Warner Bros. Sued By Meme Creators Over Copyright Infringement 210
Krazy Kanuck sends this quote from the BBC: "Warner Bros is being sued for the alleged unauthorized use of two cats that have achieved internet fame. ... The complaint alleged that the cats were used without permission in Scribblenauts, a series of games on the Nintendo DS and other platforms. Court documents alleged that Warner Bros and 5th Cell 'knowingly and intentionally infringed' both claimant's ownership rights. 'Compounding their infringements,' court papers (PDF) said, 'defendants have used "Nyan Cat" (designed by Christopher Torres) and "Keyboard Cat" (created in 1984 by Charles Schmidt), even identifying them by name, to promote and market their games, all without plaintiffs' permission and without any compensation to plaintiffs.' "
Re:Copyright of IDEAS is ridiculous (Score:5, Informative)
So yep.
. Who knows what would happen to the Steam Workshop for Scribblenauts Unlimited now, as it's 99% encumbered by facsimilies of real registered trademarks, created by players.
Re:Pot, meet Kettle (Score:5, Informative)
Frosted breakfast toaster pastries aren't an exclusively owned intellectual property. Nyan Cat doesn't have a "Pop Tart (tm)" label on the image; just an image of a food (?) product of which many generic variants are available.
Re:Copyright of IDEAS is ridiculous (Score:3, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Madness must stop. (Score:5, Informative)
No, in fact, they're not public domain. Declaring them public domain based on their pervasiveness would mean that Mickey Mouse is also public domain-- and we all know that isn't true.
Pretty sure Fatso the keyboard cat was simply posted on YouTube and the meme snowballed.
Re:Madness must stop. (Score:4, Informative)
I think you should consider a key difference here: not only is Warner Bros. using the work to make profit on the game but they are also using these images to promote the game. There is a huge difference between some kid posting Nyan cat on 4chan for the billionth time and Warner Bros. using Nyan cat for marketing. That random kid on 4chan isn't making a profit from it. It's not part of his business model.
It's perfectly reasonable for the creator of Nyan cat to say "I don't mind it when random people (even if it is a lot of random people) post Nyan cat on imageboards just to have a laugh but I don't want a global corporation to use my image to make money without my permission".
That's how copyright works and to a certain degree that's perfectly reasonable. You shouldn't be expected to litigate against every single person who ever uses your image withot your permission. That is going to be way too onerous for something like Nyan cat. The Nyan cat creator would go bankrupt trying to sue the internet. It does make sense, however, to target a huge corporation who really should know better.
Purpose and character (Score:5, Informative)
they were actually making money off of someone else work without compensation.
Which is irrelevant in determining fair use.
How so? The first factor in a fair use determination under U.S. law (17 USC 107) involves whether or not the "purpose and character" was commercial.
Re:Copyright of IDEAS is ridiculous (Score:2, Informative)
Bayer didn't lose it's trademark on Aspirin because it failed to defend it. It lost it as criminal punishment for that whole "participating in war crimes" thing back in WWI.