Nuvendil said:
The way those "porn equivalents" get away with it is that they aren't actually those films. So it's not "Star Wars," not really. It's Shtar Shwars, if you catch my meaning :P. They are just similar enough to wink, nudge their way around it but not enough to infringe. Also, keep in mind two things: 1), they might have discreet permission and 2) copyrights give people the *power* to stop things, it doesn't force them to. Some companies - nearly all companies - allow a lot of things that are technically infringement to run rampant because A) they want the exposure, B) it would cause unwanted negative press coverage, and C) it's impractical. Clasic example of that last bit, I was part of the Middle Earth Roleplaying Project for Skyrim. We were shutdown by WB when they acquired the rights to make games based on LOTR. However, they didn't shutdown other high profile, large scale LOTR projects like Last Days of the Third Age, Third Age Total War, Lord of the Rings Total War, the Edain mod. Why? because it would have caused an enormous uproar (even we got coverage from numerous sites and youtubers), it's impractical to pursue all these projects, and while they wanted to clear competition for Shadow of Mordor, they don't mind the exposure the IP gets from all these other, non-RPG/Action Adventure projects. However, back to the point, yes it could be parody. In theory. But it would be a tough case to argue. Cause these people are trying, to the best of their ability, to make these things look like the official characters are officially getting it on :P . There's no wink nudge here, that would defeat the point. And that sits squre in the middle between ironclad fair use (criticism, scholasticism) and infringement. When you make that argument in court and send your case to the Supreme Court for a fair use evaluation, you may as well flip a coin, it could easily go either way. However, trademark infringement has very little defense when it comes to damaging the mark. Which is what this is really about, disparaging the IP. If the activity negatively effects the market itself or the marketability of the copyrighted or trademarked work or emblem, that tilts things towards the copyright holder. |
Wich is exactly the same idea here, if you have an original model, in a original story, doing something unrelated ot what is done in the source material then its not copyright infringement, wich is why 99% of the porn Lara Crofts are called Laura Croft, Clara Soft or whatever, they are not the same characters.
Blizzard isn't even trying to crack down on draw pornography because that is an area they have 0 chances of winning. Rule 37 porn have been around for ages and ppl creating it are protected by the same laws that protect fanarts and fanfictions, you aren't infringing anything if you have created it yourself and is using it non profitably in a scenario unrelated to the main product, even if it is based on the original. No one else but Blizzard (they have a long history of trying to do it with Warcraft related porn as well, and look how well that worked out for them) tries to fight it cause ppl know its a losing battle.
