• hperrin@lemmy.world
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    17 days ago

    Either Funko is lying or their “brand protection partner” is lying. Also, what the fuck does Funko have to protect? The only thing they actually created was those beady little eyes they put on everyone else’s IP.

        • keyez@lemmy.world
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          15 days ago

          On threads a few days ago there were images of indie games posted to itch which mentioned playing with using Funko characters so there was infringing content on itch but the domain takedown was way too heavy handed.

          https://lemmy.world/comment/13894654

          • HowManyNimons@lemmy.world
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            15 days ago

            Yeah, so a good faith response would be to ask Itch to remove that game and associated copyrighted imagery. Nobody would have really minded that. Uncharitable, I would have thought, but with copyright law being what it is, perhaps legally necessary.

            What they did, however, was they told Itch’s DNS that Itch was hosting fraud and phishing, which resulted in their whole service going offline for some hours. That is deceitful and hostile.

            • keyez@lemmy.world
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              15 days ago

              I understand all that, my comment was addressing it being mentioned that itch did nothing wrong which wasn’t true. The site themselves may not have purposefully knew of that content but it was there.

    • Wogi@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      If my kid is running a website and some fucking lawyer calls me about copyright bullshit, that fucker is getting 100% of my pent up salty rage.

      I have a very particular set of skills, and they only make me a nightmare for a very specific type of situation.

  • ms.lane@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    We reached out the admin of Itch.io’s mother and made threats against her.

    That’s the real situation.

    Funko is a corrupt, evil company.

  • The Snark Urge@lemmy.world
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    17 days ago

    Apparently I’ve just shared in Funko Pop’s passion for creativity.

    Is this a different language that sounds deceptively like English? I feel like someone wrote this by running whale song through an LLM.

    • Capt. Wolf@lemmy.world
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      17 days ago

      Funko: Hey, chatgpt… Write an apology letter to the gaming community about getting itch.io shut down. Something like “Sorry, we fucked up. Please don’t hate us and continue to buy our stuff!” but make it sound like it came from an intern in HR.

      Chatgpt: I got you fam…

      • kitnaht@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        Bro, GhatGPT wrote a better apology:

        Dear Community,

        Look, we know we sell little plastic figures—not games, not platforms, not anything remotely digital—but somehow, we’ve managed to trip over our own shoelaces and knock something precious to all of you right off the shelf. Yes, we’re talking about itch.io, and yes, we understand the gravity of what happened.

        We’re not going to sugarcoat it: we messed up. We’re not entirely sure how the dominoes fell this way, but somehow, through a series of unfortunate events (and probably some poorly-thought-out legal maneuvers), our actions have impacted an entire community that thrives on creativity and passion. That was never our intention, and it’s not who we want to be.

        The truth is, we’re sitting here staring at our little figures, wondering how something so small can lead to such a big screw-up. We know this affects you, and we’re genuinely sorry for the frustration, confusion, and anger we’ve caused.

        We don’t expect forgiveness overnight, but please know we’re working hard to make this right. We’re talking to the people who actually know what they’re doing (because, let’s face it, we clearly don’t), and we’re committed to doing better moving forward.

        We value this community more than you realize, even if we’ve done a poor job of showing it. Thank you for your patience, and we hope you’ll give us the chance to earn back your trust—not just with our figures, but with our actions.

        • catloaf@lemm.ee
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          17 days ago

          It’s good, but it’s too negative. The PR folks would never let it fly.

        • Deestan@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          Your assumptions are too honest. Try “non-apology” and see if it is closer.

          edit: I took the above prompt but added “do not admit to any wrongdoing”, and got a more believable letter

          Subject: A Message to Our Gaming Community

          Dear Gamers,

          We wanted to take a moment to address recent events and share our heartfelt thoughts with you. We understand that some of our actions may have had an impact on platforms you value deeply, and we recognize the passion and creativity that make this community so extraordinary.

          While it’s not our place to dive into specifics, we want to assure you that your voices matter to us. As a company, we’re constantly learning and striving to support the vibrant ecosystems that make gaming so special.

          To those who may feel disappointed or frustrated, we hear you. Your passion is why we do what we do, and we remain committed to delivering the experiences you love.

          Thank you for sticking with us and for continuing to be part of this journey. We appreciate your feedback, your creativity, and your unwavering support as we work to do better.

          Sincerely,
          [Your Company]
          An Intern in HR Who Definitely Wrote This Alone

          • uis@lemm.ee
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            16 days ago

            While it’s not our place to dive into specifics, we want to assure you that your voices matter to us. As a company, we’re constantly learning and striving to support the vibrant ecosystems that make gaming so special.

            I feel drunk on polymers. Looks like what crossbreed of game industry and Apple would write.

            Sincerely,
            [Your Company]
            An Intern in HR Who Definitely Wrote This Alone

            Was last line really generated?

  • THCDenton@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    The sad thing I cant do anything more to hurt funko as I’ve never bought their stupid little dolls

  • werefreeatlast@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    At united health care we really respect all the money we extract from all your dying folks and recently we noticed that one of you died one of us. So we started a manhunt for anyone of you and now we got a rando who sort of looks the part. Thank you for the inconvenience. We will be ghosts now since you won’t find any of our names online starting now…wait not, starting now!

  • pachrist@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    I am so confused by all this. It makes me feel old.

    Funko is essentialy just plastic, shitty Beanie Babies, right? They do nothing original, from what I can tell.

  • homesnatch@lemm.ee
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    17 days ago

    Some people are looking past the partner or putting “partner” in quotes.

    Funko doesn’t handle these takedown requests, they hired BrandShield for this. BrandShield definitely went overboard and their reputation is at risk.

    I’ve shopped around for brand protection in the past when scammers registered a domain name with my company’s name in it, and used it to do fake job offers. We got the domain suspended by contacting the registrar, but we didn’t know about it until it was reported to us.

    • uis@lemm.ee
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      16 days ago

      They were hired specifically to go overboard and risk reputation. To shield brand from reputational damage of scorching internet. It’s even in their name.

      Tsar is good, blame the boyars.

    • ms.lane@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      No, Funko’s reputation is at risk, as it should be.

      Other companies should look at the situation and cease using BrandShield, but from a consumer standpoint, the blame falls squarely on Funko.

    • Agent Karyo@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      Come on, man.

      I support reigning in corrupt oligarchs (full asset seizure, 20 years mandatory community service as a live-in junior janitor in a hospice care facility) as much as the next person, but this is stupid.

  • nutsack@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    community notes is the best thing post-musk twitter ever did and i hope the idea spreads to other platforms