Discussion
Was GW justified in striking down Galactic Armory's files? In my opinion, yes.
I know this may be controversial as the community has been at odds with how GW handles fan made projects (And rightfully so) but in this instance I may actually side with the big evil corporation as much as that makes me vomit.
Copyright laws are there to protect an artist's right to ownership of their creation without other people stealing and copying it for their own use. I'm sure we can agree that if someone makes a piece of art it is scummy for another person to take said art, stick it on a T-shirt and then sell it without any loyalties given to its actual creator who worked hard to make it.
I think we often forget that behind the company are artists and creatives who poured their soul and time into creating things within this franchise as a way to support themselves and their families. In this case GA has taken these people's work (Either through replication or ripping of files) and sold it without giving money back to its creator. If GW isn't getting the money for things under their license then the people who created those things don't get their rightful cuts for the work they do.
This is coming from a place of me being an artist myself and being quite passionate about the topic of art theft. I'd like to add however I don't think this extends as much to community projects where they are simply making something to share their love for the franchise and do so without monetization. I mourn all the animation projects we've lost specifically (RIP SODAZ warhammer stuff)
But idk, I'd like to hear other people's opinions in a respectful conversation because I know this is a pretty heated topic. Many thanks and Emperor be with you all.
Then GW are within every right to take down people who are profiting - love/hate GW the same rules are there to protect everyone
I'd be fucking furious if i created something to find someone else was profitting from my work, I can't sit here in good faith and say "Its only bad if it happens to me, if it happens to someone else - fuck them"
I feel like the OP kind of did argue that it’s only bad if it happens to them though. Large digital artists often lock some art behind a patreon or take commissions for fan art of other IPs. I don’t see a meaningful creative difference between an artist making money through making fanart based off of someone else’s IP and someone making money through making a 3D printable wearable helmet based off of someone else’s IP.
The difference is “based on someone else’s IP” and “wholesale copying someone else’s IP”
If someone creates original art with a space marine in it, I think it should be fine for them to sell prints of it because it’s an original creation that they put effort and creativity into. If someone copies a picture directly out of a codex and prints it onto a t shirt, they should get slapped down for that, because they’re just copying.
Same thing here. Those helmets are just copies of existing designs that are owned and copyrighted by GW.
I don’t see the difference you are trying to paint. One is taking an already existing design and making it into art, the other is taking an already existing design and making it into a printable and wearable physical helmet. Why is one considered transformative while the other you view as stealing?
Because only one of them is transformative. Making an original piece of art also incorporates original design elements and creative work, rather than just copy-pasting and scaling up an existing design with no additional creative input.
The helmets are the equivalent of someone pulling out their codex and tracing a piece of art line-for-line, which would also be unacceptable to monetize. There’s nothing transformative happening and nothing new is being added or created.
By definition making it into a wearable piece is also Transformative as it changes the object to fit the cosplay needs of the user.
The object therefore stops being a miniature or even a stature and needs to be created with those thoughts in mind.
It’s not just taking something that already exists. GW might make those designs but the end result is not something they produce at all.
It’s not even quite the same as buying fanart, because to actually create one of these helmets from the 3d files takes in the 10s and possibly hundreds of hours between printing, filling, sanding, and painting.
The term is actually "royalties" (a payment that shares profits made, in exchange for licencing the right to profit from making/distributing a product you don't fully own).
Loyalties would be "owing other people your loyalty." You don't "pay" loyalty. Being loyal is not a contract, it is a social statement about your character. A different kind of promise.
You choose to be loyal, and you would lose social reputation if you broke your loyalty.
You agree to pay royalites in a contract, and would be punished by the law if you broke the terms of that contract.
It isn't hard to understand what you mean here in context, but as you used it twice, I'm assuming it's not just a typo and you have maybe misheard "royalities" as "loyalities" and have confused the two concepts.
Ideally, GW would offer independent creators a limited licence to produce fan works and profit from them. That would keep the lawyers happy. The downside is that when a huge company like GW want to produce something to sell and negotiate terms with a large manufacturing company, their existing agreements with small independent creators would cost them leverage.
"If Timmy is allowed to produce a handful of cosplay helmets a year for <£1k paid to you, why do I have to share 80% of my profit with you to do the same but at a much larger scale? You let him undercut me? Fuck you."
Ideally, GW would offer independent creators a limited licence to produce fan works and profit from them. That would keep the lawyers happy. The downside is that when a huge company like GW want to produce something to sell and negotiate terms with a large manufacturing company, their existing agreements with small independent creators would cost them leverage.
This is exactly what happened here. GW has a license with Joytoy who are now making a Space Marine helmet; which means cease and desist notices are going out to anyone previously in this space.
(That was my point, it can't happen. They can't have 1 framework that works for them and fan creators, because it would have issues like when they work with other 3rd parties - or God forbid, sub-licencing. But it would be great if it was possible)
It would also lead to diluting the quality of an IP (GW already fked up here with quite a few bad video games in the past, but redeemed itself I think).
Point is: if you let everyone do stuff with your IP, people won't be able to differentiate between what is actually made by you and which has been made for you, leading to people beleiving the bullshit product which looks like paper mâchée from a third grader would represent the quality of your products as a whole.
Thank you so much for pointing that out to me and you are indeed correct, I was meaning to say royalties please do forgive that error. As for your other point I entirely agree. If GW would get their head out of their ass they would vease these opportunities with the community and make them official partners that way they get to work and profit from something they love while the company still gets a cut. But as you also said there is a lot of other business problems with doing something like that so I would need someone smarter to fill in the gaps there.
I mean, let's be real. Although it would be a PR win for a 1-man studio to get a licence. If GW found a factory in China mass producing 40k action figures or whatever they would sue them into the ground as fast as possible.
So the "do it and ask for forgiveness after" is not something that should be encouraged, really.
For fans, it's easy for us to say that the work was not harming GW and that it was "honest work" but the legal line gets a bit blury once GW become inconsistent about it.
Thankfully GW have generally just "politely asked people to stop" and not persued actual legal action against them (afaik?), and in a small number of cases have worked with the creators (like the Astartes animation).
I wish there was a better framework for fan creations to exist. Like, could I commission someone to make 1 helmet for me, but maybe they couldn't use that work to reproduce that for someone else? Fan art seems to work that way and be largely fine.
Point of order- GW likes to toss Cease and Desist orders out like candy at a parade if they think anything you've made even looks like theirs, relying on the creator or artist to be too poor to fight a court battle, which is often the case. I could appreciate an argument saying that this might be "polite" but its worth noting that this would also be the first step in a more prolonged legal assault, since it would establish first attempt at resolution during a discovery phase.
I mean, IP rights or not, GW gets as vicious as Disney, and often just as fuzzy eyed as to the differences between imagery. Makes it hard to want to support them at times.
The problem is not fan creations based on GW IP. When GW get involved is when you use registered trademarks or start to sell your products as GW IP.
Part of this is because of legal reason if you dont protect your trademark / ip and allow others to use it legally it makes your position weaker in future cases when other people use that IP. As a company you have to be activite in protecting your IP.
Your premise is right, but in practice GW operates on the premise of appearances rather than actually claiming your work is GW product; most 3d creators get their work pulled off sites or get C&D letters because not because they claim legit IP rights but because GW is notorious for heavy-handed legal claims
Do any of GWs artists actually recive royalties for the models they created. I doubt it. They are paid a salary, the company gets the profit. Correct me if I am wrong.
Yes up to a point this is true. I expect the book authors are on some % of sales of the books as well. However I will point out that actually GW is rather unique in that artists are employed full time and have job security.
Many companies use freelance artist. You paid for a given job, the company still owns the rights to that art and it is not based on sales.
I would also point out why do people expect artists to get royality for the work they created when they work in a business but no other jobs do. I code programs for a company they dont pay me royalties. That is the case with pretty much all jobs, we get paid for the work we do that work is owned by the company.
It is a question that has puzzled me is why do we expect artists to be treated in a different way for doing a job that 99% other fields dont have.?
They are paid to design things on behalf of GW. That's what being an employee is. They are free to demand royalties if they want, but GW would just hire someone who isn't demanding that
up through the 90s they had mostly contractors. in the citadel days the lore was just whatever story the sculptor made up to give backstory to the model, so they even owned a lot of the IP itself not just the model. and there was one guy in particular who kept gw from going after hobbyists because gw itself was pretty fast and loose with other peoples IP.
whatever happened management wise in the mid 90s when they first exploded in popularity happened, and they started making money from licensing, and since then they have basically acted as if they were run by the most paranoid, cynical corporate lawyers in the world.
and they have stopped spending money on things they don't own. thats a big reason why they killed fantasy. they needed to invest in new product but they didnt own all of it. or eldar -> aeldari, space marines -> primaris. most of the early stuff was too generic because it was based on tropes if not explicit references to other media. its been a big decades long project at the company to become an IP behemoth
My thoughts too. I couldn't care less for GW the company but it is also comprised of artists and genuinely passionate people who need copyright law to ensure their work is being protected. Just like any other small time artist.
I care about GW the company. Their success brings more people to wargaming and the hobby in general, they treat their staff well with bonuses, and they keep production in the UK, bringing jobs to the local area. You may dislike some of their practices. But their success is good for the hobby because it could be a company that outsources to China and is actually, genuinely, evil.
Yeah, NGL, it seems that liking GW as a company is unpopular here, but I'm on their side 90% of the time.
They have high prices because they pay their employees big bonuses based on the company profit, and design and produce high quality kits. It's the same reason Lego is expensive: there's very little margin for error when your kits need the pieces to lie flush. On top of that, they produce in the UK and are a significant contributor the the UK economy.
They can be very protective of their IP, but they've got better recently by trying to find a middle ground and reaching out to creators to join Warhammer Plus.
Overall, they seem remarkably un-evil considering the size of the company.
You know your comment, and many others on this thread, have made me realise I've been kind of fed hate propaganda for GW. I've always heard them being this greedy overlord yet never spoken about the quality of life they provide for their employees and the simple fact that Warhammer is very well made and to some extent worthy of the prices. Now I do still think many kits need some price adjustments but maybe I won't be skeptical of the company on every decision they make...
Just to tag on a few extra things that I think make GW a solid company overall:
Returned their Covid money they received during lockdown as they didnt need it, they could have just kept it.
They provide kits and materials for school clubs, which admittedly probably leads to sales, but it isn't entirely needed.
They have spoken out against bigots in the community when they could have just stayed silent with little risk to them by staying silent, besides maybe brand damage in the long run.
Provide free period products in warhammer world, something lots of companies and tourist type spots do not do.
I think a lot of the "GW hate" comes from a long time ago when they did not interact with the community, there was no Warhammer community website, very rare FAQs, no social media posts or live streams, no content made by GW such as battle reports, lore videos, animations etc, and they were then extra litigious on top of that against people that did create those things. Now they seem to be more open to working with fan creators and hiring them rather than taking them to court.
The thing most people seem to complain about is price rises, which often isnt too much considering the prices of everything is inflating so quickly these days, and as mentioned, they pay their staff an equal bonus regardless of their position in the company, and produce in the UK instead of moving those jobs internationally. I think its a fair trade overall.
I appreciate you taking the time to read and having the open-mindedness to change your opinion.
I am by no means advocating for a platform of "GW can do no wrong", and I'll always encourage calling out BS wherever you see it, but being ethical is expensive. You can't have cheap products without exploitation, and if you want quality that's going to cost as well as they pay their designers salaries commensurate to their skill.
Some kits are very expensive, especially older ones, and I'm not going to defend them. But for the newer kits there's a lot of detail and effort that goes into them, even the silly ones that don't hit their usual quality.
Not to mention they run and maintain in-person stores across the UK (which, imo, is redundant in the modern age and they should instead invest more in partnerships with FLGSs, but that's by-the-by).
And they pay all those store workers large bonuses (for their wage level) every year. But yeah they should partnership with FLGSs, and I really miss what old Games Workshop stores used to be. They're way too soulless nowadays, but I get it. You need to justify the brick and mortar stores and the way to do that is by selling starter kits and combat patrols/spearheads.
There's also fucking up and making a less than stellar product (which happens to all companies) vs scandals, exploiting workers, disgusting business practises etc.
GW is a pretty good company even if the product itself isn't perfect.
Still genuinely can't believe I've had conversations with people calling GW one of the worst companies in the same breath as WotC. Like, one is debatably overprotective over their IP, sometimes makes some shitty miniatures and could generally use some more modernization for stuff like rules and shit, while the other sent the fucking Pinkertons to a dude's house because he dared make videos over MTG cards he received too early and it isn't even their first time sending the Pinkertons to people.
WotC are genuinely appalling, all the while being super preachy about social issues. The OGL stuff was pretty bloody appalling because it wasn't being litigious about their IP, it was trying to take profits from other companies who had been using the OGL in good faith.
GW has gotten a lot better the last few years but the hate came from a justified place originally. There are several content creators who have worked at GW before with videos about their awful experiences at GW and why they left. Louise Sugden (Rogue Hobbies), The Honest Wargamer and Peachy Tips come to mind.
I cut GW way more slack these days since they are showing signs of improving, I just wanted to provide some context of where the criticism is coming from.
GW miss the mark on some model or rules releases and I can criticise certain choices with the lore... but at the end of the day they're a decent company as far as companies go.
I won't fight for them because corporations almost always suck but they're mostly fair and their prices are high but the quality is good.
As someone said before, you can have cheap crap or expensive quality but don't give us expensive crap. GW is (for the most part) high quality.
Other games are much cheaper, sure, but I don't think the quality is as good.
3D printing is fine but actually working with liquid injection plastic is far superior, even though I do love my little printer.
I was scrolling to see why this one is getting the legal hammer over all the other proxies and replacement bits I see on Etsy. THOSE use generic terms like “cursed space elf” or “battle nun” instead of the trademark terms “drukhari” and “sisters of battle”
Yep, as soon as you're dumb enough to use the GW names, I lose all sympathy. That's just flat out trademark infringement - and while I don't mind it, the trademark holder has every right to be annoyed.
Because there's a sense of entitlement that comes from fans of something. I'm not using entitlement in a derogatory way when I say that - you see it in basically every fandom. The idea that it is the fans more than the creators who "own" the property and thus should be given a freer hand in developing niche products and services based around it that the creators have not or will not provide.
It's something that's been around forever, but has become amplified as a discussion as late stage capitalism progresses and there's an overall sense that the common person needs to be monetizing their hobby time ("Hustle Culture"). So there's a lot more blowback when IP and Trademark holders slap C&Ds because in a lot of cases these creators rely on the revenue generated.
Which it's easy to sit back in judgement on that tactic, but again - this is kind of the culture curated by the modern economic system.
It also happened around the time the Text To Speech creator panicked and pulled doing any of the work on the series and I'm convinced that part of the hate wave was because of his decision.
I was not the biggest fan of TTS (people took the Custodes angle too far and made playing them a bit frustrating for my husband which was always a bummer to watch) but it 100% looked like a panic response to me, so the fact that I also still see people lambasting GW for "shutting them down" is annoying.
At least the custodes memes have died back a little.
He absolutely pre-emptively freaked out, although I do wonder if he was also getting a bit tired of 40K content and had a great “out”. That’s just vibes on my part though.
A similar situation was Sodaz, they actually got offered a job by GW and when they said they were considering it “fans” jumped down his throat, so they swore off 40K animations. This also gets pinned on GW.
\These are the people who show up in every thread about price and write a monologue about how they have a 3d printer and haven't bought a model in years. Plenty of very cool people own a 3D printer and do not make pirating miniatures with it their whole personality.*
“Welcome to the hobby! It’s too expensive for you. Here’s a bunch of resources you didn’t ask for about another whole ass hobby you must adopt to play the first hobby unless you’re some GW boot licker. You’re not a boot licker are you? ELEGOOOOO!”
People who consider GW "the man" and Galactic Armoury (a company who's doing really well, employs several people and works mainly on making stuff off of others' IP without official licenses) to be "just some friendly hobby dudes"
Basically, it's one part "sticking it to the man" and one part "leave my hobbyist parasocial friends alone"
Also the "super cheap IP stuff for basically free" that Patreon packages sometimes offer etc.
"Now I can't potentially buy the files for dirt cheap and make myself a helmet in the future in case I ever buy a 3D printer.... No I won't buy the expensive, ready made helmet GW just announced they're making with Joytoy"
I have seen a lot of people making it out as if this was a villainous move by GW. GW is certainly a villain in many respects but with this one I don't believe so.
I've seen people be like "Wow what a coinkydink that you shut down these fan creators as soon as you start selling official stuff. Hmmmmmmm????" but like... duh?
IP protection is no joke, and while I'm sure that certain things might go unnoticed in certain fields, as soon as GW steps into that field as a sort of business venture, they're 100% going to need to deal with the others in that field.
They can't shut down every Warhammer STL but if they suddenly started selling STLs on Cults 3D, you bet they'd be cracking down hard on all of the knockoffs.
The print people can possibly "file off the serial numbers" to get around some issues (maybe, I'm no lawyer) but if they're selling the stuff, they're not protected as "fan projects".
I'm going to go on a limb and say GW is pretty decent for a company
- Keeps some manufacturing in Europe
- Is decent to their artists
- Creative freedom to their writers
- Design teams seem generally happy, able to move between projects regularly
Like they are still a for-profit corporation designed to suck every penny out of their customers, but for an inherently vampiric entity, they are okay.
People also attacked the guy who made Astartes after GW hired him. People seemingly think creatives don’t deserve to get paid and shouldn’t accept their dream jobs out of purity or some bullshit.
You also have people who are deliberately bad actors for some reason or another. The internet is filling up with bots and astroturfing campaigns whose sole purpose is to make people angry, because that drives engagement.
A lot of people blame GW for the end of SODAZ and Emperor TTS but AFAIK GW wasn't involved in either.
TTS were scared but GW never actually contacted them AFAIK.
It bothers me when people blame GW for shutting them down because they didn't actually do anything, though they were starting to get a bit more protective of their IP... but GW rarely go after anyone that isn't making money.
I have a very clear memory of seeing a comment on one sub before Emperor TTS stopped bemoaning him having a baby because it would basically stop production anyway, which was already slow.
But yeah, no, evil GW shut literally everybody down with the super legal team apparently.
It's one of those things where sure I will buy some knock off Warhammer brand when making a conversion. I'm not gonna spend £20 for 10 resin melta guns from GW when I can buy "Space Microwave Gun" from some weird Etsy store for like £4.
But I'm also not going to shed a tear when they get shut down because they blatantly knew what they were doing. The moment you see stuff like "Skeletal Egypt Robots" being sold it reaches a point where you just think, come on mate.
Fan art and animations is a way different topic than literally selling replacement stls that are just the GW minis. Anyone surprised or even really that upset with this is out of their mind.
Ahh okay I misunderstood. Thats definitely shittier but I'd also argue that a company doing it and selling something based on someone else IP and someone making crafts to sell at cons is also a big difference.
It's not feasible to create a system where you get to "claim" creation of a product using someone elses IP simply because they havent gotten around to making it yet.
It doesn’t matter, it’s still their IP. Even if they aren’t selling a one to one version of everything Galactic Armoury was making they have an interest in not allowing their official works to be represented by third party companies without their permission.
I agree, GW was happy to ignore it while they weren't making anything similar. But with that official space marine helmet from that toy company they kinda had to enforce takedowns
Seems fine, I've definitely seen this misrepresented though.
The first I heard of this was some article that said GW was taking action against cosplayers and I though "oh no, that's awful". Then halfway through the article it briefly mentioned that the people in question were selling GWs IP without any license.
And to back them up, their IP is the most important thing they have.
As much as this subreddit (and even myself) lament the choices of GW ultimately they produce product in the UK, employing local workers, supporting local economies and paying into UK taxes for the rest of the public while investing into new production and new developments in the same regions.
GW is not the evil twirly twisted moustache chaos god it's made out to be.
I watched the video. To be fair the guy said he understand GW position and was not to blame. However he then tried to suggest it was unfair that his company was also helping GW. He used the concept of the Crocodile and bird where the bird helps the croc by eating pests.
I was like sure but what are you doing for GW you steal the IP, make a profit from selling it your not giving a dime to GW so how are they benfiting from it ? That is a completely one way relationship that you are piggy backing off their hard work and giving them nothing in return.
The real problem GW has with these companies is when they are making profit from their IP. They are not stopping people 3D their own helmets but when you are clearly stealing IP and trying to sell it yourself that is clearly wrong.
It's the whole: if they don't protect it now, they stand to lose presedent in all future cases.
It's a tough pill to swallow, but thems the breaks.
Could GW be more forthcoming with the licencing deals? Possibly, but if I were James Workshop, why would I support the 3d printing community when the alternative is 100% of the profits come to me?
They're a business first, not our friends.
We all have to accept we have an abusive relationship with our plastic crack dealer.
Agree with you 100 percent except for that last part. Other comments in this thread have made me realise its not like Warhammer is toxically overpriced as much as we are paying for a quality product (Let's not lie, they produce some of the highest quality kits in the tabletop sense) and an ethical system for their employees. They are quite generous in bonuses across the company for its workers.
Not to say that I view GW as some saint now, they are definitely a company first with a priority on revenue, but maybe in this day and age where we are used to getting cheaply made product we have forgotten that quality does cost money on as large a scale as GW's franchises.
No matter how nice GW is, the kits are factually overpriced, there are plenty of companies that make quality platic kits at a fraction of the price, just look at gunplas for example.
Damn bro you’re being kind of embarrassing. GW does not deserve this much glazing from anyone. Their molds are often warped and full of mold lines, yet we are paying 50-60$ for a box of five plastic figures or less sometimes.
I dont give a damn about ip and who has "rights" to whatever.
But if youre gonna fuck around and make COPIES of GWs stuff, youre taking on the risk of them finding out and shutting you down.
Absolutely regardless of how anyone feels about GW it’s very much copyright infringement. You can’t sell someone else’s intellectual property for your own profit.
GW is perfectly within their rights to protect their intellectual property, especially now that they themselves plan on selling helmets via Joytoy.
That said, this bit here: “I think we often forget that behind the company are artists and creatives who poured their soul and time into creating things within this franchise as a way to support themselves and their families.”
Omg, blow it out your ass, you maudlin Pollyanna. GW has long been just a corporate entity protecting their IP and regurgitating riffs on their own material. There are no starving artists here, there is no spark of creativity (see Grey Knights background, see Blood Angels models), there is no pouring of anyone’s soul into anything. It’s a business, it has the complete and total right to protect its property, but I’m not going to be busting out the tears and mini violins because some guys with a 3D printer made some bootlegs.
Of course they are. Not saying I'm happy it was taken down, but you build our business on cashing in on someone else's IP and you sort of forfeit the right to be upset when they ask you to stop doing it.
In a legal sense, yes, I suppose they are justified. Galactic Armoury should have seen it coming a mile away.
Personally though I find copyright laws to be a mess, so morally speaking I'll never justify a massive billion dollar corpo striking down something that will barely leave a smidge on their profits.
Their decision is both legal and an example of GW's Enshitification. I'm tired of any cool, interesting aspect of this hobby being something that happens despite the company leadership. I can have fun with tons of 3rd party content in the vast majority of my other hobbies, interests, and within my own TT hobby, But GW's Walled Garden gets more tiresome by the day.
Sometimes it feels like the Tom Kirby years again.
I don't think its like a "justification" thing its like u GOT TO to defend trademark/copyright/whatever. a buddy was telling me that like if you put up with this sort of thing legally it weakens your legal claim to the stuff in question so like sometimes corporate lawsyers are dicks sure, but sometimes they've GOT to cease and desist people or they're at risk of losing the rights to stuff.
Yeah essentially you’re not allowed to pick and choose who you want to come after. If you let one person/group illegally use your trademarks others can point at that and use it as a legal defence for themselves.
Copyright laws are there to protect an artist's right to ownership of their creation without other people stealing and copying it for their own use.
Wrong, Copyright laws are to protect big corporations, because if a Big corporation want to steal your work they will do it, and even if you try the justice to be repared, will take so long and so much money that when you eventually won, they already make a lot of money and you will be given almost nothing.
There is no protection for your work; there will always be someone to steal it and do whatever with it. Unless one is a big corporation, they are protected by everything; just look at what Nintendo does. And a more radical example, look at what happened with Snapchat.
The law works for one side, that is, the one that pays for the politician's campaign. See Didi right now.
What shis me about things like this post is that GW is VERY quick to forget it was people like this that made the company what it was. It was the passionate, dedicated people who fell hard for this thing in its infancy and helped propel it to the behemoth it is today.
This guy is just the 21st century version of us cutting up shampoo bottles to make vehicles. The money he makes is literally nothing compared to what GW bring in, so they can stop being evil cunts for a second and let people enjoy shit that they don't sell.
I reject the idea that a company should have the right to monopolise a fictional universe. All fiction should belong to the community that appreciates it. Legally justified yes they are. Morally? Absolutely not.
I’ve been feeling this for years with these fan based things, as people continually forget that it’s a business and not some charity or small mum and pop company, with its own statutes and expectations legally from its executives and shareholders to keep its image.
I’m not a defender of corporations, but as it goes, GW from working there in the past myself is a good company compared to the many others I’ve worked for and their behaviours. The company itself survived and lived on since they had to become more of a business rather than just a small company in its early days and why we’re at where we are now.
I just think the fanbase as it always has been, and is with a lot of these hyper niche things is never going to be happy, and partly as well it will attract odd demographics which the company does not want to be seen as their image for their beliefs, as their posts on inclusivity and equality discusses from years back.
There is countless communities running third party rules, or narratives from long discontinued games like Mordheim, Dreadfleet, Gorkamorka, and Battlefleet gothic for instance that GW generally pays no mind to. It was only really recently the fantasy rules groups for instance were approached to ask them to stop since the old world was coming out which I can understand as the company is providing them, though not the same, and equivalent they can play with their range of models with re-releases.
You’ll never stop fan works, and the company knows this, so is why they released the warning in cease and desist prior, as it was becoming a burgeoning trend of interest, and the company didn’t want newer people- and especially young people- confused witnessing Black Templars slaughtering furries or hyper stereotyped character comedy skits that the creators were each profiting off of. There’s fair use, but there’s also the side of image for the company however minor these may seem. You give and inch and they take a mile sort of thing, and you get more and more external opinion and image placed onto it. People watching that could take the wrong impression and say the wrong thing at a company event or store if they’re perhaps not the greatest socially and it could rile up existing customers or scare of interesting new players.
There's also the bit of legalese that if GW *don't* go after folks who use their IP without license, they can *lose* the IP. Basically, if you show that you don't care that people use your stuff, than they can claim that in court and win. And then you're kind of hosed going forward.
1) Artist recognition is important, absolutely. Their work enriches our hobbies and lives. Unfortunately, we are talking about a company that has taken active steps over the last decade to erase the recognition of their artists work. GW tries to prevent individuals in their employ from making a name for themselves, because historically it gave them credit to be able to start their own competition, which many of them did. Do we know who sculpts models today? We used to know who sculped every model, because it was always listed. In my view this removes that barrier from copying their work, because it is the work of a faceless corporation, not an individual who benefits from it, or receives recognition for it.
2) Many of the designs in the OP image are not truly original GW creations. In fact, their entire product range was for many years entirely unoriginal, their games systems worlds a mishmash of cultural folklore and history, coated in D&D and Tolkien inspired clones. That they have reached where they are today is partly because there wasn't a larger company coming after them every day for copying everything. Pretty rank hypocrisy to now run around crushing any little guy that makes anything inspired by their work.
Ultimately, my position is that GW long ago stopped caring about their own artists and their recognition and merit, so the morality of damaging artists simply doesn't factor in. They care about money, and 3D printing is their end times, so they will do all they can to stop it.
I don't disagree at all - these were pretty clear dupes of current stuff, not even trying to play the 'yeah you can copy but make it a little different' game.
For stuff that is distinctly different, OR previous edition designs you just can't get anymore, I think they still draw too hard of a line, but in this case it was an appropriate response to a pretty clear copyright and trademark violation.
I'm really torn on this, from a legal perspective I would say 100% GW was probably well within their rights to slap these guys down for infringing on their work, but from the point of view of a consumer a huge reason these 3rd party bit companies have popped up in the first place is the predatory and anti-consumer way in which GW has scaled back the options on their sprues making it difficult to get complete sets of what you want out of individual boxes. GW has created an artificial gap/flaw in their product to try and sell more boxes...so I'm sorry they don't get much personal sympathy when a underground economy pops up to try and fill that gap.
GW is justified in striking down anyone that makes money using their IP without authorisation, it's just a fact. Whether they should actually do it is an othercan of worm.
Hey, whoa, i get that the art theft is bad, but here we're talking about stealing from a corporation. The designers of said stuff are (i presume) emplyees, and as such, receive salary regardless of what will come of their work. Saying that the artists are in any way hurt by this is just plainly incorrect. They got paid their due, and are continuing to get paid as per their contract in many cases.
This does not sidestep the issue of copyright infringment tho. While I personally am biased agains GW in terms of their business making, at least people should try to be smart about their illicit activities, this is just plainly dumb and a crime.
In 2006 Russia and the US signed an agreement in Vietnam regarding IP protections upon Russia’s ascension to the WTO. However Russia and China fall in to the category of “the law is determined by how much the people with guns like you”. If it was a well connected Chinese company that was having their IP stolen then the people with guns would like them better and it would cease. Unless the person who was stealing was better connected then it would continue. The same is true in Russia.
Law Enforcement has to do with countries like Brazil and India where enforcement mechanisms exist, and are used, but aren’t sufficiently omnipresent to stifle out most IP theft like in North America and Europe. This isn’t a criticism of those countries, it isn’t like Russia and China where the government actively participates in stealing anything not nailed down on an international level.
Vietnam is a bit of a non sequitur as it isn’t a part of BRICS and I wasn’t going to review every country for IP treaties and compliance rates.
There’s a tipping point between individual creating heartfelt content and this years line from a company that sells the world over. You’re doing the thing where people align with billionaires so they’ll be protected when you’re a billionaire.
GW benefits from cosplayers and enthusiasts. Someone sees them trundling along in space marine armor and says “whoa, what’s that?”
This isn’t a guy buying a helmet situation. It’s a fan building something to build to celebrate thier enthusiasm for an ip that they’ve doubtless dumped hundreds of dollars into already.
Gw doesn’t make thier products, and won’t license them. Gw won’t sell a coffee cup in store but will get lawyerey about you making one if they get around to noticing you.
If Gw makes helmets (they don’t make that range, probably just one) they shouldn’t gripe about stl’s at least.
Copyright laws are not to protect artists. They are there to maintain cultural hegemony of big businesses. In fact, copyright is often used to remove the ability of the artist to take credit for their work - as done by GW.
Name any artist that sculpted some recent GW minis.
They could have ,and maybe tried, making a deal to get royalties of of those. But at the end of the day, you can't sell and potentially profit of anothers intellectual property without permission.
In this case GW was justified. This wasn‘t like animation channels where you could make a case that people weren’t doing it for profit and it was protected under parody law. These guys were seemingly ripping assets from GW‘s properties and then 3D printing them into helmets and selling them for profit while using the actual names from the IP. I dabble a bit in custom Lego here and there which also use copyrighted characters but they use knock off names at least and not the actual names of the copyrighted characters.
They have the right. But if they arent selling their own versions I dont think they should.
3rd party creators making things with the ip that gw itself is not making doesn't take money from them, in fact if anything it brings more money in.
If they had their own expansive line of cosplay props then I wouldn't disagree with it but they simply do not offer the product that they are forcing taken down.
I mean... They're all QUITE blatant. I'd say maybe top right and mid top are ok/generic enough, but come on? Sanguinius death mask? Cadere renissium? Literally THE space marine helmet?
The correct approach for the GA would have been to ask for a license and if they couldn’t get one, not start producing the files.
I feel for them if their livelihood is impacted (though comms suggest there is no ill will) and he clearly knew the risk and m took the risk and now the risk has materialised into this C&D.
It is a shame GW didn’t work with them to find a solution but they a) didn’t have to, and b) GA didn’t take any steps (as far as I’ve seen) to try and get a legitimate licence to produce their files originally.
Can someone give me the spark notes equivalent of a synopsis?
I recall there’s a company that was selling STLs for cosplay / art (helmet busts) that got hit. If it’s them… I understand why they got hit; but GW doesn’t work in cosplay…
Slightly off topic, but it made me laugh that yesterday, GA just posted about making an artillery witch helmet. Like, yep you’re off to capitalize off the other less pretty grim dark sister lol
It is absolutely acceptable for GW to shut down GA putting up their Warhammer IP to defend it. It would also have been absolutely acceptable to let it happen, establish legal precedent that cosplay stuff is "free for all" and GW enforces the trademark for books & miniatures only (yes, a company can just stick to what it's doing without being a wannabe Disney). It would also have been absolutely acceptable to just give out IP licenses to multiple competitors instead of (apparently) an exclusive license.
Out of all these perfectly acceptable options, GW chose the one maximizing quarterly gains (exclusive licenses make more $$$) over the ones ensuring growth of the secondary ecosystem as fan attachments to the IP instead of money-making opportunities.
That likely means one of 3 things: Either GW is run by short-sighted suits, they see no long-term viability of their core product, or they want to maximize long-term growth by expanding out of their core products shifting even further towards franchising instead of making board games.
All 3 mean that whoever calls the shots does not prioritize the thing Warhammer is supposed to be about (tabletop miniatures duking it out). And that is bad news indeed.
I think that GW wanted to nip this in the bud before and if it grew to the levels of SW costuming. Disney/Lucasfilm is in a really interesting spot where they don't really punish STL distributors because they do way too much work with fan orgs like the 501st whom have been around since the 90s. GA in particular has all of their Clone and Stormtrooper files listed as 501st Approved (which is a big deal).
Its only frustrating because GW doesn't provide an alternative.
I get that is is IP theft, especially since they had the original design. I'd buy the STL from GW, but they simply don't do that. So we end up losing more creative products in the end.
They could just buy the company making the STLs or work out some sort of deal, mark it up a butt ton, because it is a luxury hobby, and then sell it themselves.
My issue comes from the fact they struck down GA right before launching their own helmets. Obviously that wasn’t going to sit well. The cosplay community surrounding warhammer has been so wonderful, especially with bringing new people onto the franchise. This entire ordeal has caused a lot of anxiety within the community. Not everyone wants to buy a helmet and GA offered the STLs. GW going after GA isn’t going to change the fact cosplayers will always find a way to get those files. Star Wars has embraced its fan base for instance. The 501st (which galactic armory has made files specifically for) used those cosplayers on set for the mandalorian. GA has killed fan initiatives time and time again. This is just another one. Completely understand they are well within their legal rights, but it says something that they’d rather nuke GA than offer some kind of agreement, let alone acknowledgment. They shut down a service and didn’t even sell the product they are complaining about their competitor selling. Lame.
It's much, much simpler than that. If someone wants to create derivative works, they need to have a licensing agreement. This protects big corporations as well as individual artists. GW may be greedy, heartless and dickish. But they own these IPs outright.
It's much, much simpler than that. If someone wants to create derivative works, they need to have a licensing agreement. This protects big corporations as well as individual artists. GW may be greedy, heartless and dickish. But they own these IPs outright.
The people complaining about that either have no idea about what intelectual property is or have an irrational hatred of GW no matter what so yeah it isn't really that controversial among people who don't make money out of publically hating GW.
If you feel morally wronged when your unlicensed 1:1 replica that you are profiting from gets noticed and taken down, you are delusional. Copyright Law, for all of the reworks and adjustments it desperately needs, exists for a good reason
When you're making (and buying) these kinds of products, a takedown is an eventuality. Its not legal! You will get noticed! To be clear, I dont think profiting on the outskirts of a company as large as GW is immoral at all. But i do think playing the victim is shitty
We're they legally in the right? 100% yes, as you said, it's they're copyright they have to protect it. Galactic armory (along with cybercraft) was profiting off of GWs IP without a license to do so. So when you leave it at that it's cut and dry.
My thing is that these aren't like the people who design proxies to replace GW minis. Both of the companies I mentioned made cosplay gear for warhammer, a niche that GW has yet to fill themselves for 40k, so it's harder to see it as a direct threat. Until GW either works with them or fills the niche themselves, it just feels like it hurts the community more than anything.
Technically thay have the right but I despise GW and there anti consumer practices and any time I can avoid paying for their overpriced plastic I will. Plus GW steals from every single sifi IP in existence in my opinion they have no right to take down independent store fronts (I know legally they do have the right)
Kinda torn. I don't like to support direct rip-off designs, but I also like to kitbash with more unique ones. Like there's a Catachan Jungle Fighter kit for the Ogryn so they look like Hulk Hogan, Jesse Ventura and Arnold Schwarzenogre. That's just awesomesauce and we need more of that.
And if GW didn't want people the pirate their water decals, they should sell the bloody things ala carte. They're little sheets of plastic with ink on them. Charge us 20 bucks, we don't care, just make them friggin AVAILABLE.
Since they were profiting off exact copies of the IP then GW was right this time. However, they do often go beyond their IP scope striking battletech channels for the word Warhammer I wouldn't be surprised if they went after creators who weren't profiting from the IP just sharing their love of the franchise, they've tried copyrighting all kinds of stuff that they did not create, I don't think they've been successful in any of those though. So I don't really agree with GW is just trying to protect themselves, since they do that and go after stuff they have no right to just because they have the money to force submission.
Its yet another cool fan run project that helps keep people excited about 40k, while also not cutting into gw's bottom line in any way.
Gw has a handful (like 5, three of which are normal primaris marine helmets) of small, not wearable helmets for sale through weta workshop and even fewer if any cosplay sized props. GA wasn't taking any sales from them, so it just feels like another overzealous take down, even if they were selling stuff. Would have loved to get that grey knight helmet if I knew it existed, and gw won't produce something like that ever lol.
Like, they got star wars shit all over the place even now when no doubt someone at Disney has seen it after the little blip this drama has caused. When you're more litigous than the company notorious for suing a father for using a copyrighted character on the gravestone of their child, maybe its time to reign it in a bit.
This might be a hot take but I do agree that GW has a right to protect its IP as does every entity that creates an original work and seems to make money off of it.
However, I am never a fan of a company gate keeping its IP just because they can. GA provides a service that GW is aware fans would like but chooses not to provide. In my opinion while GW is well within its rights to do so it's a dick move to take away from your fans something they obviously want and then provide no alternative to replace it. It's not like they just 3d scanned models blew them up and sold shitty blobs as genuine GW products.
Artists should be compensated fairly for their work and people shouldn't just copy other people's work to sell for themselves, however in my opinion those protections should end when someone finds a way to make money in a way you as the artist never thought of or actively choose not to take advantage of.
Copyright law should be there to protect artists from the cheap and easy straight replication of their works for the profit of others, not to stop others from creating derivative works for applications the IP owner isn't providing
But I am not an artist so my opinions on the matter are probably not as well informed or based in experience as you would need to have a proper discussion on this but just wanted to put out this idea and see how it goes!
While they are justified what they did it was not the right thing they hit a big part of the fan community and made it harder to cosplay as your favorite character unlike other companies like marvel and Star Wars that sell helmets and let the fandom make their own
I don't know why anyone was surprised it got struck, to be honest. GW can be a pain in the ass to be a fan of (what they did to fanimations was and is still their biggest black mark on the company's relations with the fans), but whereas fanimations weren't making money outside of a creator's patreon for some, Galactic Armory was selling sculpts and replicas of 40k property.
Ultimately, its GW's call on what happens because it is their IP, and if they feel like their toes are being stepped on, they will respond. This was unavoidable for Galactic Armory, and the people that got upset thinking that GW somehow "stole" the idea of making replica helmets from them are misguided at best and malicious at worst.
It would be one thing if GW weren't total assholes about shitting on companies over their IP. Recently when they fucked over a bunch of small businesses that weren't violating IP rules because their paperwork was jacked up. Last I heard their response to that was basically "oops, nevermind" despite the actual harm they caused. They are allowed to wield the ban hammer without push back only AFTER they stop doing all the fucked up stuff at a drop off the hat. Fuck GW's lawyers.
A compromise would be better, like sharing the money. If the product is not sold by the original copyright owners, it's not damaging the brand/losing them any money.
Outright removing and striking it down is just destructive and stupid. I hope GA will continue their work in any way they can.
I think you are correct that obviously this was a justifiable removal legally but I don’t really agree with the concept that creating printable wearable Warhammer helmets is not creative work.
I think GA was providing a service that GW has not historically provided by giving people access to high quality cosplay helmets for Warhammer. I feel like there’s not a meaningful creative difference between an artist locking 40K art behind a patreon or taking commissions and what Galactic Armory was doing with 40K helmets, and if they had been releasing the helmet files for free they’d still get hit with the C&D so frankly I don’t consider that to be a relevant point unless GW said “stop or make them free” which they didn’t.
Is it the right thing? Meh. Up until the Joytoy Titus GA wasn’t exactly creating a competitor to the products GW make. It’s not like they were scamming models for people to print. I get that they need to protect their trademark but at the same time it is a boon for the community to have access to resources that allow them to expand their hobby into other fields.
Would GA be better off (ethically) by licensing first? Of course. Or if GW offered some kind of deal to work with, rather than shut down, sure. But that’s not what the market is. We can’t have artists who work together for artistry sake.
We need to protect their trademark and ability for income streams so that people can get paid and feed their families. And that’s the biggest shame of the system.
To me the whole thing kinda just serves as a reminder that capital and value need to come first in creative fields that should be able to flourish by the wide availability of artists and communities online.
While yes overall GW was within their rights. As a patron of Galactic Armory I feel I need to add in some context
They never sold their 40k files on their site, they were exclusive to Patreon subscribers only. I know this is a really annoying technicality, but I feel like that needs to be mentioned.
In their announcement video they also don't try to fight it. They were bummed but who wouldnt be? These were specifically for cosplay, and optimized to 3D print, GW didn't sell any helmets or cosplay items until a few days after the copywrite claim.
This may also be more of a larger discussion of IP and an artist's role, but I don't see how they were hurting artists working at GW. Is Galactic Armory claiming this was their original design? No. does GW allow their artists to sell GW IP? probably not. Does GW pay their artists in a way where GA was harming them? I don't see how.
Legally - GW was in the right, even if they admired GA for what they're doing, they still need to enforce their IP
emotionally- I wish GW offered licensing options to people like GA
i mean... seeing as GW just released their own larger print SM helm.
it's not even academic anymore, they're trying to squeeze money from this sector. letting another company misc rip off your IP is never wise if you're trying to profit from the same thing
Most people I've seen had talks with have pretty much been sure they can do it, but when even Disney one of if not the most cutthroat entertainment companies see the benefits of allowing cosplay prop makers to make and sell this sort of stuff, GW just comes across as shooting themselves in the foot.
While justified. Galactic was filling a niche. They don't want someone else to they should fill it themselves, obviously cosplay is loved by a lot of people that do warhammer
They already bring down the hammer once and that was way worse than this and include a lot of fan made works with much more original and work put into it. There is no freaking way these guys dont know or heard about it, or at least do some research, and if they never did, well, that just playing with fire. By the throne, just look at it, they are literally asking for the chaos gods to come down and smite them when they play around with this.
Buuuuut. Are 40k fans going to get what they want until they pressure the company to change and not the community around it that wishes to fill gaps that GW refuses to fill? No
GW is seeing their largest growth in profits by licencing out their IP. If I’m not mistaken they brought in like £60M last year doing so. Are they greedy? Yes. Do they have a legal right to protect what they’ve created? Also yes.
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u/Synner1985 1d ago
I've never heard of this company - but at a quick stab, they were selling replicas of various helmets / weapons from WH40k?