do, but it would be really nice to publish the book hundreds of people fell in love with.
Some people do take fan-fictions and change the names and some other details so they can publish the book. It’s known as “scrubbing.”
@@Lu4455
Ahh, is that what the author of Fifty Shades of Grey did?
@@jaschabull2365 yeah
@@Lu4455 I've heard it called "Filing the Serial Numbers Off."
Good luck with your novel. Let's hope people actually like the work you did, and not just the fact it was a fan fiction of something they love...
if fanart is illegal then I’m serving MULTIPLE lifetimes in jail
good
*multiple lifetimes*
Good
Well... hopefully, you have fun in jail I guess...
Many people I know would be joining you
I loved a fox in space it’s pure gold
you’re pure gold 🙂
The thing that makes me saddest of all is that copyright isn't currently based on how long a work should be profitable before entering the public domain, or how long is a reasonable amount of time to make your money before others can get in on the idea (like patents), but exactly long enough that none of Disney's products ever leave copyright protection. Money speaks, in this case.
Richard Stallman has proposed a term of 10 years, with most books out of publication by then.
@Bob Wow What kind of stupid line of thinking is that? The clickbait mooching doesn't hurt you. The fetish art doesn't hurt you. What hurts you is the fact that because of "quality control", you now have one less good game from your favourite franchise.
Your logic is on the same level of the people that cause the "70% of all food is thrown away" statistics, where anything you perceive to be of lesser quality shouldn't be accessed by the starving masses at all, on merit of hand-outs not being as economical as just having it end up in the dumpster.
It's not just Disney. The copyright duration for music in Europe was extended from fifty years to seventy because the 1960s were about to go public domain at the time, and there are a lot of very, very lucrative music producers from that period. The Beatles most of all.
@Bob Wow ,you seriously can't make things worse when the IP holders themselves have never done anything with the product for a decade plus,have never even made significant money after the product release,and/or are producing the worst crap that anyone can produce.
I like how Scott Cawthon did it. He created this popular property and people made a bunch of fan games. Instead of cease and desisting them he essentially made a deal with them to legally sell those fan games for a cut. If I had a massive multimillion dollar property and I saw people making amazing fan works of it, I would let them sell it and just give a cut to the copyright holder. To me it's a win win. The copyright holder is making money off their property whilst supporting artists who are breathing new life into said property.
Exactly what I want to happen
The reason corporations don't want to do that, is then they have to compete with fan works. Did you see how amazing that SWTOR remake looked? I don't even like Star Wars and I was like WOW! I guess in their mind it's better to have an airtight grip on quality control, so you can pump out shit after shit without anything to negatively compare it to...
@@PinkManGuy I mean, if it’s a remake they could take higher royalties and now someone has made a remake for them. They can spend money on other products. And if they can’t compete with fans making things for their own property with probably significantly more resources that suggests a deeper issue on their end.
Agreed but when you get into megacorps, like Disney where PR is life, there is huge risk. Maybe the small creator destroys your rep in a very public way and you've supported him/her, maybe the fan work eclipses your multi-billion dollar investment in the next "chapter" (which should never happen but... we all know it could) and you lose serious revenue and have POed shareholders. It's a lot easier for small to mid-size creators to license. Lucasfilm isn't going to pay someone to review every terrible fan project and maybe license 2 or 3 of them.
@@SpookyTanukiGaming
It seems in that case, they're afraid they might then have to put in the work of addressing those deep issues rather than just rake in the cash from minimal-effort works which ride the wave of brand recognition.
Though then again, it does seem like an equally reasonable cash cow to create minimal-effort works which can be fixed up by people voluntarily outsourcing themselves to you.
I love how LegalEgal has become the de facto lawyer in the TH-cam cinematic universe.
Why? You love watching the world burn? The dude's like a left-wing version of Nick Rekieta but worse. That's as laconically as I can sum him up.
@@SirBlackReeds I prefer Lock Picking Lawyer
I prefer Bruce Rivers and Rekieta
LegalEagle is a hack
yes because he lies and plays to the far left social media hivemind
Fandom would be so dull without fanart Tbh
Also, they're essentially free advertising. I know a few video games and shows I would not have known about if it wasn't for artists drawing them
I really don't think the average person cares as much about fan art as you think they do lol. Most fan art fans probably also make fan art. And aren't most people seeking out fanart of something they already enjoy?
.
Good, most fandoms are absolute dogshit and laughably cringeworthy. I've yet to actually see a Fandom bigger then 100 people that isn't remotely the same cookie cutter "OwO I'm such a Stan XDXD" shit
I don't know if you've ever heard of Touhou, it's a Japanese game series that has been incredibly open to fanworks to the point of even supporting some; as a result, fanworks flood out of the community. These fanworks range from games to art to music, even an entirely fan-made anime; some of the most popular of these works have over 10 million views on youtube, you might have even seen some already without knowing. Touhou has proven to be a great example of what can happen when you let fans express their love for a series without barriers and it has grown as a result.
Touhou memes are _pivotal_ for understanding just about anything that came over from NicoNico around 10 years ago.
The western equivalent would probably be Undertale, which allows all fan content to be made and sold without legal repercussions
Lucien Sankou ah no wonder its extremely popular people are actually allowed to make fanfics and fanart. I don’t know if thats a good thing from seeing all of the horrific crap I have seen out of the fandom but im glad people within the fandom are allowed to express ideas and opinions about the whole game.
@@roxanne_ yeah the fandom and undertale fandom universe are extremely hard to understand, there are MULTIPLE 1 hour long+ undertale movies
Ive been planning to get into touhou for a while by now but personal life has stopped me from that
Also 69 nice
Most of the touhou fans are for the music and fan made content
I feel like in these sorts of conversations, we never really hear from "the other side." Which is to say, representatives of some large established, copyrighted property. As a result, there tends to be a lot of speculation about what the companies "should" do or think, but I think it would be helpful to hear their defense of the status quo, and possible rebuttal to common fan arguments (ie, "this is just free advertising for you!" etc).
i too would like this. given the number of stories there seem to be quite a lot of examples of these stories. so perhaps its just a quantity issue? they cant (or dont want to) pay the resources to identify which r actual threats to their content and which r harmless?
You’re one of my favorite creators 🙂
I think one should look at fan art in terms of the potential for causing economic harm to the copyright owner. A teen drawing Mickey Mouse or writing a short Harry Potter fan fiction story and posting it on their Instagram or Wattpad account shouldn't cause any actual financial harm. On the other hand, the example given at the start of this video about a fan recreation of the classic Knights of the Old Republic video game using a modern game engine does have the potential to cause actual economic harm because it could become a serious competitor to officially licensed Star Wars games. Perhaps Disney would want to issue their own re-release of a modernized version of this game at some point in the future, but that would be severely hampered if a free fan fiction version with professional production quality is available online. So I can understand Disney's rationale for not wanting that game to be released. But I wouldn't support them going after children and young teens who merely posted their fan art drawing of a Disney character online because that is excessively heavy handed for something that won't actually hurt their bottom line.
And to be honest, sometimes I wonder why the best and most hardworking fan fiction creators continue to play in someone else's sandbox? Doing so places them at the mercy of the corporation which owns that intellectual property. All their hard work can become worthless with a single cease and desist letter. These fan art and fan fiction creators are evidently highly creative and intelligent people who would be quite capable of creating their own unique worlds and cast of characters which they would own the copyright in. Perhaps it wouldn't be such a bad thing to nudge them in that direction.
Why not simply analyze what makes Star Wars great at its most abstract level and take those basic ideas and use them to create a new universe that doesn't infringe in any way upon Disney's intellectual property? After all, ideas and abstractions are not copyrighted, but only their specific expressions are. This is why "The Orville" can co-exist with "Star Trek" even though the former is clearly heavily inspired by the latter. Furthermore, creators who go this route can place their creations under a permissive Creative Commons license that will allow fan fiction and fan art creators to legally build upon that universe without fear of some big corporation sending them a cease and desist letter. The community itself can decide what is "canon" and ultimately I think such an open world could become just as popular as any closed corporately owned world like Star Wars or Star Trek.
Companies risk losing intellectual property rights if they don’t actively protect them. Nintendo’s whole company is essentially intellectual property with their games and characters so they arguably go overkill on protecting their property because it’s so valuable
As a fanfiction writer and fan-artist, this recommendation got me scared
Yup. Me too.
See this is why we need AO3
eyyo fanfic what do you make? im interested ;)
@@YurieSnowie main ship's sskk from bsd, mainly alternate universes :> main fic's a medieval au gonna be writing one shots soon !!
@@narimdraws6696 i have no idea what that half of those word meant but okay? maybe ill check it out later
where are you gonna post your fanfic btw? i have no idea where normal fanfics are released
Seems like LegalEagle still has flashbacks to the omegaverse lawsuit.
The what lawsuit?
@@Mothlord03 Lindsay Ellis made a video about a whole huge, stupidly complicated incident involving wolf porn fanfiction that LegalEagle was involved in.
...
Just don't ask. Please.
@@HeroLink18 my goodness
Some things really take time to heal and forget.
@@HeroLink18 So I looked it up and watched it. My god. It's... so fascinating in a horrific way that people can be so incredibly petty over something so... uh. Whatever those books are.
Fanmade material definitely draws some people back to the original. There are shows that I never would have watched under normal circumstances, but did because a fanfic writer whose work I enjoyed gave me a thoughtful glimpse into their characters and worlds.
Company : I want cheap advertisement and unpaid labor.
Fan artists : Hi.
Company : You are leeching of our property, we will take you to court!
Everyone : OK, bye.
Company : No, wai-
This shouldn't be so accurate.
They don't want that though.
If a company, let us say Saga, lets you make a fan art of Sonic and it is good and all, and then more fan art gets made without any legal action and one day a fan makes something that hurts the Sonic franchise, well guess what, because Saga didn't stop all that good fan art they lost their rights to the character and now they can't stop the works that hurt Sonic. It is in their best interest to act like Nintendo and shut down any all fan art then to risk setting a legal loss of rights. Before we get to far yes this has precedent in trademark and copy right laws, see aspirin litigation.
@@hopefulmayhem5744 There needs to be a better middle-ground. Also, hateful content won't be weighed the same criticism of content or an approval of content. Being like Nintendo is an easy way to make serious fans despise you.
That first bit makes me wonder if Shaq Stories ever took off
@@hopefulmayhem5744 Ironic example since Sega does let people make fanart and fangames etc and even encourage it.
I'd honestly tell these giant companies "fuck your IP rules" You're a huge company with enough money. You're not gonna die by losing 20 bucks from fan art. Literally no company has gotten bankrupt from fan art. Copyright is bullshit because it's never enforced when needed and needless enforced when not needed.
And the best way to flick the bean at them would be making works completely anonymously and releasing them en mass online with zero prior warning.
By the time the company even thinks about it,the product has been downloaded,along with a built in message telling people to keep sharing the data,and there's no way to track down the creator.
I'm surprised that none of them have realized that supporting your fans who created a lighthearted project with your IPs is a much better business practice than threatening to send them behind bars
@@sleepyavenue5572 That's exactly what I'm thinking. What do you gain by seizing all control over your IP's and taking down anyone who dares trample on that? A few salty tastes in mouths? Loss of supportive fans? You lose essentially nothing by just letting fan creations exist that don't cross a certain line
@@lumonetic1124 I'm honestly baffled myself. Imagine if instead of out right shutting down fan projects, creators are given creative freedom, although the revenue will be shared to the original creator.
This way, the original creator will earn from this fan made projects, while also incentivizing fan creators to make more great content, which leads to the original creator earning more revenue that he can use to create more original works, that will lead to fans and those fans would then create fan projects, that would then lead to the original creator earning more revenue. etc....
We no longer live in an analog world where it is difficult to track copyright material. Most specially, since digital distribution has become easier, most original creators should take advantage of the current age to expand their franchise, instead of killing creative fan projects that could otherwise lead to more popularity
@@NareshSinghOctagon sharing it is fine its when you try to make money off of it that there's a problem, and of course that will leave a money trail back to you
I'm reminded of Sonic and The Black Knight for when Sega actually included a whole section of wholesome fanart for everyone to look at in there
I loved that game so much when I was a kid.
I remember going to anime conventions and seeing people selling posters, stickers, t shirts, and even body pillows of their fan art and all I could think was “wow this is definitely illegal.”
It’s really weird how in the modern era how much you come into contact with copyright infringement and how little we think about it.
but the companies dont do anything (most of the time) about it so most people assume its not illegal.
@@mairidberz1450 which is definitely a recipe for disaster
I once saw a video of someone ranting about an "art thief" who manually copied some Deviant Art drawing of Overwatch characters onto a physical paint canvas and tried to sell it at a con. The person who made the video ranted to no end about defending the Deviant Artist's rights, but didn't even make a peep about the rights of the folks at Blizzard.
_Then the video-maker got side-tracked showing off some obviously fanmade Sailor Moon merch she bought at the con._ *My face hurt, I palmed it so hard. (>_ლ)*
@@ChaosRayZero people will bitch and moan for hours about art thief’s when they do nothing wrong. “Oh you didn’t pay for art you featured on a T-shirt even though the artist clearly gave you permission? ART THIEF!”
because most of the creators and some of the publishers know that it is free publicity, more publicity, more potential revenue for future projects.
Edit; Although honestly, a shared revenue would still be preferable. Where the author get's to keep ownership of the intellectual IP AND earn some extra revenue from fan projects. Fan creators are incentivized to create more great content/more fanbase which leads to more revenue to the creator. Instead of the current state, where the original creator would just send DMCA takedowns, which only restricts the creative freedom.
I love how the Minecraft team started hiring mod creators to help them create new interesting mobs and bring in new ideas. I think fan creations can be a great way to find good talented people with passion for the franchise they're creating fan works for and it would be great if companies could learn that and maybe make deals with fan creators that make quality stuff.
Smart!
I also love the fact that although they could copyright strike litteraly every minecraft video ever made, they don't.
@@starchy_ well thats would be too stupid
@@slitnotgm it would be very stupid
Some companies have license agreement with third party companies that produces merchandise. Some of them are small. That would be unfair to them.
Illegal or legal, sometimes it's Fanart that keeps long dead franchises alive.
If fanart had been illegal throughout history, then wow would a lot of old works be hit.
Yeah, say goodbye to Shakespeare
So much religious artwork would be scrubbed from history.
Imagine if the Sistine Chapel was just cottage cheese off white instead of something objectively masterful and sometimes memeable?
I have not watched the shows, but would there even been four teenage mutant turtles named after famous artists without all of those religious commissions to make them iconic?
Goodbye to every masterpiece that was heavily inspired by another one (and that's a lot lol)
Murder is illegal, what I'm thinking is to use squarspace to make a website where the holders announce their rights can be used freely or with conditions, to then peaple sing up with their real id so whenever they make money of them they tax them, and people go their like shoping this might work for fanart and *some* modes, but definitely not music or *the* modes
Most of Disney's animated movies are literally folk-tale fanart. Disney could not have existed without an expansive public domain to steal from.
Only the fanart that turns me in a cat femboy
Modern Art looks like a child urinated on a canvas. BANNED!
Jazz Music sounds like the feeling of needing to fart. BANNED!
Art that makes Gromek999 a furry? BANNED!
if that becomes illegal, i’m serving multiple sentences
everything else is just irrelevant
Same bruv, I've gotten two of those, from the same person
Sausage
This is happened to me on, I admit, a much smaller scale.
I was working on a video which chronicles the history of logos that a company (in particular 20th Century Studios), and I spent a week and a half working on it, took a whole day to upload it, and I woke up in the morning to see that Fox claimed the copyrights as their own and I had to do something else for that video. (I ended up doing PBS)
What's funny is that Fox has not owned 20th Century Studios, brand names, or trademarks since last year, yet they still have time to get after me to make a video that I DO NOT PROFIT OFF OF.
So, technically, I know how this feels on a very reduced scale.
And to be perfectly clear, I enunciated "FAIR USE" to them (and it is fair use, considering it is being educational about that topic)
Sonic, looking at pictures of his feet:
*”Absolutely”*
*shivers* the deviantart horrors I have seen
i hate sonic
@@ericsilver9401 I don’t hate Sonic, I hate the weirdos who like him
@@ericsilver9401 same I don’t like it either, but I respect the NORMAL fans who have to put up with the crappy fans
@@ericsilver9401
Why do you hate Sonic?
As a fan-artist this notification got me real scared
AS A FANFICTION WRITER SAME I RUSHED OVER AS SOON AS I GOT THE NOTIFICATION HGBFBB
@@besterjester If you write on Archive Of Our Own i think youre fine.
I saw something about them having clauses in the way to fight for, and protect their writers.
Name checks out
Where I am is that we *had* a good system: in it's earliest days, copyright could only last 20 yrs, but be extended to 40 if a good case was presented;
But then Disney kept extending the copyright further and further to what we have now- 90 yrs after the death of the artist
I've heard this story one thousands times. The problem is, that's extremely reductive. I don't live in the US and Disney hasn't bribed our politicians here. But our copyright lengths are still absurd. So is the case in most countries in the world. Why? Because of the Berne convention, made a long time ago, that has as a rule copyright lasting for 50 years after the death of the author. Which is already very long. The vast majority countries in the world signed it. It's very hard to amend, and also you can't just sign a low that will make this convention null and void because you're required to sign it to be a member of the world trade organisation. The world seems to have a more unified stance on this than in the age of consent lol
If fanart becomes illegal, then the Jesus fandom is going to suffer greatly
what will he send? legal angels? lmao
.
I was gonna make this joke...
Pretty sure Jesus is in the public domain ;)
ehhh, the mohammed fandom has had this limitation and they've been doing pretty ok
This reminds me of the interesting case of Archive of Our Own.
It's a non-profit fanfiction website run by volunteers born out of the legal issues surrounding fanfiction. People would be threatened with legal action because of their fanfiction, and would be forced to take down things they've worked endlessly hard on(there's fanfiction that are millions of words long). As a result, fan coders, fans with legal knowledge, and more banded together to make an archive of everything that'd be able to defend itself.
It's a really interesting case, and I suggest for anyone interested to do further research, they even received a Hugo Award for their efforts.
Thank you! I have no idea why this was never brought up in the video.
its why I use apps to download said fanfiction to be able to enjoy
Shakespeare had the right idea.
"The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers."- Henry VI, Part 2, Act IV
He *really* did
Something that's interesting, is how Japan deals with it. I only found out about this, cause I was looking for a fan story, and came across a manga someone made, and they had explained how they were able to get away with it, based on Japanese law. They're American by the way.
Basically, they were allowed to make the fan manga, on the condition that they followed specific rules, the primary one being: you have to draw everything yourself. Meaning, you can't re-use any pictures/panels from a pre-published book of the series, and you must use your own resources. And, apparently this seems to be fairly popular, as their (japan's) book stores have sections dedicated to both the original works, as well as the fan works.
And, honestly, I think this is what we should be doing over here. We need to open things up, and let fans do things like this. However, I'd implement slightly different rules, based on the medium. One being, not to *remake* a game, and of course, follow the above rule of, "the game must have it's own resources".
Although, something that would also help is, having a stamp of sorts, that people can toss onto their project, that outright states that it's fan work, and that, if it doesn't have it, the companies have the legal right to halt it as they see fit.
But, seriously, the rules *need* to be changed, because there's tons of great people out there, that, honestly, if they were to apply to some of these companies, their work would become incredibly useful. What's a better way to build your portfolio of art, writing, movies, or games, than to make a fan version? It shows passion and dedication, and loads of skill, much of which all these industries are typically looking for from people.
problem is you can bet your ass that corporations will find a way to sneak loopholes into any new copyright law that will render it basically useless. thats one reason copyright law hasn't changed for the better. because we are so busy on the defense to prevent it from getting worse and any attempt we do get to try to change it for the better is quickly countered and puts us back on the defense. the painful truth is the average person can easily be fooled by legal texts and speech. using many words you wouldn't understand because they aren't used in everyday conversation. words that they use to confuse, run circles around, and skillfully manipulate you into thinking they are talking about something helpful but the wording used allows them to completely and legally undermine everything they say. this is how they are able to sneak manipulative laws that benefit them right under the nose of the average citizen and gain support for the act. the only ones that can call them out on their bullshit are the ones who know legal speak. if we didn't have them things would have gotten much worse than they already are long ago. currently their tactic is to slip stuff into essential bills so they can pass.
Japanese manners and conventions are not the same thing as Japanese law, and it's important not to get them confused. This "you draw everything yourself" rule is one example of a manner that's not exactly rooted in law. Actually Japanese law can be much stricter than American copyright laws. Several doujinshi creators have gotten in trouble before, though nobody would notice because there's so many of these creators that this has hardly made any impact. It's just that fan manga is more popular in Japan for some reason, and I don't know why, but maybe the community aspect of playing with shared characters is a bigger attraction to them than more individualist Western countries.
The main issue for anyone creating fanworks in the West that's not a big fangame project is not legality, but simply the lack of demand, or at least a lack of places where there is demand. Even it's a "labor of love," it still hurts not to get noticed for whatever effort one puts in.
the rules will never be changed as long as fans supply these big companies with money. no corporation cares to protect an unprofitable ip. people who still spend money on corporate brand garbage in this decade are part of the problem.
I'm not surprised this would be a discussed topic at one point, ages ago disney had a copyright lawsuit against a couple who made a gravestone for their late son who had a spider man picture on it.
fandom is the heart and soul of media and its a complete shame that capitalist behemoths can feel good completely strangling their own fans .-. i grew up in fandom spaces, ty for talking abt this
@@Fata1Client dreamsmp stans lol
Copyright law, especially with how it is now, goes against the principles of capitalism. Blame corporatism. (When large companies utilize government to pass laws that benefit them and hinder competition.) These laws were meant to protect the little guys from having their work poached by the big guys, but corporations have broken this. Now copyright is just a tool they use to monopolize content and crush any hint of competition.
Quick edit: You gotta know the enemy you're fighting against to beat them. Corpos benefit greatly by the confusion between capitalism and corporatism, since it makes people want more government involvement to check what they think is rampant capitalism, not corporatism. Ultimately this is what the corporations want.
@@SolarFlareWings no dude, this is capitalism, capitalism is the privatisation of the means of production and owning the labor (and profits that comes with it) from the working class, which is literally what copyright is, buying the rights for the IP from the original authors so only you can make big projects in with the protection of the law.
Making a loby doesnt make the system less capitalist, in fact, capitalism need a goverment to protect the laws of private property, otherwise companies would need to pay mercenaries to protect their different forms of property, this is how capitalism has work since it was invented arround 300 years ago.
@@SolarFlareWings copyright is capitalism, "corporalism" is just a libertarian buzzword that is only used to ignore the problems of capitalism and silence anyone that wants to evolve from it, when things are going well is always because we live in capitalism, but when stuff start to go wrong we sudenly become corporalism.
@@SolarFlareWings Corporationism, more like somebody win competition too much
im sure in the phone call with the lawyer, the fact that the lawyer was using a really old phone was symbolic of how laws are behind the times, but i find it funny that austin himself is using a flip phone, something noone has used for like a decade. i don't know if this can be called ironic, but it certainly is pretty funny lol
At one point, Nintendo welcomed fan art by featuring it in their official magazines.
Deep irony.
Cooperate paranoia or just doing what they can do
And now they are a shithole just like EA
@@alx2900 eh, not really
@@radiosaido66 wdym
"Should Fanart be Illegal?"
Me: *Looks at pile of fanart from various fandoms* "uhhhhhh"
This reminds me of a joke Carrie Fisher made at an awards-show many years ago, where she thanks George for charging her fees for every time she sees her likeness in a mirror.
I'm not smart enough to discern if this is fundamentally relevant by any string of connection.
But it sounds similar, and I found the joke quite funny.
This is that Happy Birthday song issue with Warner Bros, where they were gonna sue anyone who just sang that song. Like no kidding.
Aren't we humans who get excited about the things we like and inherently want to share it with others, specially with those into the same stuff we are? I think people creating fanart are not actively trying to make money out of something. They just want to express themselves and share their work with their community. Of course they need resources, thus the donations and other ways of funding. Copyright is such an issue, specially in platforms like TH-cam where you can get striked if something slightly ressembles some copyrighted work.
Amen.
You go from saying they aren't trying to make money off of it then go on about how they need donations and funding. You act as they deserve to love off of ot because they are just doing it out of love
But of that was the case ot would just be a hobby they did on the side.
@@Dielawn69 can you re-edit your sentence so it makes sense. Not trying to be a Grammar Nazi, but I don't even know what you are trying to say.
"It is illegal to sell fanfiction."
Wait, aren't doujins/fanbooks like popular in Japan? They even sell tons of those in huge conventions.
Don't those creators pay a small amount of revenue to the mangaka and/or publisher?
Different countries have different laws, copyright included.
They are not allowed to make a lot of money over it though. I think I heard somewhere that the comic should make enough for the labour of the creator. And depending on your audience you have to adjust prices so the threshold price you are not allowed to reach is never reached.
fanarts in Japan are as illegal as they are pretty much everywhere else. The fact that you don't often see these kinds of lawsuits is simply because of the rights holders' tolerance of such practice to some degree. One of the few legal loopholes Japanese fan artists rely on is that by selling physical copies, they can just say that the revenue is only for covering the printing cost. Rights holders understand the potential of massive popularity fan projects can bring and thus allow them, but they also mercilessly strike back whenever they see some of those works undesirable (also fan-made merchs are pretty much big nono).
It's a mystery how they are so widely tolerated, but I guess at this point companies would receive a tremendous backslash if they started sending C&D letters to doujin artists. Comiket is huge.
If George Lucas still owned Lucasfilm he would have sent them a packet full of information on what he wanted to see, original files, conception art and a good luck letter
Sad how that remains in the past, its because of Lucas that the guy who voiced Chad Vader managed to become the actual official VA for Vader in quite a while
yay. no.. Lucas was just as greedy as everyone else.
@@weberman173 Yeah the argument Disney overadvertised Star Wars is a moot point. It was getting tons of cash grab ads made way before 2013
@@lazyproductions8005 heck, lucas litteraly WAITED till hasbro iirc(or whoever had some of the toy rights) forgot or did not care to renew their license agreement to announce his plans for the prequels
@@weberman173 One of the biggest reasons Star Wars had so many pop culture references is because he allowed it. In fact, when Seth McFarlane asked Lucas for permission to parody it Lucas sent him a packet to help him including the soundtrack. He also did cameos as himself in at least two Robot Chicken skits that I know of. He was a smart buisnessman which is why he got the money and the merchandising rights but he also let other people write books, make fan art, ect. This stuff stood never fly with Disney.
Tom Scott: "told you so."
Exactly what I was thinking
Here's an idea: Allow all fanart, but make it so that the fanartists must always disclose that what they're doing is fanart, the same way TH-camrs have to disclose sponsorships, that way the ip wouldn't really be hurt if no one is mistaking the fanart for the official thing.
They most of the time disclose it.
Yeah, and If they want to sell it just come up with some sort of deal to split the revenue.
@@CrazyGreenFluff Most of the time people know of the original artists in these scenarios... it is rare though it does happen where the little people are lost but this is often due to the little person not following through.
If you create a cure for cancer and then make 1 cure a year what do you expect to happen?
@@Buglin_Burger7878 sounds to me like you've never had an art block before
"Should Fan Art Be Illegal?"
Me, currently making fan art and intending to start posting more, maybe even open fan commissions in the future as a way to earn money during the pandemic: **sweats**
the question has been answered. Yes, it's illegal.
I hope I don’t sound rude, but can’t you just make your own characters? It seems kinda lazy to want to make a profit off of someone else’s creation. Maybe I don’t really understand it because I’m not in the “fan art community” nor am I really familiar with it myself
@@truefalse934 @True False Nah I get it, man. It's just that (with what I've seen) it can be hard to gain any attention with original art as opposed to making fan art of characters that are already well-known and loved by many. I won't necessarily profit from making fan art but, instead, use that attention from fans and direct it to original art that I would post alongside fan art. (As far as I know, that's how a lot of artists start out).
For me, fan art's a good way to showcase what kind of art you can do by reimagining characters into your own style and how that will look like in more original pieces and commissions. Then again, I haven't actually started posting art yet since I'm still working things out (it's also hard to get a job with everything going on, so i figured i should stick with smth that I can do, which is art)
@@deltaweathers We're in the same boat man. Also trying to start my artist dream by posting fan art. For what is worth there're tons of professional artists who post fan art and even comics, so I don't think small projects like that are risky. But if you wanted to make a film or video game, then companies may go after you. Good luck to you!
@@truefalse934 Not really, all creations are based on things that already existed before them. It's the very basis of creativity.
The biggest misunderstanding with fan art or fiction is that those who create them simply copy and paste the original content and earn money. That believe completely ignores the transformative process of making fan media. Through your own interpretation and style you will inevitably add sth new and exciting to the franchise. And fans who want more content also benefit from fan arts. Contrary to popular belief, it doesn't hurt the label most of the time because fan made contents keep people interested in sth for longer periods of time. Not to mention, lot of creative people started professional careers with making fan arts then transitioned to original content.
The main reason I end up checking out new shows/games ect. is because there’s a lot of cool fanart, it shows me it must be good if people are passionate enough to make so much art. It’s basically a super effective and free form of advertising for these IPs
large companies haven't realized that fan artwork increases exposure, exposure leads to curiosity, curiosity leads to searching, searching leads to possible new costumers
Minecraft/Undertale/[insert game here] can not be a better example, a game with no marketing what so ever lead to a massive genre thanks to fanwork and fan products
I don't really deal with fan art based on Ip however. it seems in Kpop fandom (Whichever one you fall into) You don't have this omni present threat of having your hard work yanked down.
If exposure is so good, why do artists online complain so much when someone tries to pay them with it?
The main problem with your theory of exposure -> curiosity -> searching -> new customers is that there is a serious dilution between the amount of people who are exposed to the product and the people who decide they will willing pay what the asking price for the product is.
How many people need to be exposed to a product via fanfiction/fan art/fan projects to result in 1 guaranteed sale? 10,000? 100,000? 10,000,000? And what if those projects fans make completely replace the original one, such as the Star Wars KOTOR remake that the video began with? Why would anyone purchase the original KOTOR game (which I believe is available on Steam right now) when they can download the fan-made remake for free?
You would be surprise how many people are willing to waste money on anything
People buy a product for having the words Supreme in them, if someone likes it they are willing to pay for it and even if some things are free, some people have so much money they will look for what ever excuse to waste it and if it means supporting an artist they will spend that money, how do you think youtubers are this wealthy??? By pure support, that people don't need to spend money on the videos that are free but they spend it anyway because it means helping someone else
@@Rajun008 Companies pay millions on advertisements with no guarantee on sales.
Why download the original KOTOR? Maybe because it doesn't have flaws like the fan one does... and if the fan one does better then that means the KOTOR creator might've released a failed product no one would get to begin with... meaning the KOTOR on steam would've gotten MORE SALES ironically.
If a game is bad enough to be beat by the fan then it won't get many sales... but it will get more sales then if the fan didn't exist.
Here’s the thing... it literally doesn’t matter if the original content owner thinks there is an infraction it only matters what the judge or jury thinks. Go to court, brush up on the legal process and represent yourself, its cheaper that way. Present your case and appeal by stressing the originality of your work and how much it differs from the inspirational material.
This is how it works for music as well. You remix the track you like in order to be different and there isn’t anything the original owner can do... and they know it. Which is why they rarely go to court and almost never succeed when they do. Rachel Platton threw a fit over The Piano Guys doing an instrumental cover for one of her most popular songs and The Piano Guys basically said, “Thanks for the inspiration but this isn’t even the same song... this is an instrumental cover not previously available to the public in any way, tough luck.” And literally nothing came of it because it was original in its arrangement and presentation even if it wasn’t entirely original in composition.
The best way to look at the situation (in my experience) is with an analogy. How many brands of barbecue sauce are there in the world? How many use different ingredients? How many use the same ingredients but in a different ratio? How many lawsuits between brands do you see? Almost none. Unless a carbon copy is made there is literally nothing anyone (no matter how big the company) can do. And they know it! (Don’t forget that.)
Donations can’t be considered payment because there is no price tag on the material and no payment is required for its use. It helps if you have a wide variety of content because the donations are non specific to available material and unless the prosecution can prove beyond reasonable doubt that any and every donation was made in exclusive connection to the elements that they hold intellectual rights to, they don’t have a leg to stand on. I speak from experience, albeit brief and limited. (It is expensive to hire a prosecutor and the potential gain is almost nonexistent for most big companies to bother with. Your “infraction” is more than likely a mere bug on the metaphorical windshield.)
Some things to remember:
Try to make your work as unique and original as possible in every way. (Design, name, color pallet, etc. no one said “knockoffs” or “spinoffs” had to be cheap, just try to be creative!)
Understand that it is the right of the opposition to appeal to a court and present their case.
Try to reach out and cooperate with the group making a claim prior to court involvement. This will dramatically increase your odds of favor in the eyes of a judge or jury should things actually go to court. (An attempt to resolve a conflict before wasting the court’s time is well liked by officials in most instances.)
Look up cases on TH-cam where the “violator” won the case against the big company. It happens way more often than you would think and there are many examples. (Often, the company gets gutted afterward for wasting the court’s time. 😆)
That’s the Facts.
"Should fanart be illegal?"
Nintendo and fresh TV:YES
add disney to that
@@ericsilver9401 wait what did disney do?
Wait, fresh TV as in total drama? Those well-known poorly made bases aren't worth the legal fight
@@randomrandle9141 Star Wars. MCU. Shortly Avatar. Any legal battle over those properties come from the House of Mouse.
Disney is literally Lucasfilm, and has been since 2012.
Legal Eagle is literally on every TH-cam channel I follow these days
What else is he gonna do? Practice law?
He should go on Rekieta Law's channel as well, if he dares :)
A crossover with Austin was a tiny bit predictable, given this video's topic. It wouldn't be too surprising to see a LegalEagle - LockPickingLawyer crossover someday. What would really amaze me is if he did a crossover with Captain Disillusion.
I know this'll probably get buried but, it's really fuckin cool to hear SBN3's voice in this, knowing your history with him and how you were originally inspired by him and then developed your own style beyond that to get your own voice and now hearing his voice in this, especially with what this video is about, is super nice. it's like a little arc that got wrapped up!
I can't wait for Jesus, David, and Solomon to sue Leonardo, Michelangelo, or El Greco for drawing fanart of their books.
Or better yet, the Grimm brothers...
...you know who they'd sue the shit out of?
@@chaoticsilver8442 but the Grimm brothers based their books on stories that already existed, so in other words, they shouldn't be able to sue anyone bc the stories they wrote about were on the public domain for a very long time by the time they decided to write them in their books.
The point being made is that, Disney. The one's who are constantly lobbying to extend the time it takes for things to hit public domain. Who wants nothing but to get rich, while denying anyone the chance to make even fan works of the subject... is built on a foundation of what essentially are fam remakes in and of themselves- and if they had their way, and extended copyright term to infinity... then the people who made what *their* works are based on would have just as much of a right to sue the shit out of them, as they do to anyone who wants to, say, make a fan remake of a starwars game.
That the 'public domain' they're so adamant at keeping all their works out of by eternally extending copyright law... is essentially what the company itself is built off of.
Michelangelo : sorry bruhh your copyright expires wayy past some centuries, your public domain now
I feel like this is actually a surprisingly untouched topic and should be WAY MORE controversial. Because I think a lot of good-faith artists like the idea of having (in theory) so much control over their private property (which is what it becomes when you've monetised, copyrighted and licensed the thing you've made).
For everyone else except the few that own the copyrights, I think the legacy of copyright and patents is actually DEVASTATING and we've most likely been denied some of the best works of art and most important innovations in history because someone couldn't just go ahead and MAKE what they wanted (within every other regulation that keeps people safe of course).
I'm definitely a pirate in this respect, as soon as you've released your creation into the neverending abyss that is the internet, you should just kind of accept that it can and will be used and abused, but that's OK? I think a person's position on this topic says a lot more than just what you think about the legality of certain cursed fanfiction, and more what you think about private ownership, money, wealth and libertarianism/anarchism in general.
Ok, maybe don't PIRATE a piece of work, but I agree that copyright laws should be changed.
The system that should be around is one that doesn’t allow corporations to own copyright, but instead assign it to one individual person, preferably the one who was in charge of its creation. No trading of copyright, only licensing. Once they’ve passed away, into the Public Domain it goes.
I'd honestly make things go into the public domain in a fixed set of years instead of waiting for the death of the creator. Some countries have 30 years, which sounds reasonable to me.
That would be hilarious because fan project creators would have incentive to hire assassins to kill the person who owns Mario or whatever, so they can make their fan project 😹
Like "It's simple. We kill the IP owner of Batman."
This video makes me glad to be a weeb. Fanworks are not just generally permitted, they are instrumental to the culture. The largest convention, Comiket, is almost entirely dedicated to derivative works. There are so many people today who got their start 10-20 years ago making Doujinshi (self published derivative manga), working with Vocaloid (hatsune miku) and Touhou (just a really popular intellectual property I guess). Anime in the west also owes its entire existence to fansubbers who for decades have been arduously translating and subtitling works for the western market.
Permitted but the still have the rights to shut you down. Comiket and doujins are technically illegal it's just IP holders just let the fans be.
The guy who created the basic anime face and shape should just sue everyone, because *everybody's still using it*
@@flavorgod It's not that IP holders "let the fans be" necessarily, it's just that everyone participating in Comiket and doujins are small creators who wouldn't get noticed enough to get shut down in the first place. As for why they're so prevalent in Japan, my guess is that the communal aspect of playing around with shared characters creates a feeling of connection that is very attractive to them, whereas Westerns prefer to be individualists and "do their own thing."
If someone copyrights a stickman and fanart is made illegal, we're all screwed
I drew "Sticku-Sama" in the early 2000s*, I hereby grant permission to any and all to create derivative works of him.
*One time at a local anime club the club president said for us to draw an anime character and name them.
Everyone gangsta till the pepe the frog becomes copyrighted lmao
Now that's the thing : a stick man doesn't have enough distinctive properties to be protected by the laws of copyright. At best you could do a logo with a stick man and trademark that logo, but the stickman itself, you can't.
The shape of a bat isn't copyrighted, but the Batman logos are trademarked for instance.
The shape of a spider web isn't copyrighted, yet the specific web on Spider-man's suit, with the blue and red colors, is enough to make it specific and recognizable by the public.
Same with the S of Superman.
Copyright and trademark laws are kinda complex.
"That was a close one Henry!"
Imagine Disney points at a kindergartener who drew the Mickey Mouse shape on a chalkboard then found a nickel on the ground, and says "see you in court, asshole!"
I like that SEGA went with "Hey, these Sonic things on the internet are free publicity. Let's hire the ones that make the really good stuff!"
I feel for both sides of the argument. On one hand, making fanart often comes from a genuine expression of appreciation from someone who loves the work. It's tough to have a metaphorical slap to the face when you cannot profit over something you love doing.
On the other, I wouldn't want someone to make tons of profit over original content I make, especially since I may earn less for my own work than someone else seemingly mooching off my stuff. It's a really hard toss-up between the interests of fans and the copyright holder.
Someone in the comments mentioned how it would be a good idea for both worlds to allow the creation and selling of fanart, as long as there is a certain percentage of funds given to the original copyright holder depending on how transformative the fanart is.
I was so sad about that one Arrowverse game that the creator spent years on only to have it receive a cease and desist. : ( If I recall correctly, he got the notice the day before it was supposed to come out.
I remember. That was heartbreaking.
@@supernunb3128 it really was. I can’t even find his videos anymore so I guess he took them all down. : (
I have zero sympathy for companies like Disney that go after small creators for things like fanart. Disney is a multi billion dollar company that owns the right to many of the most popular media out there. They're not hurting for money at all. The fact is a lot of times fanworks help bring in new fans. There's been many times I've seen some fanart and it's made me want to check something out. Artists shouldn't have to worry that they'll get slapped with a lawsuit just because they're showing love to their favorite movies or shows. Something definitely needs to change with the current system.
i think the whole copyright system in general is broken and stifles creativity. Some of the greatest works were remixes and homages to past works. Copyright was created to last for a certain amount of time for as long as the creator of the works to live to profit and then the works go into the Public Domain. Now through lobbying, companies like Disney have extended their copyright far beyond what’s reasonable. It’s disgusting, they use other people’s work to make their work and then stifle other people who do the same. IT NEEDS TO CHANGE
i couldn’t find the link but Tom Scott made a really good video that helps explain the whole situation
But how could we even change it? Literally boycott Disney? Nintendo? Other such companies and corporations known for putting down fan creations?
...yeah... right. As if the pennies they'd lose from losing a few individuals like us as customers would actually make a difference to them.
...things need to change...
...but how could we even start?
@@chaoticsilver8442 Anti-lobbying laws is one place to begin. Its a tale older than time that politicians get paid off by corporations to keep immoral-but-profitable laws in place.
our world was just ruined at the exact same moment when money was invented, everything in peoples life,such as dreams,hopes ecc just fall apart and what we end up doing is just working for powerful people to just earn useless money
Maybe i'm saying something dumb. But big companies should recognize the effort and talent behind all those fan works. And maybe hire some of the people involved. Rockstar Games recently hired a modder that made GTA V loading a lot shorter... That was cool of them...
They didn't hire him. Stop lying on the internet.
I thought they did, and I lie who I want on the internet.
@@santiagogirbau2392 Bro I was gonna defend you for making a simple mistake. But "I lie who I want on the internet" was weird.
And yeah the modder wasn't hired but he was awarded some money in return for his work.
yeah, not hired. paid like $10k tho
Yeah but you see the issue is, they won’t. It’s a good idea, it’d get people passionate about the thing even more fired up, expand the content of that piece of media, but companies don’t do things that are solely beneficial.
I try my best to make original characters but sometimes you just gotta draw a Mario. I won't stop.
The TH-camr you want to consult for a great understanding of Fair Use legislation is Casey Fiesler, she wrote a PHD thesis on Fair Use Copyright law and the legality of Fan Works. She also weighed in on another Fair Use situation that happened on TH-cam a while ago.
Thanks for that. I will look her up.
"If your favorite franchise suddenly granted you a free license for derivative works, what would you make?"
rule 34 artists: *cracks knuckles and stretches neck*
artists doesn’t feel like the right term
@@ericsilver9401 rule 34 _maestros_
The very same people who denigrate those that produce high quality illustrations of pornography as "less than artists" are the same people who breathe through their mouth and know nothing about figure drawing let alone art in general, yet obnoxiously insist on having an ignorant, uneducated opinion. Perspective, foreshortening, anatomy, gesture, poses, composition, color theory... Any one of those categories and many unmentioned others could take years, *decades* to perfect. Whether you're a fan of the content or not is beyond irrelevant. They're skilled artists, and denying it makes you look like a philistine jackass. Thank you, this has been my TedTalk.
@@PinkManGuy i totally agree with you but i didn't trash them tho, tag the other guys who said they're not artists. i've actually had some experience drawing just nsfw stuff in general (i don't post them on the internet tho) and i always struggle with thinking of or sketching good positions or making body proportions look nice.
Go the South Park route - people are making yaoi art of your characters? Make an episode about it, feature fan artists, then make the relationship canon.
"are those copyright laws fair in the 21st century?" - no. Most of them were made in the second half of 20s century by extending copyright length to absurd degree. Star wars should have been public domain 10 years ago due to age. Those laws are deliberately unfair.
*"The human brain is the most complex structure in the whole entire universe"*
_-Human Brain_
brain named itself
Insert obama awarding obama here
lol
How pretentious lol
@@joeldeakin2003 Pretentious... a concept made up by _human_ _brain!_
Nice try Austin. No one will stop me from making AustinMcConnell x LegalEagle fanart.
That is a horrible mental image.
How dare you do that to my brain
Truly a work that will rival Fifty Shades of Grey
I would love it if someone threatened to do this, then when they released it, it was just the two standing at the bus stop waiting for the bus, with one asking the other the time. APRIL FOOLS BITCH
*Puts finger up*
"I don't like where this is going"
I feel like when All of the creators of the original project die then the copyright should be lifted. Company brand names and logos can stay forever since those identify the company.
On the flip side, being able to fall back on trusted IP's allow companies to make riskier moves and it could be argued that we actually get stuff we never would have gotten otherwise.
I see A Fox in Space in the thumbnail, and I insta-click.
I didn’t expect SBN3 too tho!
If I had a franchise, I will be like George Lucas and make an EU. I couldn't wait to see what people would make. I'm going to put that stuff into my newsletter. Fan art is the best part and it's great to see people being passionate about your creation.
I actually have this idea where the fans create the world. You give the a foundation and basic rules and they create stories and characters.
@@thewriterforge DC did that once, didn't last long
The problem with copywrite is if the company that owns the property doesn’t cease and desist these smaller works someone actually trying to steal intellectual properties can use that as leverage
The art that comes from your mind and hands is your own. Otherwise there really is no freedom of speech.
Plus it would be completely unenforceable
what about when?
@UCVV9ShmRmYC9byGeaVvmz-w huge difference between stealing and using their artwork as inspiration for your own version of it. If you're out right copying their artwork 1 for 1 sure. But if you make your own unique version of it; it should fall under fair use law.
The characters aren't your own. They constitute the art too.
Sorry, for ruining 69 upvotes, but I had to.
although your videos' subjects are never related to each other and might look random at times, they always fit my interests. you really know your ways on gaining the attention of a person.
I was talking about this just last week! I study game design and design posters for gaming events we host at our university. Whether to include the game characters, or use them in a different pose, or wearing our merch for the events is all troublesome for those of us who just want to organise a tournament for the games we all love.
I got scare for a moment because I read “Should farts be illegal”
yes
Fuck...that's a scary thought
Don't give me nightmares, man
Me too
@@0uttaS1TE 🏃💨
Heres the interesting thing
Apeiron was given a cease and desist order
Compare that to Legends of Pirates Online, a fan reproduction/continuation of Pirates of the Caribbean Online
They somehow bought some of the original code to work with, and its still going strong
Disney knows about it
Disney knows all
The obvious difference I see is that one is an MMO thats no longer online and not being monetized by the rights holder at all while the other is a remake of a game still actively being sold that could have an official remake possibly being discussed.
i think fan art is the next level of appreciation
Fnaf fanverse is the first thing I've seen where fan creators got a chance to monetize their works thorough the original creator of the series. Surprised you didn't mention it at all.
Fox in Space is the best show I have only seen one episode of over the course of 5 years ever.
Child: *draws a stick figure “look mommy, I drawed mickey!”
Disney: FBI OPEN UP
In the US, a child is a minor if they're under of the age of 18 so a child cannot get into legal trouble in the United States for drawing a stick figure of Mickey. Why would Disney, with the FBI in tow, come after a member of their target audience over a stick figure drawing of Mickey Mouse that wasn't even sold or posted online for all to see?
*looks at a water molecule*
Disney: You have been sentenced to life in prison for copyright infringement by observing Mickey's head.
@Susana Fangirl
It's a joke
@@susanafangirl1595 its a lil jokey joke
I gotta say, that side of legal eagle scares me
The FNAF creator seems to be taking a more motherly approach to fan creations.
edit:
If anything, this video makes me want to talk to my representative about this subject
The thing about Legal Eagle is that, as somebody who practices the law, he's largely concerned with how things function within it, as opposed to how they should or could function.
Well I mean, the actual conversation about that behind the scenes probably was a bit more complicated at least because they agreed to film the bit.
He IS a lawyer after all. Did you think just because his character is nice online he's not going to function as a lawyer? Like if he's hired as a defense attorney to defend a criminal, or to represent a corporation and take down a fanartist, do you think he's be some hero and avenge the victims? No, he's do his job.
@@theywalkinguptoyouand4060 yeah.
@@theywalkinguptoyouand4060 People who don't make attempts to do the right thing aren't just neutral characters following orders, they're scumbags. Moral values and principles are a higher priority than duty.
Well, at least they arent stealing fanart like Disney does with official Star Wars Art books. Its been well documented that some of the images that appear in their books time to time was ripped from DeviantArt and they dont credit the original artist either.
wait really fuck Disney
@@daveraschke Yeah. If you google "Disney stealing star wars fan art" you will find loads of hits.
its a case of Disney outsourcing production of the books to outside companies who are ripping fan art off for their books. I heard a few artists have contacted Disney about it but have always been stone walled. A huge part of the problem is that these fans dont have what it takes to take Disney to court for it. Disney has all the money and the power in their hands to drag out court cases or have loophole lawyers that will make sure that whatever legal challenge you make against them will be one that you die on even if they are in the wrong.
Yeah, it’s happened for other things, too. Disney has stolen art and used it for their parks and even TV shows.
imagine a world where ZUN didnt allow fanworks.
all those IOSYS remixes, the popular bad apple music video, heck, maybe even those un owen was her or night of nights remixes would all be gone.
just a thing i think of constantly.
Funny how you mention IOSYS since they have been copyright striking anyone who uploads their stuff to TH-cam. Hell they have been copyright people who has their song playing in Touhou Spell Bubble for the Switch.
@@NealCamerlengo godDAMN IT
cant a man enjoy fan art without a care in the world? man...
point still stands though, those fan remixes and fangames wouldn't exist.
but i guess iosys has every right to copyright strike, cuz they made the videos. someone could reupload iosys content then get more views, people might think the reuploader is the og
It's awesome that you're not trying to argue one way or another here. You're using your postion as someone with a lot of subscribers to draw attention to an issue that's becoming more and more relevant as time goes on, and that's just great of you to do as a content creator. Props.