Fox's lawyer got to me!

[starrley]

Some of you may remember my Fry and Leela from Futurama cross stitch. I had spent so much time on it and the pattern, that I decided to sell the pattern on Etsy. A lawyer from Fox made me remove it! And so, I'm going to post the pattern on Sprite Stitch for free. HA HA!
Link to pattern:
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=5667

[Lord Libidan]

They did!?! No way...

That's incredibly surprising. Did you get a cease and desist order then?
Fox are mean. Big fat meanies.

[johloh]

wow. first person I've heard that has gotten a cease and desist from anyone...impressive.

[blackmageheart]

Aww. Fox ARE meanies. Meanies with lots of money. I bet they're SO cut up about all the money you were siphoning off from their dollarpiles.

I haven't had a C&D as such but Etsy removed a whole slew of Skyrim stuff recently, including some patterns I had. Zenimax (Bethesda's moneygrabbing parent company) realised they'd missed a merchandising trick and 6 months too late decided to clean up! They couldn't remove two of mine, because they were so different that no infringement occurred! HAHAHA IN YOUR FACE ZENIMAX.

Best thing to do is what you did do, share it for free

[kuja.girl]

You know what this tells me? That Fox must employ a lot of people to do nothing but troll the internet looking for lawsuits. Eww.

HAHAHA IN YOUR FACE ZENIMAX.

I will always love you for that comment.

[Ally]

That blows! I've always wondered exactly who it is trawling the Internet for insignificant copyright *breaches*. I've had stuff taken off eBay because they were apparently illegal or something. They were Zumba DVD's my mother bought off eBay 2 years prior!

[Icelandic Hitman]

There was a classic case ages ago, where some * site or soft * site might have been suicide girls... got it to MEGA trouble with Nintendo because one of the girls listed in her favourite things Legend of Zelda. Nintendo being a Super Family company didn't like * stars linking themselves to their products. Penny Arcade ( think it was them ) made a comic how the guy loves his job so much sometimes he doesn't even take lunch.

But Fox are tightwads they are know for having fan sites taken down because they use official art work.

[RMDC]

On the other hand:

I've known a lot of little people - webcomic artists, small game designers, illustrators - who have had their work ripped from them, sometimes flagrantly and sometimes simply by well-meaning people who do what a lot of people here do: show their fan love for something while trying to cover the cost of making it plus a little extra. In the end, when the unlicensed creations get to be popular themselves, it's the original author / artist who loses.

Bill Watterson's fight to hold onto Calvin & Hobbes is a legendary tale.

I think that copyright law could stand to recognize when something becomes a part of the cultural grain. The law was written poorly by people acting in the best interests of corporations. But it's hard to find the middle ground. It's easy to say that you shouldn't rip off a lone illustrator's IP - but Watterson became part of the cultural grain, and he prided himself on being a one-man operation. Where does one draw the line?

I could have filled my Etsy shop long ago with loads of hilarious and poignant video game, TV, and movie works, but with copyright law the way it is, I won't... not to mention that I know how personal these works are to the individuals who make them.