Because somebody requested this be
Because somebody requested this be re-bloggable
Given how strict Disney is on cracking down on people who infringe on their copyright (not to mention them frowning on people sexualizing their characters) I’m honestly baffled that Disney hasn’t tried to sue Campbell yet. He’s not only distributing sexualized (and badly drawn) images of Disney characters, he’s also making money off of it.Anonymous
I asked my friend (who is a law student) about this and this was our conversation:
Friend: Disney doesn’t own most of those characters
Ami: i think they’re referring to them looking the same as the disney versions
Friend: they are fairy tale characters, or pre-existing novel characters and it’d be hard to prove they are close enough because you’d have to prove not just that it’s cinderella, but that it’s so uniquely the disney one that it’s disney’s depiction
Friend: What makes it harder is that these aren’t original characters
Friend: now, if they were a disney original character, like Donald Duck, it would be an easier case
Friend: donald or mickey are disney originals, which means you just need to show that they are clearly using your character
Friend: the most common test is whether a “reasonable person” would be able to determine from viewing it that it’s the same character
Ami: so having the beauty and the beast char in the same yellow dress isn’t enough
Ami: or that his tinkerbell is dressed the same as disneys
Friend: right, because even if they recognize it as tinkerbell or beauty it’d be hard to prove it was so close to disney’s that you are stealing disney’s work, not just basing your own thing on the originals
Friend: here, the character designs are different (you can tell at a glance it’s not a disney image) and the plotlines are presumably not too much closer to disney than to source material
Friend: Tinkerbell is not owned by Disney, only Disney’s Tinkerbell design/specifics are, so being able to tell it’s Tinkerbell isn’t quite enough
Friend: in any case, it is a tough burden to prove that someone is stealing your non-original character
Friend: though some people obviously do it in such a blatant way that proof can be made
Friend: say, if you used a much more similar animation design, talking dishes, etc. with your yellow dressed Beauty that would move you closer
Friend: the big things are that they aren’t orginal characters, so it’s tough to prove you are stealing disney’s interpretation and not just making your own interpretatoin of the same original