ishidoshuuji:

On Friday I discovered that someone is selling clothing with one of my drawings on via Amazon.jp.

The drawing itself is of Ice Bear from We Bare Bears wearing Inazuma Eleven’s Gouenji Shuuya’s hoodie. It came from a joke post I made in September 2015 (LINK) asking is We Bare Bears was about Break Trio as furries. I drew the following for the post:

And this is the range of clothing that the drawing has appeared on:

SELLER: NIKI-CC (LINK)

As well as this they have altered my drawing so that my signature no longer appears anywhere (they also removed a toe while editing this out) and have removed Ice Bear’s mouth. 

Not only is this wrong to begin with, by removing my signature they are acknowledging that they know that this is not an official WBB image and is actually someone else’s work.

But this is not the first time this has happened to me on Amazon. On the UK site a seller called Wall Station (LINK) are selling the following as silk posters (*NOTE* they also have used lots more Inazuma fanart so if you have ever made any yourself then you should go and look):

Original Tumblr Post: LINK (dated 1st May 2012)

Original Tumblr Post: LINK (dated 17th April 2012)

Now when I discovered the silk posters I got in touch with Amazon explaining that they were using my art without permission. They directed me to fill in forms to challenge the copyright which would get the items removed. However, the forms were legally binding and iirc had you accept that if you were proved wrong you could be up for charges yourself. Since I don’t own the copyright to Inazuma Eleven (or WBB for that matter), I was reluctant to even go down this route since I only “own” the drawing (and in those days I never signed my work which has bugged me ever since because that group Inazuma drawing has virtually been accepted as official art and has been on websites advertising games and in Nintendo magazines and everything…). I also don’t sell anything with my drawings on so they’re not taking any business away from me as such, but still…. 

And so this leaves me in a bit of a no win situation… But please… DO NOT BUY THESE ITEMS FROM THOSE SELLERS. They shouldn’t be allowed to just take things they want to and sell them at a profit. While I do believe Amazon should be more aware that this is happening under their name, I know that bootleggers are just going to do it anyway regardless of what happens to them.

I’m sorry this is a really long post but I don’t appreciate my work being taken for someone else’s advantage and felt the need to document it here (because this is where it stems from, I have never published/posted that Ice Bear drawing anywhere but Tumblr).

Thank you for listening!

(via ishido-shuuji-deactivated201903)