So yesterday I found out that Randy Queen (artist of DarkChylde) filed a bunch of DMCA takedown notices to Tumblr to remove posts of his covers on this blog (the entire posts, not just the images). I’ve also gotten messages from other users that he’s had their stuff removed too (redraws, etc that have been featured here). Non-critical Tumblr posts of his art/covers and those praising his work appear to be unaffected.
I’m writing this to let other people who run sites that might have criticized his work ( thehawkeyeinitiative, bikiniarmorbattledamage, boobsdontworkthatway, repair-her-armor, comicartcorrections etc) know that he seems to use DMCA takedowns to remove pages that are critical of his work. And, to be prepared that he might have Tumblr remove your posts without warning (there was no prior communication of any kind, or conventional requests for removal).
Also, if you’ve submitted redraws of his stuff to these sites, you might want to ask them to put them private for now (if he complains about a submission you’ve made, Tumblr will count it as a complaint against your account).
To date, Mr. Queen is the only artist who has taken this kind of action – 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.)
If anybody is curious about what his DarkChylde art looked like and why they were featured on this blog you can find them here.
(Don’t harass him on his Facebook or Tumblr by the way. I’m not interested in having a feud with him, just letting people know what’s going on.)
Update: He has now filed a DMCA takedown with Tumblr to remove this post. This post is still up on Escher Girls, but every single reblog of it has been removed.
As Tumblr has not disclosed the reasons for removing reblogs, or preventing more reblogs – I can only assume they’re okay with me putting this back on Bikini Armor Battle Damage.
While obviously the right of artists to prevent others from using/abusing their artwork without permission is essential in a society that respects artists and values art – the right to Fair Use and to criticise others publicly is essential in a society that respect for all it’s members.
More information on these events available here.
– wincenworks