Are there rules against naming your characters after copyrighted characters?

jediavatar

My friend named his character CatDog. He's at lev 38 wasn't going reach lev 40 today, and in game they changed his name to "Bad Name". He tried to rename it CatDog, but the game won't allow it.

Is there a rule against naming his character after copy righted characters? What should he do, should he just delete his character and start over?

chalupaoffury

Yeah, we've got a lot of copyrighted stuff word filtered. Looks like Navi noticed that he did that (I saw him chatting in zone and I expected it to happen) and blanked/blacklisted the name.

Cryptic was sued by Marvel back in the CoX days, and as a result they look pretty harshly on copyright infringement. He'd be better off coming up with a unique name. I wouldn't delete the toon, though, deleting something at or near 40 is just silly.

chaelk

Character Name, Handle, and Super Group Names May NOT:

Incorporate vulgar, obscene, hateful, defamatory language or imagery
Be derogatory towards race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic background or cultural background
Incorporate the name or image of a major religious figure or deity, nor any form of religious title, especially with a costume resembling representations of the figure
Be the registered property of any other company
Relate to illegal drugs or activities
Advertise any website, product, or service
Be designed to impersonate a real world individual
Be the name of any Cryptic Studios or Perfect World product, character, or employee (This includes Cryptic or Perfect World Game Masters)
*snip*
You may not create costumes or costume/name combinations that are recognizable as the registered property of any company. (This includes things such as: comics, anime, movies, or video games.)

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naming and costume guidelines-http://support.arcgames.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3964/p/101

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he may have a rename token given to him. check. otherwise it's pay for it yourself.

jediavatar

Well this would explain why I've seen so many Supermen call themselves "Son of Krypton" rather than just "Superman".

chalupaoffury wrote: »

Cryptic was sued by Marvel back in the CoX days, and as a result they look pretty harshly on copyright infringement. He'd be better off coming up with a unique name. I wouldn't delete the toon, though, deleting something at or near 40 is just silly.

Ok, it's just Ray Bradson (CatDog), he switches back and forth between Dog with legs and Cat with legs, so he's pretty attached to the name and reported the name-change to the admins on https://support.arcgames.com/, I wonder what they'll tell him.

Ok, I better message Ray on Facebook and tell him to come up with a different name, like "Cat & Dog".

.

I have another Facebook friend named Matt Mitchell; he has a CO character named "Greedo Shot First" who looks a lot like Greedo; like a ripoff of the character. Do you think I should Facebook him, let him know about the game's Copy Right too?

chalupaoffury

It wouldn't hurt, yeah. Just let em know that they should probably expect a wipe at some point. I've seen wipes even happen for homage characters, where it was obviously inside the rules of fair use. Safest bet is to not even tempt fate.

In greedo's case, the costume and the name might get a wipe. I've seen that happen a lot of times. Usually if it's similar but not the same, you can avoid the issue. Example, I've got an homage that's a cross between marvel's lady deathstrike, and glory from shadowrun returns dragonfall. However, she's got her own name, Talyn, and just borrows concepts and elements from em. That's the safe way to do it.

I'll bet your friend could get away with DogCat or some variation on the Beast Kid concept. I'd probably go with the second, because if they get more slots they can make lizard people and the like. That, again, falls under "similar but different".

flyingfinn

Is it ok to drive while intoxicated?

jonsills

Homages and parodies work - I've got Spider-Bat and Captain Americlown on my roster. Copying, however, is right out.

kojirohellfire

Yeah, this is a part of the game's Terms of Service. It's been one of the big no-nos since Day One of Champions Online and its late sister game, City of Heroes. Absolutely no naming yourself after copyrighted characters (you're not even supposed to copy their costumes either).

mrhinkypunk

jonsills wrote: »

Homages and parodies work - I've got Spider-Bat and Captain Americlown on my roster. Copying, however, is right out.

I'd still keep a low-ish profile with this sort of thing as it can still make them worry that it could be against copy right laws.

I've made a few clone-ishcostumes in the past that I used for laughs now and again in PvP and around ren cen. However I've never used the name and everything for the character it was based off and will usually change the costume once I'm done messing around on it.

crypticbuxom

If you want to parody the crap out of a character from the Champions IP, go right ahead! I think that's the limit.

xcaligax

jediavatar wrote: »

Is there a rule against naming his character after copy righted characters?

.....yes.

/10char

jonsills

Not too worried about the copyright thing - the Parody Rule is pretty well spelled out, and, well, these are the toons we're talking about:

Spider-Bat: Eccentric billionaire Peter Wayne was hunting rare spiders in the Amazon one day, when he was bitten by a rabid radioactive bat and became a little confused...


Captain Americlown: I knew we shouldn't have subcontracted the Super-Soldier Program to that guy from the circus!

jennymachx

A blast from the past:

http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/champions-online/news/detail/1046590-infinite-customization%2C-infinite-possibilities%2C-infinite-deadpools

Also the link to the Shark Knight in the article is invalid since the Champedia is long gone, but I managed to google a pic:



I still think it's hilariously awesome to this day.

kojirohellfire

Okay, the Shark Knight is gold. Pure gold.

chaelk

Now that is just brilliant, especially with the fish symbol.

chalupaoffury

I made similar. "The Bark Knight". Werewolf batman.

skylyger

jonsills wrote: »

Not too worried about the copyright thing - the Parody Rule is pretty well spelled out, and, well, these are the toons we're talking about:

Spider-Bat: Eccentric billionaire Peter Wayne was hunting rare spiders in the Amazon one day, when he was bitten by a rabid radioactive bat and became a little confused...


Captain Americlown: I knew we shouldn't have subcontracted the Super-Soldier Program to that guy from the circus!

funny because the one and only character I ever had get hit with the need to rename here on CO is a character named Clark T Wayne who was not unlike your spider bat toon in blending together elements of super man and batman into one super human detective. It was still in COs early months and the GM stated clearly to me characters blending two well known and trademarked characters was just as much a violation of their rules as making a straight up clone.

Frankly since its you, and your fanboism is well established on these forums, you being left alone rather reeks of GM favoritism of one of the games more ardent supporters.

Tell me would you be so loyal and ardent if characters like your spider bat where deemed not allowed now, and you given appropriate sanctions for flouting the rules for so long and spreading misinformation about what they tolerate?

Because to me a character named Peter Wayne and blending so many elements of spidey and bats seems very little different from my old toon aside from it being a marvel and dc blend rather then a straight up dc blending like mine. Id love to have a GM pop in here and explain why one would be bad named and one wouldnt. Hell my guy even wore plain street clothes, no super outfit at all so even less trade mark infringement.

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jennymachx

gradii wrote: »

Let me get this straight: every time someone makes a character with a name taken by some already established comic book hero (theres thousands) eventually the name becomes not allowed anymore for anyone.

until no one can name their character anything good because 90% of all the good names for superheroes are used by someone somewhere. lovely. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

It's not so much the name as it is the character sharing the likeness to the copyrighted character.

If you happen to use a name that's similar to one being used by a copyrighted comic book character (one that isn't high up there in popularity), you're most definitely off the hook if your character looks entirely different from that copyrighted one.

If you go all out in making a clone that looks exactly or near exact to that of a copyrighted character and there's obvious intent that you're making a copyright clone, then you're pretty much inviting GM action, even if you're not using the same name as the copyrighted character.

sistersilicon

skylyger wrote: »

funny because the one and only character I ever had get hit with the need to rename here on CO is a character named Clark T Wayne who was not unlike your spider bat toon in blending together elements of super man and batman into one super human detective. It was still in COs early months and the GM stated clearly to me characters blending two well known and trademarked characters was just as much a violation of their rules as making a straight up clone.

Frankly since its you, and your fanboism is well established on these forums, you being left alone rather reeks of GM favoritism of one of the games more ardent supporters.

Tell me would you be so loyal and ardent if characters like your spider bat where deemed not allowed now, and you given appropriate sanctions for flouting the rules for so long and spreading misinformation about what they tolerate?

So you've suffered an injustice at the hands of the authorities. Someday, you may come to realize that attacking other people because they've not suffered the same injustice is an immature and destructive way to respond. You might even call it villainous.

jennymachx

skylyger wrote: »

Frankly since its you, and your fanboism is well established on these forums, you being left alone rather reeks of GM favoritism of one of the games more ardent supporters.

Here. Wear this.

drgmstr

I wish the costume designs were more enforced than the names. When you put a certain combination of clothes together to try to make a Superman or Spiderman etc look, it'll grey out the Purchase button with a tip saying 'This costume is copyrighted, please change blah blah blah'.

It's not the marvel/DC looks I am worried, its more like the pokemon, slenderman, Attack on Titan, Space Dandy, Bleach, Naruto, DragonBall, InuYasha, etc that'll come to Cryptics doorstep to file another lawsuit of copyrighted stuff.

I am not a complete fan of homages as they are not exactly clones, but you know which hero/villain they are off of and that to me is close enough to being a copy, or inspiration really, to the look.

gandales

drgmstr wrote: »

It's not the marvel/DC looks I am worried, its more like the pokemon, slenderman, Attack on Titan, Space Dandy, Bleach, Naruto, DragonBall, InuYasha, etc that'll come to Cryptics doorstep to file another lawsuit of copyrighted stuff.

Or they could partner with them to create costume packs and share profit. I have seen this in some articles about asian mmos so it is not like it has never happened. Of course, this would be way easier than dealing with DC or Marvel since I doubt anime producing companies would see CO as competitor in their business :biggrin:

kojirohellfire

As far as I know, the Internet meme Slenderman is in the public domain and not copyrighted, so anyone could make him if they so pleased.

drgmstr

gandales wrote: »

Or they could partner with them to create costume packs and share profit. I have seen this in some articles about asian mmos so it is not like it has never happened. Of course, this would be way easier than dealing with DC or Marvel since I doubt anime producing companies would see CO as competitor in their business :biggrin:

True but I like to see how creative others can be. When I see someone making copies of something I just have to facepalm and deadpan to them being lazy. Only exception is they make it a theme like power rangers, but don't try to make it anywhere close to what we see in the franchise.

kojirohellfire wrote: »

As far as I know, the Internet meme Slenderman is in the public domain and not copyrighted, so anyone could make him if they so pleased.

True again but its been over used so many times. When it became popular I swear every time I enter Caprice there were 3 to each instance. Thank goodness the trend died quickly.

jonsills

sistersilicon wrote: »

So you've suffered an injustice at the hands of the authorities. Someday, you may come to realize that attacking other people because they've not suffered the same injustice is an immature and destructive way to respond. You might even call it villainous.

Eh, it's sky. Not worth getting worked up about - he's always been like that. Probably always will be, too.

The costume creator can't really be programmed to watch for costume combinations, because there are so many, and because some are more a matter of opinion - is it more of a violation if your flying brick wears blue tights, red trunks, and red cape with a Diamond chest symbol (the same sort of pentagon as Supes), or a red S on his chest? Some of the costumes would require a human to judge. And of course humans are flawed, so not every single violation will be spotted (that's why there's a function for us to do so), and not every person will agree on what exactly constitutes a violation, aside from the Rule of Two (appearance, name, backstory - if two of three match a trademarked character, it's in violation).

If they had an AI capable of making that judgment, we'd have a much more challenging game, because then the mobs would actually behave semi-intelligently...

xydaxyda

http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Clark_Wayne_(Earth-3839)

spinnytop

Navi copyrighted?

chalupaoffury

I love this community sometimes. Hey Jon, that's the first time I've seen you get called a fanboy for having characters. I'm literally dying over here.

I can't believe I need to explain this.


You guys know how when you go to a costume contest, there's always that one costume *you* think should have won? But, it didn't, because it's open to personal interpretation. GM decisions like this work exactly the same way. They've got rules, but they basically have to interpret them as they see necessary. I've cursed in zone for the silly amount of time I've been here. I don't give a f*ck, I use the language I feel fits the discussion. For the first time about a month ago I got a GM warning for language because I said B*tch in zone. 5 years live, and closed beta, I *just* got a warning for doing that. Sky, you saw the post earlier where they said "the shark knight" was clearly parody and homage. Copies are bad. The GM you got blanked by saw that to mean mashups. I've also seen parody costumes get blanked, in the early days of the game. Tyshien in particular hit me with that, how you could view a hot pink hulk with a heart on his chest named "the incredible hug" as a clone is beyond me, but in the end there wasn't really anything I could do about it. That's why I suggested to the OP to warn their friends: if you're going to have a very well known name, you risk it being blanked. Not that it will, that it *may*. Same thing with homage, it *can* happen.

Dazee, that might be a bit too far, though. Yeah, every super hero name has been done before. Everything has been done before period. However, I think we all know who CatDog and Greedo are. This is hardly like naming yourself Pulsar or Quasar or Chernobyl and getting a blank. There are at least 5 of each on Comicvine, but I doubt more than a handful of the players that have ever touched the game have heard of em. Hell, I've got a 40 named the same as this girl:



I doubt anyone is gonna mistake my iron bird power armor for a small female magician. I'm pretty sure if I made a character named Beavis I'd get blanked.

Now if you'll excuse me, I gotta go remake the Hug. I forgot all about him until this came up, curious if he'll stick around this time.

championshewolf

xydaxyda wrote: »

http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Clark_Wayne_(Earth-3839)

Am I the only one laughing that the DC wikia has an add for Guardians of the Galaxy on it :biggrin:

chaelk

looks a lot like Northstar from Alpha flight

spinnytop

The name thing in this game is enforced the same way pot laws are. You pretty much get away with it until a cop/gm sees you doing it AND decides to bust you for it. Many people have gotten away with it for a long time, just because no GM ever decided to bust them for it, while some other people got busted five minutes in for a slight similarity. Heck, some people have gotten busted for using copyrighted names.... when the name wasn't even technically copyrighted.

To use another analogy, it's enforced the same way the law was enforced in the wild west; spontaneously and without much consistency. The sheriff shoots somebody, we all assume he did it for the right reason, and even if he didn't it's not like we can unshoot the person.

thelastsonofzod

So I have a funny story to add to this.

Shortly after launch I built my first character, who went by the name Poolstroke. Same basic principle as Jon's Spiderbat, an amalgam of two disparate characters. Curious about if he fit as a parody, I actually reported him myself to the Devs, and got an all clear.

Had him for five years since, though I've since renamed him Deathwish...which ironicly makes people just assume he's a Deathstroke clone.

So yeah, hybrid toons are just fine, as long as you make it readily apparent that they're created as parodies. In Poolstroke's bio it actually listed him as being the hate child of competition between two leading comic book companies.

themightydork

i find it odd if they are serious about their worry of legal action, that various SGs are running around which are populated almost entirely by obvious clones rather than homages or parodies.

ninjapiff

Well, for the most part, I find the easiest way to get your character cleared of all ToS violations is to make it a parody. Parody Law in the US can be very loose (check out this Article ).

Some parody characters of my own include Gallagher 3 (with his Mallet-o-Matic!), Californium Gurl, and a character I've been thinking of making, Macaulay Hulkin' (a former child actor, turned irradiated superstrong hero!). Plus, if you can warrant a couple of chuckles for your character, then it's just that much better!

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nepht

jediavatar wrote: »

Well this would explain why I've seen so many Supermen call themselves "Son of Krypton" rather than just "Superman".



Ok, it's just Ray Bradson (CatDog), he switches back and forth between Dog with legs and Cat with legs, so he's pretty attached to the name and reported the name-change to the admins on https://support.arcgames.com/, I wonder what they'll tell him.

Ok, I better message Ray on Facebook and tell him to come up with a different name, like "Cat & Dog".

.

I have another Facebook friend named Matt Mitchell; he has a CO character named "Greedo Shot First" who looks a lot like Greedo; like a ripoff of the character. Do you think I should Facebook him, let him know about the game's Copy Right too?

Look just tell ur buddy to make a toon not called Catdog and the problem is solved .

themightydork

nepht wrote: »

Look just tell ur buddy to make a toon not called Catdog and the problem is solved .

he may have already used his rename. or there is another one out there called .Cat.Dog. now. really.

nepht

themightydork wrote: »

he may have already used his rename. or there is another one out there called .Cat.Dog. now. really.

BANNED'DOG! Alone in the world is a little banned Dog

themightyzenith

gradii wrote: »

Including one which has a name suggesting it be for actual homages, yet full of clones.

Yeah, it seems most of the folks in that SG don't know what homage means.

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spinnytop

nepht wrote: »

Look just tell ur buddy to make a toon not called Catdog and the problem is solved .

DogCat, perblem served.



GrumpyCat is already taken... by Nepht.... u3u

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chaelk

I have Deadfool, yes it is in red and black, yes it has 2 bladed weapons.

female- zombie- clown, dogs crowbar axe.

eiledon

Did the Shark Knight have any nemeses called Harley Finn?

roughbearmattach

And just to be pedantic, generally the relevant law here is TRADEMARKS, not copyrights.

Different rules and regulations, and trademarks can be maintained indefinitely (unlike copyrights), as long as they are defended vigorously. That is why entities with trademarks can be more litigious than those with only copyrights.

Know your IP law.

eiledon

can probably agree if it's not a public domain character, or an intellectual property created/owned by the particular player, then you shouldn't be making a character of it.

jonsills

eiledon wrote: »

can probably agree if it's not a public domain character, or an intellectual property created/owned by the particular player, then you shouldn't be making a character of it.

Strictly speaking, ToS won't even let you clone a character from your own IP, if you've trademarked it. Jack Black could play this game, but he'd still get in trouble for creating Wonderboy (and his Nemesis, Young Nasty Man, with all the same powers as Wonderboy!).

nepht

jonsills wrote: »

Strictly speaking, ToS won't even let you clone a character from your own IP, if you've trademarked it. Jack Black could play this game, but he'd still get in trouble for creating Wonderboy (and his Nemesis, Young Nasty Man, with all the same powers as Wonderboy!).

If he ever played CO , PWE would need to make an exception... the dude can kill a Yak 200 yards away with mind bullets.

sistersilicon

jonsills wrote: »

Strictly speaking, ToS won't even let you clone a character from your own IP, if you've trademarked it. Jack Black could play this game, but he'd still get in trouble for creating Wonderboy (and his Nemesis, Young Nasty Man, with all the same powers as Wonderboy!).

Also known as the Marvel Lawyers Created Their Own Clones in City of Heroes to Use as Evidence in Their Lawsuit Against Cryptic Studios Clause.