Warner Bros. and 5th Cell facing Keyboard Cat, Nyan Cat lawsuit

LOL. Talk about ambulance-chasers. Pffft. Now I don't much care for the big conglomorates, but who's being "shameless" again? LAWL

Filing trademark applications AFTER the games were made and then suing WB will get you laughed out of court.

Now we're copyrighting memes. Wonderful.

Holy ****, what?

I hope the guys who made this lawsuit get massively fined.

Memes are not your product or merchadise, they are viral internet jokes, not your personal belongings.

I usally hate Warner Bros' practices, but this time, they are completely in the right.

The very fact they could license a meme is already wrong. They have no right. Might as well have someone license the trollface. Idiots.

This is stupid

Great... Now any company will think twice about making funny games by using any user-created content...

These guys are simply idiots, look at how widespread memes are, they might've created, but no longer belongs to them as it became viral. Nyan meme was already a rip-off of two other memes, when will HE get sued?

This issue is not about being a "greedy money grab". It's about people who created the source material not getting anything when somebody else is using their stuff as part of selling a product. The original creators definitely deserve some money.

It's very different if their work was used by some kid to make a cute or funny personal form of media, like a youtube video or a jpg file that says something funny. The kid doesn't make money from those things, he's not using it as a means of helping his business earn money.

Now think of this. Imagine that you're a creative individual and you just came up with something nice that suddenly catches the attention of the internet. You created this thing just for fun and turning it into a profit generator was not part of the reason. Suddenly, some company takes your creation and slaps it into whatever they're selling. The popularity of your creation helps boost their product. The company earns a lot of money while you don't even get a penny. Isn't this very wrong?

Just because you didn't think of turning your creation into something to make money with doesn't mean others can just use it without your permission to make money for themselves. You created it, you have rights to it.

There are lots of companies that go after small time people who make things that don't even closely resemble anything in the official company product line just because they think the small time product would misrepresent the official product, therefore affecting public perception and could lead to loss of sales. If they can do that to something that's not even close to the original, then what's wrong with the original creators of a certain item from going after people who didn't even bother to change the form of the stolen material and just outright implemented it in their designs without even trying to reach out and ask for permission?

In this case, I side with the original creators of the memes and the companies using their stuff should be ashamed of themselves and pay up.

http://www.nofunallowed.com

What the f**k. Just.... just what the f**k.

So, should I pay the guy every time I mention or draw a Nyan Cat?

Well, arrest me if you get me drawing one, but, come on!

This is why we need copyright reform. Technically, everything you say, write, doodle on a napkin is copyrighted without your doing anything. If someone finds your napkin doodle in the dumpster and does something with it, you can sue them for "damages." It's ridiculous.

It's also why public domain material is frozen. No one knows who owns all this stuff from a few decades ago, no one is claiming it, but everyone is afraid of being sued. It's killing the arts.

This is pathetic and have no case. They were contacted to use the memes in the games, they gave consent, they have no case. Especially since the nyan cat thing wasn't fully Torres' creation. It was someone else who took his gif and put it to music, which then caused it to take off. So in essence, he didn't create the meme in its entirety, just the image.

They won't win.

@TigeronStarfire Seeing as people aren't buying Scribblenauts for shitty and old internet meme references, there's not a huge problem here. While it isn't unusual for creators of popular memes to have said meme trademarked. What is unusual is that these two efftards are suing over what has commonly been accepted by meme-authors the internet-over as "Fair Use". As long as credit goes back to the original authors, it can be used by anyone. And if the author of coolface/trollface has that policy, these outstanding and non-avaricious human beings are out of their minds.

Not too mention the trademark was submitted AFTER Scribblenauts was released. Derp.

Dafuq?...this is just pathetic...

What egotistical pricks, wow. The nerve to think you can trademark a meme, let alone absurdly overused and old memes.

I think by the very concept of it, you can't actually trademark a meme.

Oh please get over yourselves.

This is nothing. Imagine the trouble 5th Cell and Warners will be in when *Cthulhu* decides to take "legal" action :P

so next time someone uses a troll face, they can sue him?

this makes sense. i'm pretty sure both of these memes were recently used in a commercial to advertise a product. i'm sure they were paid for that; therefore, they should be paid for having their creations appear in these video games.

Good! Memes are obnoxious anyway.

They just want money. Money is better than having your meme portraited on a famous game.

...what the Hell did I just read there?

Internet memes are not something you want to file a trademark, coryright, etc. It's stupid and a waste of time. It's not an investment. If it was, grandpa would be have a nice retirement because of "Y U NO Guy" and how people are using them.

Keyboard Cat: "ALL YOUR MEMES ARE BELONG TO US" :-\

Yes they're being shameless, greedy assholes about it... but can any of us say we wouldn't do the same in a similar situation? If all I had to do was tell a solicitor that I give him permission to fight on my behalf and I might see a couple of grand because of it... of course I'd do it. No work for me and I might get some payout!

What? I didn't even know Nyan Cat was trademarked, nor that it can exist within Scribblenauts. Plus the fact the trademark was not even submitted until after Scribblenauts was released? Lawsuit FAIL!

lulz

Did they give permission to the innumerable youtube uploaders using their memes without permission?

That's kind of the point of a meme - NO ONE OWNS IT

So I guess I can get sued now for saying Keyboard Cat without his consent?

Good that the trademarks were filed after. Sounds like a pair of trolls...

Uh oh, we better not use memes anymore. These companies might sue the internet!

Wow, this is a thing!? You can't use memes like this without the creators consent? I thought memes were everyone's property, but of course, hardly anyone making them or spin-offs thereof ever profited from them. I can has cheezburger and the like are all non-profit even though everyone is ripping off everyone else. It's all fun and games until someone tries to make money out of it - then you get sued.

Probably some lawyer saw them in the game and called up the video creators.