in the u.s, as long as you aren’t using it commercially, at least
(I mean besides that I’m for the abolition of copyright, but just purely talking about what’s allowed in law as of current)
species?
this is more prevalent in furry circles but not limited to there. when someone makes an original design for a species, they can decide whether to make it an open or closed species.
a closed species means that the creator forbids other people from creating characters from that species (though sometimes compliance rules are made instead). as you can guess, this is mostly unenforceable; some people respect those wishes, others don’t. some will shun the latter, some others won’t care.
btw I made it sound simple, but by god, the people of both sides often have very strong opinions about it
While I don’t care either way really. I can say iv literally never seen a closed species that was legally enforceable per the way the creator wants it to be or a single creator of one that didn’t violate basically every copyright law and fair use law possible in an effort to enforce it.
About the closest closed species I can think of is hobbits from LOTR and the whole kerfuffle with WOTC creating halfling. Even then it wasn’t over the appearance, traits, design, it was just the name and the fact it was commerical.
While the joke is furries are always in IT, they sure aren’t lawyers.
it was just the name and the fact it was commerical.
Yeah it’s because names can be Trademarked, and in the case of Hobbits, that is Trademarked, and the holders are currently paying and fighting to retain their Trademark.
Furry species like avali, protogen or wickerbeasts.
I think I heard about a species that’s licensed under a GPL license, it’s called a Gnu or something like that.
Monsanto disagrees.
in the u.s, as long as you aren’t using it commercially, at least
No, this is still wrong, a species cannot be copyrighted no ifs, ands, or buts. Copyright can only apply to specific characters. A species is way too nebulous of an idea to copyright. They can be trademarked but that is expensive and many of these artists don’t do it and won’t fight to retain it. You are allowed to create characters of closed species and sell them just as you would any other piece of intellectual property, and the only thing the creators of the species can do is whine, scream, and make petty meaningless threats. Which is what they have done.
If you do wish to sell them though you should disclose that said Character isn’t official, so people are aware before buying it, and don’t think you are trying to scam them.
(I mean besides that I’m for the abolition of copyright, but just purely talking about what’s allowed in law as of current)
I agree with you. I’m all for copyright abolition. But you are a bit wrong about what is currently allowed. The reality is much looser than you might think it is.
By the way, shameless plug. I have a community called !protogen@pawb.social, and we do allow unofficial Protogens, and Primagens there (Yes Synths too), if that seems interesting to you or you have related art (or memes) you’d like to share there, I encourage people to check it out.
based and floppapilled
