Wrong move from Games Workshop. When will brands learn?! The best way to protect a license is to grant them to community members, not C&D them. Cherish your fans and they'll take care of you. Threaten them - they'll find somewhere else to go. youtu.be/LXnF6A0nlaE
oh come on, it was free positive publicity! ðŸ˜
Right?! You can get in this position with exclusive licenses for merch, but not doing a carve-out clause for custom goods and promotions is amateur hour in IP licensing. Shame.
it's so easy to do right by fans and enable the wonderful people who are excited to create content centered around your IP, who will expand your community's reach for free.. and then companies will casually take a shotgun to their own foot because they're terrified of being a little permissive lol
Galactic Armory were selling for profit items based on the GW IP without any kind of permission from GW. The guy behind GA even admitted they should've contacted GW to at least try to get some form of permission or License. I believe he actually states that in the video you linked.
Sure, fans do this *all* the time. Companies should know better, they're the IP experts with lawyers and research budgets. Fans just do what they love.
Fans do not usually set up a company to infringe on the copyright of the thing they are a fan of. Yet that seems to happen a lot with Warhammer.
Look, I would check some assumptions on your first statement there. Not sure what you mean by usually, but it's presented pretty disingenuously on first read. If you've also had a career centered around IP development, then cool you've had a different experience. If not, this is a pretty bad take.
What assumptions do you think I'm making? I know that a load of fans are producing and selling stuff based around IPs as a cottage industry. That is not this case, as they're generally not doing so as a company.
Galactic Armory produces STLs and actual helmets from various IPs. They seem to be pre-made and not made to fit, which would mean they're not 'Custom Goods' under UK Law.