| This article has been copied a bit, my take here is: 1. Ikea sent a C&D to a small indie developer alleging trademark infringement or trademark dilution (NOT copyright). Seems like this has been lost a bit, and most articles are reporting on other articles. 2. If go to the Kickstarter page, the Ikea branding features prominently in the promotional materials for the game. It LOOKS like blatant trademark infringement or dilution to me. It’s not like you fire up the game and find out that it’s set in an Ikea. The game is marketed as a game set in Ikea, except for the term “Ikea” itself, which is scrubbed out. 3. I can’t see any parody angle here. It seems like it’s a horror game which is supposed to be set in an Ikea, but it’s not making any kind of commentary on Ikea. Like, how is this supposed to be some kind of protected speech? As far as I can tell, it’s “What if you were trapped inside an Ikea, and there were monsters?” People seem to like it for the David vs. Goliath angle. However, nothing about this needs to be set in Ikea. Just like how SCP-173 didn’t need to use that particular artwork. If you think it was right for SCP-173 to change artwork, but it’s wrong for this SCP-derived game to change the branding for its setting… why? Edit: For context: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-14469202/announcement-r... > However, as authors (and staff) didn't know much about licensing originally (nor did SCP have the significance at the time for it to be as big of a deal), they would often grab images from the Internet at random, including images that their creators would not allow the use of. > […] > Izumi Kato has extremely graciously allowed us to use Untitled 2004 on our site, on the condition that Untitled 2004's itself or its likeness would not be used for commercial purposes. Nonetheless, we cannot indefinitely keep the image on SCP-173's page, especially since it has become increasingly difficult for us to prevent Untitled 2004's likeness from being used for commercial purposes by others as SCP grows. > Licensing aside, Untitled 2004's usage on the Wiki is also an ethical issue. Izumi Kato did not intend nor ask for his art to be used as an SCP, and the meaning and purpose of Untitled 2004 has been, in some ways, permanently tainted by its use in the article. Kato kindly and retroactively allowed its use for SCP-173 in 2014 on condition, but it was clear he was not happy with the situation. Additionally, his art's been exploited by third parties trying to profit off of SCP, which has likely caused him much distress. > As such, we believe the most correct course of action in this situation is to remove Untitled 2004 from SCP-173. Although this process has been delayed significantly, the longer we wait, the more harm is done to Izumi Kato's creative vision and the risk of legal issues becomes greater. |
Sure it does. IKEA either invented or popularized the concept of designing a store in a maze-like structure, to _force_ customers to walk through aisles of product to entice them to buy something, even if they're not looking for anything in particular. If you walk into an IKEA store, the only way out is to walk through the entire store. It's why they have one-way arrows to guide the traffic.
This layout is particular to IKEA, and no other store evokes the sense of dread of being forcefully locked in a retail environment. This is why having a horror game set in an environment that parodies IKEA specifically makes a lot of sense, and would connect far more with players than if it was set in some random store.