HOORAY FOR COPYRIGHT INFRINGMENT!

[Carnificus]

lol, I'm sorry but the chunky Misha picture is hilarious.

[yipyapper]

Besides, they aren't going to get known and the very few that do won't buy crap like that. We have nothing to worry about.

[Notguest]

How is this copyright infringement if they drew the art themselves and don't use official assets?

[MAZZ0Murder]

[A Humbled Fan]

Adding to that:

[A ghost...]

I'm just going to say this:

If they made the whole thing,fine we can bitch about someone making and selling Katawa stuff.

BUT

They didn't make the main characters,they based it off of someone else's drawing,if anybody could bitch it would be the guy who drew the girls,the devs can fight about whatever they made i.e. the guy,the library girl,the nurse,the story et cetera.

So if I wanted to go make something with Hanako and sell it-I'm going to the creator of her,NOT the devs they can go hang for all I care I just have to avoid copying anything they made.

Just my two cents,this game has brought up some odd issues.

[A Humbled Fan]

I'm just going to say this:

If they made the whole thing,fine we can bitch about someone making and selling Katawa stuff.

BUT

They didn't make the main characters,they based it off of someone else's drawing,if anybody could bitch it would be the guy who drew the girls,the devs can fight about whatever they made i.e. the guy,the library girl,the nurse,the story et cetera.

So if I wanted to go make something with Hanako and sell it-I'm going to the creator of her,NOT the devs they can go hang for all I care I just have to avoid copying anything they made.

Just my two cents,this game has brought up some odd issues.

Which is basically what one of the devs was saying here:

After some internal discussion, we revised the GAME FAQ for instances like this.

Q: I saw this game for sale. Are you selling this now?
A: No. Four Leaf Studios is not charging for Katawa Shoujo, and never will. If you see anyone selling Katawa Shoujo, charging for "official" merchandise, or using game assets in their for-sale items, please report them. Selling fanworks that do not use official content (including the KS logo) and do not pretend to be official is okay.

Basically this is begrudgingly okay as long as it doesn't take assets from the game or pretend to be official.

I was face palming the quality of the art, not the capitalistic nature of it.

[A ghost...]

Yea,I had an idea for a game version of my own but-"no we won't share the precious!!!" and got my thread locked.

Sooooooo~I may gather my own team and take the girls and do my version,just with a whole new setting,maybe even two settings.

We'll see,stay tuned Batfans!

[erisi236]

Given that it's DA the person who did that might not even know how to turn off the "make print" option. There's TONS of stuff on there that are basically stick figures that have buy prints on them.

Also I'm pretty sure copyright wouldn't apply anyway, if I make an original drawing of any known property I'm still able to sell it because I'm the one that drew it.

[zanger]

How is this copyright infringement if they drew the art themselves and don't use official assets?

It's 'copyright infringement' because they're copying the copyrighted assets from the game. Sure, it's an "original" work so much as the artist used his/her own technique to draw the same character, but the correct legal term for that kind of stuff is a "derivative" work. Derivative works, however, are only non-infringing if the copyright owner gives permission to the artist to make them. When the infringing artist is selling her "derivative" work, without license from the copyright owner it's blatant infringement. 'Course, 4ls' gives them permission to do this so it's ok.

Also I'm pretty sure copyright wouldn't apply anyway, if I make an original drawing of any known property I'm still able to sell it because I'm the one that drew it.

Not really. For example, in Gracen v. Bradford Exchange a woman made an acclaimed original painting of Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz but her work had no valid copyright because it's merely an attempt to copy an already copyrighted character. You don't have a separate right to sell the work, absent permission from the original's copyright owner, because it contains copyrighted material.

[Ryto]

On the whole subject of copyright, I've always wondered how anime conventions and other conventions get away with having artist alleys where the main attraction is hundreds of drawings of copyrighted characters being sold...

[zanger]

On the whole subject of copyright, I've always wondered how anime conventions and other conventions get away with having artist alleys where the main attraction is hundreds of drawings of copyrighted characters being sold...

Probably licensed.

[Ryto]

On the whole subject of copyright, I've always wondered how anime conventions and other conventions get away with having artist alleys where the main attraction is hundreds of drawings of copyrighted characters being sold...

Probably licensed.

No. I think the conventions just turn a blind eye, but they'd be screwed if someone who cares ever showed up...

[asakayosapro]

This whole discussion, man.

I do not know what to say, really.

It is not like i want to promote such things or anything, (i take neutral stance for now) but if you wanted such merchandise like, for instance, a Rin figure / nedondroid / daimakura / whatever, but did not have the materials, tools, equipment and know-how, you're pretty much stuck at 'well, i guess i won't have it' but some people won't give up at that, of course.

But on the other hand, the issue of 'creating profit from someone's hard work that was willingly given to everybody for free' might necessarily mean that if they make the goods and invest time and money to make them, they'd have to hand them out to everyone for free, too. And of course, unless they were really into and liked the game enough to actually be that much of a philanthropist, no person would do that...

From what i have seen and read from the developers and creators so far, they probably would not like the idea of making the merchandise themselves, much less have a third party do it for them, not exclusively for profit, but to allow for fans of the game to have a chance to acquire KS-related merchandise without feeling so damn guilty about the issues of 'we made profit from this' or ' we got unauthorized merchandise just to show how much of a KS fan we are' ...

Although..

We've also been known to troll, lie, change our mind, and make stuff up on the spot, so good luck with that.

[zanger]

On the whole subject of copyright, I've always wondered how anime conventions and other conventions get away with having artist alleys where the main attraction is hundreds of drawings of copyrighted characters being sold...

Probably licensed.

No. I think the conventions just turn a blind eye, but they'd be screwed if someone who cares ever showed up...

Conventions can't exactly just "turn" a blind eye. There's such a thing as the legal concept of imputed infringement, which could make the convention liable to the owners.