<img src="http://cdni.wired.co.uk/138x138/a_c/ars.png" alt="Ars Technica" style="float: left;"/>Comic book artist Randy Queen has reportedly sent Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown requests to Tumblr asking that posts that reproduce his illustrations and comment on them in a negative light be taken down. Queen's requests were directed at the blog Escher Girls, which lobs criticism at illustrators who draw female characters in contorted, overly-stylised, and anatomically-impossible ways.
The drawings Queen wanted taken off Escher Girls' Tumblr were taken from his Darkchylde series of comics, which saw success in the late 90's after the first issue was released in 1996. On Escher Girls, Queen's drawings were
occasionally posted with a "redraw," where the submitter redraws the scene in their own style, generally to reflect a more realistic human anatomy. When Queen first submitted the takedown requests, Tumblr complied and even removed some of the user-drawn art, it seems.
Posting select drawings from an illustrator to criticise the work is protected by Fair Use exemptions from the DMCA. Still, websites like Tumblr and YouTube, which rely heavily on user-generated content, have a history of cowing to copyright holders when they cry for their work to be taken down, even if the poster of the work is legally in the clear.
Earlier this afternoon the manager of Escher Girls, who goes by Ami Angelwings, wrote on her Twitter account "I just got a tweet saying Tumblr rep says they've restored content. But I'm not sure which content."
Currently, some Escher Girls posts exist completely restored, and some just have the image removed while the post remains intact.
Ami Angelwings said that neither Queen nor Tumblr ever contacted her before the posts were taken down. After learning of the takedowns, she posted a note explaining what happened and warned others to make their posts private if they'd reproduced Queen's drawings. "If you've submitted redraws of his stuff to these sites, you might want to ask them to put them private for now (if [Queen] complains about a submission you've made, Tumblr will count it as a complaint against your account)," she explained.
But that angered Queen even more, and he wrote an e-mail to Escher Girls which TechDirt published, threatening legal action for defaming him with "various allegations" on Escher Girls' takedown notice thread.
Queen also alleged that Escher Girls' DMCA post "publicly challenges my right to protect the perception of my IP as it exists today."
Queen continues, "instead of taking shots at art someone did 18 years ago while they were still learning -- which are no longer representative of their current art style or direction for their character -- I encourage you to spend your time and energy on creating your own characters and comics which you can mkae [sic] your own personal sacrifices to bring to the world."
But Queen's outrage didn't end there. As the Escher Girls DMCA post gained steam, Queen apparently decided to send
another takedown request to Tumblr, asking that the post alerting readers of Queen's DMCAs be taken down as well. Tumblr, curiously, removed all re-blogs of Ami Angelwings'
DMCA-notification post, but did not remove the original post.
Ars has reached out to Tumblr for comment but has not received a response.
But the antagonism wasn't over yesterday. It seems that today, Queen sent another e-mail to Escher Girls, which Ken White at Popehat reproduced this afternoon:
"So, at this point it becomes harassment.
Instead of simply removing the content you do not have the right to electronically distribute, you wish to persist in character assassination, and alleged abuse of copyright claims via armchair lawyers.
*Let's say I take someone's old copyrighted photography and
'corrected' it for them, as well as posted disparaging comments to circulate along with what may be someone's first exposure to the work. Guess what? I don't have the right to do that, it's not my content. And based on the comments in this thread, it's an easy argument to make that it is damaging.*
There are people and animals suffering and dying in the world, and real human rights issues in certain countries, and this is what you take issue with? Art nearly two decades old? I think there are greater causes to champion with the limited time and energy we are given on this Earth.
For anyone this may apply to -- instead of taking shots at art someone did many years ago while they were still learning -- which are no longer representative of their current art style or direction for their character -- I encourage you to spend your time, energy, and courage on creating your own comics, and then make the necessary personal sacrifices to bring them to the world.
If you think you can do better work, or have more success with it -- I encourage you to do so. I promise I will never attack anything you create, and would only wish you only love and happiness.
Since you enjoy posting private emails, and needlessly escalating matters, I'm sure this will be next, and would again ask you to please stop.
I am sure there are more positive uses of both of our time.
Sincerely,
~ R"
As Ami Angelwings pointed out in her original notice post, getting DMCA notices from illustrators is rare for Escher Girls, despite the blog's critical nature. "To date, Mr. Queen is the only artist who has taken this kind of action," she wrote. "Other artists and publishers seem to understand Escher Girls & other similar sites are fair use and criticism, and that fan discussion, positive or negative, is important and helpful to their business. (In fact, the creators I've interacted with are either fans of EG, or expressed disagreement but know that it's fan criticism.)"
This article originally appeared on Ars Technica
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
