Itch.io Down Thanks to Funko Pop's "AI"

Digital gaming storefront Itch.io announced on Bluesky that the cause of an outage early Monday morning was the pop culture collectable company Funko filing a complaint with their domain registrar. The filing came from an "AI Powered" Brand Protection Softare by Funko.. From the spost:

I kid you not, @itch.io has been taken down by Funko of "Funko Pop" because they use some trash "AI Powered" Brand Protection Software called Brand Shield that created some bogus Phishing report to our registrar, iwantmyname, who ignored our response and just disabled the domain

The site appears to be back online at this time. after several hours of downtime. Itch.io is one of the largest online storefronts for independent games including thousands of tabletop roleplaying games.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

have exclusivE

If the IP generated serious money that’s inheritable (to say nothing of the privilege of being raised with such wealth), they will benefit whether they have exclusive control over the IP or not. I think there’s a reasonable argument that might say a copyright might reasonably extended past a creator’s life to support their kids through to their majority. But I think it’s kind of ridiculous to go longer.

Most copyrighted IP doesn’t generate massive wealth. Not a one of my clients made it big. There’s lots of reasons for that.

But why should the general rules be set by the success of the rare extreme success stories and not in favor of the myriad guys & gals whose creations generates a few thousand bucks a year? (Or less.) Why cut off a potential income stream because someone else has an income deluge?

If someone creates a song that gets 1M plays a year on Spotify, it’s probably going to be around for a while. And in doing so, it will result in paying the creator (or successors in interest) the kingly sum of $3-10k per year. Not exactly the kind of money that buys Lear jets.*

1B streams/year will make you around $4m annually. Nice money, but not exactly a guarantee of a cushy lifestyle. (There’s a reason why most states with lotteries now require big winners to take a financial responsibility course before being given their winnings.)





* To earn SERIOUS bank on their IP such as you describe, an artist not only has to get played, they need to tour and sell merch. (That’s potentially going to involve all branches of IP.)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

This comment makes no sense to me. I don't see what a restaurant has to do with this. I mean I have seen a lawsuit here that two competing restaurants stole the menu and design but they also were previous owners of the first restaurant so I kinda see that. Seems more like a non compete thing that Copyright/Trademark or patent law.

Patents only have something like 17 years of protection. I think if copyright has a similar term you wouldn't be hearing any substantial numbers of complaints. One of the large complaints is the extremely long times of protection for copyright.

A restaurant is an example of a business that will typically have both trade secrets (recipes can’t be copyrighted) and trademarks.* The former are only protectable by contract law- specifically NDAs, which last 1-5 years. And once the secret is out, the only recourse is seeking contractual damages against the person who violated the NDA. Everyone is free to use those recipes once revealed.

So keeping recipes secret is really the key to protecting recipes. And some are very skilled at keeping those secrets. Dr. Pepper’s recipe has been kept secret since 1885.

Yet there’s no outcry demanding trade secrets be revealed.

* some may own patents or copyrights, but they’re rare.

 

[aramis erak]

I’m quite aware of the lengths the various IP types are protected for. (Because IP lawyer.)

But note that the post I quoted mentioned a creator only “16 years” dead- shorter than utility patents.

The same quote also discusses corporate created IP. The fact that something was created by an incorporated group doesn’t diminish (or increase) its value as IP. A lot of artists use incorporating documents for the legal protections they offer. This is especially true when artists collaborate on a project.

I included them so others could understand my point; I presumed you knew them, but others on the board might not.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Time to ban copyright AI with serious fines for its use.

 

[Bunch]

A restaurant is an example of a business that will typically have both trade secrets (recipes can’t be copyrighted) and trademarks.* The former are only protectable by contract law- specifically NDAs, which last 1-5 years. And once the secret is out, the only recourse is seeking contractual damages against the person who violated the NDA. Everyone is free to use those recipes once revealed.

So keeping recipes secret is really the key to protecting recipes. And some are very skilled at keeping those secrets. Dr. Pepper’s recipe has been kept secret since 1885.

Yet there’s no outcry demanding trade secrets be revealed.

* some may own patents or copyrights, but they’re rare.

Trade secrets have no special legal protection so no need to demand they be revealed. If you want you can put time and money into reversing the process and create a competitor like Mr Pibb for Dr Pepper. You can do it, assuming someone didn't violate and NDA. You might still get sued but assuming your lawyer is good you probably won't lose. None of that is easy but it largely doesn't involve the legal system.

The whole IP protection group is a contract between what society give to incentivize creation. A large portion of us in society are saying we are giving up too much protection for what we're getting in usable goods.

 

[Bunch]

Most copyrighted IP doesn’t generate massive wealth. Not a one of my clients made it big. There’s lots of reasons for that.

But why should the general rules be set by the success of the rare extreme success stories and not in favor of the myriad guys & gals whose creations generates a few thousand bucks a year? (Or less.) Why cut off a potential income stream because someone else has an income deluge?

People want to cut it off after a certain(shorter) number of years. Not cut it off entirely.

If someone creates a song that gets 1M plays a year on Spotify, it’s probably going to be around for a while. And in doing so, it will result in paying the creator (or successors in interest) the kingly sum of $3-10k per year. Not exactly the kind of money that buys Lear jets.*

What's the point here? Is it that one good song should set you up for life?

1B streams/year will make you around $4m annually. Nice money, but not exactly a guarantee of a cushy lifestyle. (There’s a reason why most states with lotteries now require big winners to take a financial responsibility course before being given their winnings.)

There is a way to explain how $4m annually could be whittled down enough by taxes, professional fees, revenue shares etc but without doing that this sounds just tone deaf. $4m is more than most people make in 2-4 decades. This is not sympathy inducing to your argument for me.

* To earn SERIOUS bank on their IP such as you describe, an artist not only has to get played, they need to tour and sell merch. (That’s potentially going to involve all branches of IP.)

The touring being where most money comes from makes sense to me because it's the part that can't be replicated by anyone else. You can't go to a Taylor Swift concert if she's not there.

 

[Bohandas]

The touring being where most money comes from makes sense to me because it's the part that can't be replicated by anyone else. You can't go to a Taylor Swift concert if she's not there.

Plus it makes intuitive sense to be paid more for multipke performances on tour than for one performance in a studio

 

[Bohandas]

But my point was less about copyright vs trademarks or patents in particular, and more about businesses in general, which is why I also mentioned Carnagie Deli. Originally founded in 1937, it’s passed through several owners’ hands. While the original location is gone, there’s still one located at Madison Square Garden. While it does have rights to certain IP, its longevity has as much to do with the food & atmosphere.

This is basically the same thing that I said about how when you buy brand name you're paying for a meaningless logo. What you've described sounds a little bit like hammering one nail from the ship of Theseus into a random dinghy and calling it the Ship of Theseus

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The whole IP protection group is a contract between what society give to incentivize creation.

Agreed, but with the caveat that wholesale copying someone else’s copyrighted material is not necessarily the best path to incentivize creation.

As noted before, it’s entirely possible to create IP that is arbitrarily close to copyrighted material. Countless Superman-style stories have been published by various comics companies featuring near analogs of Kal-El without actually violating DC’s copyrights. And it’s not clear that any of them would be significantly improved if they featured the actual Superman character. Arguably, some would be worse.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

People want to cut it off after a certain(shorter) number of years. Not cut it off entirely.

I’ve seen a range of suggestions about shorter copyright durations, but it’s a rare one that pares it down to only pre-1980s levels. Even that wasn’t short enough.

Coupled with people asserting that copyrights should not be transferable is even more hostile to IP creators.

What's the point here? Is it that one good song should set you up for life?

One good song generally won’t. But it may provide you with enough of a cushion to get you through hard times.

But if you want truly professional level music, you need to allow musicians to be able to support themselves with their music. Pros put in practice & performance time like people doing 9-5 office work.

If their 1M streams are earning poverty level wages, they’re going to need a second job. (And their second job might not be cool with their merch or taking 1 month off to tour.)

There is a way to explain how $4m annually could be whittled down enough by taxes, professional fees, revenue shares etc but without doing that this sounds just tone deaf. $4m is more than most people make in 2-4 decades. This is not sympathy inducing to your argument for me.

Don’t forget, that is $4M for “the artist”, regardless of whether they’re 100% a solo act or if they’re a large band or musical collective.

I decided not to get into the weeds because it can be tedious, but, in all honesty, $1M isn’t as much as most people think it is.

Until most state lotteries changed their laws to require a minimalist financial education course before collecting a big win, the average American $5m lottery winner had spent it all within 5-7 years. This fact got publicized, and it actually caused ticket purchases to decline enough to endanger the viability of lotteries in some states.

You see similar patterns with other windfalls- inheritances, judicial awards, etc.

Bringing it back to this discussion: of the 1180 million songs on Spotify, 329k of them reach the 1M plays per year (the benchmark for $3-10k revenue).

Only something like 830 have topped 1B streams. 830 artists have produced something that will get them a $4M check (before it gets chipped away).

In the context of the American economy, that’s really good, but again, not immediate permanent retirement money.

The touring being where most money comes from makes sense to me because it's the part that can't be replicated by anyone else. You can't go to a Taylor Swift concert if she's not there.

Touring makes both the artist and the label money, but actually, merch is king.