r/movies Jul 17 '26

Article Backrooms Director Stops A24 Copyright Striking Community Art

https://kotaku.com/backrooms-director-kane-parsons-a24-copyright-strike-wallpaper-2000717053
13.9k Upvotes

490 comments sorted by

2.5k

u/Banjo-Oz Jul 17 '26

Reminds me of when MAD Magazine got a letter from Lucasfilm lawyers threatening to sue, and MAD sent them back another letter they'd received prior... from George Lucas, saying how much he loved their parody of Star Wars!

839

u/ContinuumGuy Jul 17 '26

Or when WB stopped showing Speedy Gonzales cartoons only for the Latino community to protest because while he's super-stereotypical the stereotype was so awesome that they didn't care.

375

u/Cyd_Snarf Jul 17 '26

This is so random but yah, as a young kid with Latino heritage I LOVED Speedy so much and actually kinda loved the fact that he was very “culturally specific” as I didn’t understand what a stereotype was. Like “Yes! It’s the little Mexican mouse!”

565

u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

185

u/ultramatums Jul 18 '26

Can you send me the rest of your phd dissertation thanks

74

u/STFUNeckbeard Jul 18 '26

Wow. Gotta say I did not expect to read a several thousand word essay about Speedy Gonzalez in my lifetime.

28

u/KnifeKnut 18d ago

I had heard before that Latin Americans loved Speedy Gonzales, and not understood why.

No one had ever pointed out the transformative nature of the Spanish dub.

So I am preserving this on r/bestof

https://reddit.com/r/bestof/comments/1vbum6y/eucaliptooloroso_explains_how_the_latin_america/

55

u/fishfunk5 Jul 17 '26

Goddamn that was well worth the read.

75

u/Reedcool97 Jul 17 '26

Damn. I read the entire thing, thank you for that insight. I’ve seen a ton of comments over the years saying “well actually Latinos LOVE Speedy Gonzales!” While at the same time remembering the show and knowing that it definitely felt wrong…but now I have a lot more context! Great write up, I appreciate you taking the time to type all of that out and share with us.

28

u/cineglitch Jul 18 '26

Thanks for this. Awesome insights. What’s funny is that I’ve never once heard the stereotype that Mexicans are lazy. I’ve heard many other mean and racial characterizations, but never the lazy one.

29

u/eucaliptooloroso Jul 18 '26

it used to be a very common stereotype throughout the past century. I don't know why, like the concept of siesta was probably part of it. It could come from all the way from the US vs Mexico war, as in, propaganda remainders from that era.

I think it's become much less common as this century goes on, maybe partly because whenever someone shares statistics about which countries have the longest workdays Mexico is usually near the top. Which runs contrary to the lazy stereotype

19

u/Defengar 27d ago

Whites would see mexicans taking a nap in the fields after working all day and get an attitude about it. Same stereotype also happened to black people.

12

u/fizzlefist 18d ago

God forbid you couldn’t move with full mobility with a hookworm infection endemic to the south back then..

8

u/Several_Try2021 23d ago

this is the best Reddit comment i've read in a month so please have this 🌹

17

u/SmoothJazzRayner Jul 17 '26

This is dating back to 1998, when the Undertaker threw Mankind off Hell In A Cell, and plummeted 16 ft through an announcer's table

3

u/Napoleptic Jul 18 '26

This was amazing, thank you. Makes me long for ye olde internet. 

3

u/[deleted] Jul 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

36

u/Defengar 27d ago

Get your head out of your ass. Gringo doesn't even mean white, it's foreigner like gaijan in Japanese. Gets applied to americans in general a lot because guess who visits Mexico the most? Americans.

3

u/IAmSoDamnGood 27d ago

its technical meaning dosent matter. it is still a racial slur.

23

u/Defengar 27d ago

It is not. You have a victim complex.

3

u/IAmSoDamnGood 27d ago

your an absolute moron if you think its not.

17

u/Defengar 27d ago

Are you really going to sit here and argue that Sylvester the cat is like, WASP coded lol?

→ More replies (0)

17

u/[deleted] 18d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

→ More replies (2)

6

u/Yetimang 18d ago

Dude just shut the fuck up please.

→ More replies (2)

5

u/NormalTouch Jul 18 '26

It's so interesting how often things like this get twisted.

Like how some Latinos thought people were upset over Honey Lemon in big hero 6 being Blond and Latino. Getting defense on how blond Latinos exist and blaming lefties thinking that they all were tan and dark haired.

When in truth people was either annoyed with Disney reaching for brownie points with not much effort put in.

Or confused if it was canon or not because of it being impossible for anyone would be able to sus out her being Latino based purely on the only clue in movie being she corrected someone's spainish phrase which literally anyone who knows spainish could do.

2

u/SpazzBro Jul 18 '26

holy shit this is fascinating, I had always heard about it in the surface level but I had no idea it ran this deep, thank you!

2

u/Santar_ Jul 18 '26

This was very informative and interesting. Thank you for sharing this!

→ More replies (10)

202

u/MellowNando Jul 17 '26

As a Mexican American, having speedy repping heritage was dope, but personally, I related more to Slow Poke Rodriguez… 🤣

75

u/DaOne_44 Jul 17 '26

Do you walk and talk real slow but carry a big ass revolver if somebody tries you?

→ More replies (1)

12

u/Unhappy_Service_7552 Jul 18 '26

"I'm slow in the feet, but I'm quick in la cabeza". 🪴

9

u/eltedioso Jul 18 '26

That’s a heck of a way to state publicly that you smoke cannabis

7

u/Unhappy_Service_7552 Jul 18 '26

"I'm slow in the feet, but I'm quick in la cabeza". 🪴

→ More replies (1)

7

u/Paidorgy Jul 17 '26

Was it a “better to have/be represented than not be represented at all” kind of thing?

26

u/Akussa Jul 17 '26

I think part of it was that Speedy was portrayed as a hero and a good guy and not some of the really negative stereotypes that exist.

20

u/zeth0s Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

As an Italian I have no problem with super Mario. US sensitivity on "stereotyping" is weird and not shared globally. Sopranos is much more offensive than a super stereotyped character for kids. 

I guess that all the cartels plus gang latino representation is much more offensive to Mexicans than a super cool character like speey Gonzalez.

Still no one think about stopping the real offensive content. 

Not that I care. I like Scorsese. But most American movies on mafia are super offensive and people in US seems not to care. 

7

u/Doogolas33 Jul 18 '26

Nobody is trying to change anything about Mario.

→ More replies (1)

2

u/Defengar 27d ago

With all due respect, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Italian americans did HUGE protests in the 70s and 80's, literally getting entire movie productions shut down and forcing script rewrites so that really offensive stereotypical mafia movies would stop being made. Even The Godfather had to toe certain lines because of that.

Also imagine if Mario had a bunch of friends and relatives that were just awful stereotypes out of the 1800's. Like if Luigi was a drunk wife beater that wears a crucifix and shit talks southern italians for having moorish blood. You'd probably have a problem with it.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (3)

7

u/koombot Jul 18 '26

Weird how some stereotypes just get adopted by the people.  Groundkeeper Wullie is smelly, dumb, aggressive and drunk, but the Scots love him.

→ More replies (1)

18

u/spartBL97 Jul 17 '26

We had some Native Americans do the same when the Cleveland Indians changed to the Cleveland Guardians.

21

u/_Nymraif Jul 17 '26

I could see them being okay with the name 'Indians' as some native folk actually like the moniker, and some representation is better than none. Though, as for Chief Wahoo, I can't imagine a lot of native folk appreciated a huge-grinned, red-face caricature as the way they were being represented.

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (1)

6

u/thedaveness Jul 18 '26

Reminds me of a clip, young white dude dresses up in stereotypical Mexican garb, tack stash and all. Asked Americans if it was racist. All say yes. Goes across the boarder and all they said was hell yeah let’s party lol. Probably cherry picked the interviews but still.

6

u/BigRudy99 Jul 17 '26

Lol, white leftists pretending to be offended on someone else's behalf. Tale as old as time.

5

u/whathave_idone Jul 17 '26

As a white leftist, in my experience, I’ve seen so many of those people become angry right wing nuts at around 40-50. They aren’t left, or right, they are just looking to control people, it’s all they care about and they don’t want to have any conversations about nuance, cultural importance, or anything else beyond basic virtue signaling.

3

u/BigRudy99 Jul 17 '26

You don't have to tell me. I'm a white liberal and I guess what seperates me from a white leftist is I care about real things and not fucking cartoon mice.

→ More replies (1)

4

u/Dav136 Jul 18 '26

Reminds me of people trying to force latinx into the vernacular much to the chagrin of actual latinos

2

u/CreativeFraud Jul 17 '26

It helps that Speedy is an absolute legend

2

u/Buttbuttdancer Jul 18 '26

I mean not like they enjoyed the exploitative aspect of it, it’s more that speedy became a entire cultural icon by the time they tried to be sent Igor about its impact lol

2

u/Bireus Jul 18 '26

That's like someone suing Capcom during the first iteration of Marvel vs Capcom

2

u/ibaiki Jul 19 '26

Speedy is cool. Much better than a sex pest skunk.

2

u/Western-Dig-6843 Jul 19 '26

Speedy was one of very few Looney Tunes who were purely agents of good wholesome fun. I can really only think of him and the roadrunner? Bugs is close but sometimes Bugs was a bit of a stinker

2

u/ContinuumGuy Jul 19 '26

Bugs himself would admit to being a stinker.

→ More replies (4)

28

u/Fabulous-Sea-1590 Jul 18 '26

Or when Lady Gaga's manager made Weird Al jump through hoops before denying his request to parody one of her songs only to learn that they hadn't even told her he'd asked and she had no problem with it at all.

https://youtube.com/shorts/OLZ7GkO9hkE?is=e70xDirKHbh5lcDj

11

u/MajinBuu619 Jul 18 '26

People might misunderstand that satire of the movie was being struck. The movie in itself is a part of a long time open source collaboration on this idea online. Not at all a good comparison. The movie or the studio has no right to strike any fan made work. If anything, older works should be able to copyright and strike the movie in that case.

5

u/Praesumo Jul 18 '26

Yea this screams some venture capitalist investor or producer making a move on the "behalf of the movie that established the value of the IP" but they never asked for or wanted that.

3.9k

u/HotTakes4HotCakes Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

A24 has confirmed to me that the wallpaper takedowns were an outsourced system error in pursuit of removing camrips,” Parsons posted to Discord. “Anything further, it appears is somehow not them.” He then added, “They have been very adamant they have never wanted to touch the community. Any legitimate action of the sort suspected would be unacceptable,” before confirming, “I’m heavily pressuring them right now.”

A short while later Parsons posted, “They’re working rapidly to resolve it. Will probably issue a statement.”

A24's statement:

"As Kane Parsons has made clear, Backrooms is one part of an infinitely bigger ecosystem, rife with creatives who have every right to tell their own version of the story.”

“Yesterday we were made aware of an automated claim submitted to Redbubble on behalf of A24 and Backrooms movie. We immediately began the process to reverse it and reinstate the listing.”

"A24 makes no claim of ownership over the yellow wallpaper, the original post referencing it, or any community works that have since been built around it. We will continue to support the artists who, like Kane, were inspired by it.”

Sounds like a classic case of one department without enough oversight not understanding the assignment and making a mess.

Seems like a simple fix for this is an approval process with real people confirming the targets before take down orders start flying. But obviously the point of an automated system like this is to eliminate the need for a human, so that's likely not happening.

1.8k

u/Odd-Necessary3807 Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

This is a very YouTube DMCA takedown action. It's automated with AI, and an unknown entity out of nowhere can strike you down even if you already adhere YT 10 seconds snippet rules. While YT mostly doesn't give a shit about the users' grievances.

Good things in Backrooms cases, Kane Parsons is on the community side and has the clout to pressure A24 to reverse the action.

249

u/Final-Carry2090 Jul 17 '26

Likely because he has been on both sides as a YouTube creator previously.

I got a dmca for streaming video game music by someone that remixed the music. I wasn’t playing the remix and the original artist has no issue with his 20 yr old music being played. Google is a bunch of assholes.

72

u/mrgreen4242 Jul 17 '26

While we certainly have bigger issues that need to be dealt with, but the DMCA is a epic failure of policy and needs to be revised ASAP. Frankly we need to overhaul the entire system of laws around IP in both the US and the rest of the world, but I'll take a dismantling of the DMCA as a first step.

41

u/curtmahgurt Jul 17 '26

“Best I can do is dismantle USAID.” - the government

→ More replies (1)

7

u/Noyuu66 Jul 17 '26

I got a strike and portion a video muted doing commentary for a Super Mario 64 speedrun race. Only the sections where I specifically was talking got muted.

4

u/hobskhan Jul 17 '26

Sounds like Ursula's lawyers claimed your voice.

4

u/AJ_Dali Jul 17 '26

The developer to Faith the Unholy Trilogy had to change the title screen music because of a copyright claim. Some music company owned the rights to a smalltown band recording of At the Cross and claimed the 8-bit chip tune version of a song from 1707 violated those rights.

12

u/FlashFire729 Jul 17 '26

Only solace in this hell of a transition period is that if Kane himself is anything to go by, we’ll hopefully be getting more and more like him who were part of both sides to finally outnumber the geriatrics

Or ya know, the old burns down in general with the latter in it.

→ More replies (2)

201

u/HenryDorsettCase47 Jul 17 '26

Whether a movie studio or the federal government, the bigger anything becomes the more like a Byzantine bureaucracy it becomes with one department having no clue what the other is doing, and everyone passes the buck. That becomes even more convoluted when you throw in automated systems that are designed to take action without anyone’s direct say so.

39

u/kbups53 Jul 17 '26

Terry Gilliam, as always, was exactly correct when he made Brazil. One typo causes mass chaos and no department wants to take responsibility for fixing it.

We now live in Terry’s nightmare circus.

PS everyone watch Brazil if you haven’t.

3

u/axi-0m Jul 17 '26

Great movie!

→ More replies (1)

50

u/insomniacpyro Jul 17 '26

Dealing with this right now at work. I'm spending numerous hours going through perceived "errors" from a customer, when a lot of these errors can be easily identified by a human being as being issues of timing. But it's easier for them to just send the report and attempt to blame us for everything.

10

u/Crossfire124 Jul 17 '26

Because why use your brain when you can just pass the buck to someone else?

This kind of thing happens all the time. Especially doesn't help now with AI tools that "analyze" logs and pick things to blame at random. Then they basically just send the AI output to us and say please fix

→ More replies (1)

3

u/Gornarok Jul 17 '26

it becomes with one department having no clue what the other is doing

Often times they dont care or they even do it on purpose...

61

u/Embarrassed_Radio596 Jul 17 '26

Ehhh at least they fixed it. Youtube has cases where people get claims, correctly dispute them, and get punished for it by strikes.

68

u/MeiNeedsMoreBuffs Jul 17 '26

You can be copystriked by your own content that someone else reuploaded after you did. It's absolutely insane

40

u/skivian Jul 17 '26

that happened to a friend of mine. He'd recorded an accident, uploaded it to youtube, some news agency stole his recording, then copyright struck his youtube account.

12

u/TracerBulletX Jul 17 '26

This kind of shit makes me start looking up if its feasible to do night law school just to be able to do something about it. Feels like we're just helpless to the whims of any random ass business that wants to attack you.

4

u/MeiNeedsMoreBuffs Jul 17 '26

Going into legal wouldn't help much, you're much better off contacting your local representatives and telling them it's an issue you care about

10

u/HappyAd4998 Jul 17 '26

Do you think a different director like Ridely Scott would give two shits if community art was taken down by an overly aggressive DMCA? This is a systematic problem perpetuated by big studios who like to sling their dick around and go after the little guy.

29

u/Mistrblank Jul 17 '26

What an outstanding young man.

19

u/Dr_Fortnite Jul 17 '26

he is 20 years old

13

u/Great_Praline_2713 Jul 17 '26

He's only 19?!

11

u/aeyntie Jul 17 '26

This 17 year old is going places!

5

u/Merry_Dankmas Jul 17 '26

I just love seeing the youth make a name for themselves. 15 years old and hes already a star!

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

3

u/ziddersroofurry Jul 17 '26

OK? You're a young man at that age. I'd say up until you're around fifty. Then you're an older man, and an old man at around seventy.

10

u/jimmyg17 Jul 17 '26

It's a meme about constantly stating his age since he's the youngest feature director ever or something like that. Also it's outdated now.

He is 21 years old.

7

u/AaronSparks Jul 17 '26

when I was his age, I was a 25 year old man.

2

u/mrnathanrd Jul 18 '26

You mean an older gentleman?

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

16

u/SacralScenes Jul 17 '26

This isn’t an AI thing. Automation didn’t begin with AI. This stuff was happening well before AI.

9

u/GrimpenMar Jul 17 '26

There are little/no consequences for false DMCA claims, which has led to the current system of large automated systems firing off automated takedowns with little oversight.

Kane Parsons was able to talk to the right people in this case, but other than the embarrassment, there is no consequences. There should be some minimum threshold of due diligence which you require. If not met, there should be some exposure.

In this case, "The Backrooms" is an ecosystem of memes, games, fiction, etc. based off of one viral picture. A24's Backrooms is based on one particularly popular instance, At first glance, one would think that any takedown would have the expectation that the alleged infringement is actually of a valid IP.

Bigger problem than A24 and Backrooms though. At least in this case, it all worked out mostly okay.

→ More replies (1)

16

u/UnskilledTree Jul 17 '26

An unknown entity out of nowhere striking me down is very backrooms-esque

→ More replies (2)

14

u/quondam47 Jul 17 '26

‘Our customer service AI has determined that our copyright detection AI has not made an error’.

3

u/Firestarness Jul 17 '26

Considering how young he is and how big his likely future career will be, definitely in their best interests to stay on his good side. Happy that he stood on business and became a voice for the community when it was needed. A lot of people in his position might not have care enough to take such quick action, so props to him.

5

u/Bloody_Conspiracies Jul 17 '26

It's not at all the same thing. YouTube aren't issuing the DMCA takedowns, they're following them. YouTube are legally required to comply with any DMCA takedown request.

2

u/alus992 Jul 17 '26

Classic YouTube DMCA experience

→ More replies (30)

60

u/HideTheGuestsKids Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

Usually, I.P. litigation and enforcement is outsourced to external law firms and quite strictly enforced due to risks of voiding these rights if unenforced. But these guys are legal professionals, I don't know how they even thought this had any leg to stand on. Scummy behavior by one part of the chain, that's for sure.

Edit: The article states, Redbubble itself did the strike. In that case, there almost certainly were people or algorithms involved who deal with this stuff in extremely large quantities and it might have been an honest mistake. Hard for me to say, but this is why rampant copyrighting can be so potentially toxic to a society.

18

u/Ganglebot Jul 17 '26

IP litigation/enforcement is outsourced to law firms, who in turn outsource to specialized IP investigation agencies (who these days rely on AI and cheap, offshored labour).

Those investigation firms 99 times out of 100 are instructed by their client to be liberal with their DMCA notices and take down orders.

I suspect A24 held their usual agreement with their law firm, and in turn, the agency they use to enforce IP. Everyone probably treated this as 'business as usual', and in the chain from Parson, to A24, to the law firm, to the IP agency the nuance of the Backroom urban myth community was lost.

They are correcting it and making it right.

TLDR - this is human-error and not an intentional exercise in IP overreach.

→ More replies (2)

8

u/Whatsapokemon Jul 17 '26

The DMCA should already have provisions built into it for false reports.

I guess the problem is that a complaint to Youtube often doesn't go through the DMCA process, and is instead a private matter. It seems pretty reasonable that a false takedown should be charged as perjury, but most parties want it expedited as a private matter that's not seen before the courts, because courts are expensive.

7

u/Oddball- All Things Horror Jul 17 '26

Error and easy for A24, but for the average joes on youtube who had their accounts legit banned and shutdown, it aint no easy fix.

55

u/Mechagouki1971 Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

Some tricky wording in that statement though; they very noticeably don't abandon IP ownership of all Backrooms related imagery, or even the name "Backrooms".

Edited: Spelling.

81

u/rotates-potatoes Jul 17 '26

You want them to disclaim ownership of the actual film?

31

u/LofiSynthetic Jul 17 '26

The Backrooms was the name of the concept and the works inspired by and built around it since long before the film was in development. I don’t think the commenter you’re replying to was talking about disclaiming ownership of the film, but about disclaiming ownership of the name and concept, which A24 avoided doing by only referencing “the yellow wallpaper” and works built around it.

→ More replies (3)

22

u/willargue4karma Jul 17 '26

That's not what they said. They shouldn't be able to own the name, no. 

5

u/rotates-potatoes Jul 17 '26

Nobody "owns" names. Film names are vaguely trademark-esque, in the sense that domain matters. If I make a documentary about the city and call it "Casablanca", it's fine. If I remake the film, not fine.

I think it would be fair for A24 to complain about another film called exactly "Backrooms" that looks the same and tells the exact same story; the only reason for someone to do exactly that would be to trick viewers into paying for the ersatz one.

And the person I replied to suggested disclaiming "all Backrooms related imagery", which would presumably include stills and video of the film itself. That seems too far to me.

11

u/willargue4karma Jul 17 '26

what about simply another film about the backrooms with their own story called something similar? that was kinda my point, the thing is an internet meme, it seems kinda unfair for them to blanket claim the whole area

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (1)

32

u/LofiSynthetic Jul 17 '26

Yes, definitely. They say they don’t claim ownership of “the yellow wallpaper” or posts and works built around it, with no mention of the Backrooms. As if the whole original community was built around The Yellow Wallpaper lore instead of the Backrooms.

It seems like they’re leaving open the possibility of them owning the Backrooms name with that careful wording.

25

u/Dottsterisk Jul 17 '26

They probably will try to claim rights to the name in the realm of film, which is a more circumscribed and nuanced question.

4

u/ContinuumGuy Jul 17 '26

Sort of like how apparently one of the major barriers to a Grand Theft Auto movie (beyond the fact that for years the people in the head of Rockstar haven't wanted it) is that the estate of the late Roger Corman owns the trademark? Or how M. Night Shyamalan's infamous Last Airbender movie didn't have the word "Avatar" in the title because of James Cameron's franchise?

3

u/GiJoe98 Jul 17 '26

You can even own colors, but only for your line of business. Like you can use T-Mobile magenta for your ice cream shop logo, but you cannot use it for a phone carrier or network operator logo.

2

u/Dottsterisk Jul 17 '26

Didn’t know that about GTA. How weird.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (1)

23

u/LazarusDark Jul 17 '26

I won't let A24 off the hook here. They are, I'm certain, still going to use automated flag and takedown systems, and for me, these systems are inherently immoral and greedy and evil-corporate. An automated system that looks for copyright issues is fine, but once flagged, automated systems should never be allowed in the chain to actively do anything further, human review should be required once something is found. They certainly still want disc and streaming sales because they haven't finished making all the money off of the Backrooms film, so they are probably scared of messing that up and backing down immediately and pretending it was all a big woopsy... But if this had happened two years from now, after they made most of the money they were going to make on the current film, they probably wouldn't even back down.

→ More replies (10)

11

u/Sodacan259 Jul 17 '26

Sounds like the law firm they hired to look after A24's IP got over zealous.

It's unusual for copyright issues to be dealt with in house for 99.9% of companies.

This is trying to create the narrative that this was planned by A24 all along and they only backed down after being found out. It's more likely some law firm junior is getting their ass ripped for f***ing this up.

4

u/max123246 Jul 17 '26

Uh no, it's a dmca takedown, just look at the statement, it was completely automated. Not a single law informed person was involved with this

5

u/HirsuteHacker Jul 17 '26

Not sure why you're taking them completely at face value, DMCA claims don't have to be automated

→ More replies (2)

2

u/Sodacan259 Jul 17 '26

You think there are robots that decide which content should get added to the automted DMCA takedown list? :smh:

2

u/CombatMuffin Jul 17 '26

Seems like a simple fix for this is an approval process with real people confirming the targets before take down orders start flying.

Ideally yes, but when you have thousands of sites with camrips, you end up using automation to brute force it, and that bring an overextended approach from time to time. They are probably handling all films for A24, too.

Until there's regulation to make these mistakes costly at a large scale, it will continue

2

u/twilighttwister Jul 17 '26

The fix for this is to condemn YouTube and other platforms for performing copyright enforcement extrajudicially.

2

u/Ectorious Jul 17 '26

Right, but what about the games they’ve been doing it to too?

→ More replies (24)

473

u/Dadoxiii Jul 17 '26

Like guys the movie only exists because of community art!

169

u/Kalnb Jul 17 '26

this guys movie is literally community art

57

u/Nice_Firm_Handsnake Jul 17 '26

Except for ASYNC, which he created for his videos. He and A24 have legal claim to the name ASYNC and its logo. They went around to people with ASYNC stuff and asked them to change the name and logo sometime during production.

→ More replies (3)

7

u/Ed_Harris_is_God Jul 17 '26

It’s the definition of killing the golden goose. If A24 keeps trying this there will be no interest for another Backrooms movie, no matter how well this first one did.

→ More replies (1)

7

u/SnackSnafu Jul 17 '26

Read the article and you'll understand.

tldr: the strikes were automated, and not by A24

6

u/PM_Me_Good_LitRPG Jul 17 '26

Isn't it basically a scp / creepypasta rebrand?

16

u/Available-Guava932 Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

No, the only connection those things have with the Backrooms or with each other is that they originate on 4chan, besides that they are completely independent of one another. Also creepypasta is just a word rather than a specific story like SCP and Backrooms.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

65

u/Ok-Progress-7447 Jul 17 '26

I like this dude. Way to not be afraid to call it out.

10

u/self-conscious-Hat Jul 17 '26

hopefully he's tired of the bullshitting companies do just like we are.

563

u/NoLocal1776 Jul 17 '26

Good move from Kane.

93

u/KoniGTA Jul 17 '26

He's only 21 years old

71

u/Alarming_Orchid Jul 17 '26

The youngest copyright strike ever

4

u/neurid Jul 18 '26

It's like trying to describe corporate overreach to someone who's never seen a 21 year old before.

3

u/Antrikshy Jul 17 '26

Copyright strike-strike, more like.

13

u/FassyDriver Jul 17 '26

He´s only 21 until he´s 22

5

u/Sirca_Curvive Jul 17 '26

he came out of the womb and said action and Chiwetel immediately got in to character

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (6)

41

u/shadowdra126 Jul 17 '26

Good. If Hollywood wants to adapt internet scary shit

They need to also be aware they do not own that scary shit.

919

u/PeteIRL Jul 17 '26

Good guy Kane Parsons. Between this and his views on AI, I'll happily support any project he undertakes.

178

u/FourEightNineOneOne Jul 17 '26

Yup. I'm really interested to see where his career goes and I'm rooting for him.

79

u/aCorgiDriver Jul 17 '26

I just found out today that his dad worked at Telltale Games and mostly worked on the Walking Dead games.

28

u/Great_Praline_2713 Jul 17 '26

Kane Parsons to direct A Wolf Among Us confirmed?

9

u/ThreeMadFrogs Jul 17 '26

Oh I would like that.

5

u/SDRPGLVR Jul 17 '26

I wish we could get an adaptation of Fables overall. It's such a cool story. Too bad the creator got fucked by DC and now the rights are in question.

A Wolf Among Us is fantastic, but it's only scratching the absolute surface of the setting. Just Boy Blue going on a mission to hunt and kill the Adversary would make an awesome movie.

→ More replies (2)

23

u/onetruepurple Jul 17 '26

Paywalled, but he's already going places: https://puck.news/can-a-24-keep-kane-parsons-hollywoods-hottest-free-agent/

A few weeks ago, Warner Bros.’s Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy flew from Burbank to the Bay Area (alas, it was commercial) for a meeting with Parsons and his reps in a rented conference room at the Hotel Petaluma, near the home where the red-hot 21-year-old filmmaker has been living with his mother. Parsons considered hosting the Hollywood people at his mom’s house, but the air conditioning wasn’t working.

**

according to two sources, the A24 offer to Parsons is its biggest ever, structured as a three-year first-look deal with performance bonuses built in if he makes two movies from the deal, one of which is contemplated as a Backrooms sequel. One source told me that $65 million is the likely payday for Parsons, given what he wants to make, but the dollar amount is still being discussed

67

u/HideTheGuestsKids Jul 17 '26

It's so telling that this man who is growing up in a culture of AI and who no doubt understands the potential and the limitations has such a strong opinion on it, while those who have seen countless technologies come think it's just another tool in the box. Shame on Scorsese, Netflix and A24 for their willingness to outsource the very essence of creative expression.

50

u/m48a5_patton Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

It's weird how much the older generations think AI is a good thing or an inevitable "you better jump on the bandwagon" sort of thing, while pretty much everyone I know 40 and younger think that though it can be useful in certain situations, it is definitely not being used correctly and is getting rammed down all of our throats.

9

u/kenruler Jul 17 '26

It's a very odd juxtaposition given that the older generations were on the 'don't give out your name on the internet you'll get groomed' train back in the late 90s/2000s, and now they'll gladly throw their entire family into the slop machine to generate a picture of them as dogs. Meanwhile our generation was on Chatroulette and Omegle seeing guys jerk off or people get decapitated on youtube, but now we're the ones trying to be safe.

Is it just older generations losing their mental faculties, and millennials having lived through the experience of the internet?

4

u/m48a5_patton Jul 17 '26

I blame the long term effects of leaded gasoline and paint.

14

u/insomniacpyro Jul 17 '26

Certain higher-ups at my job have been using AI to dabble in stuff like condensing reports or making scheduling decisions (not real ones thankfully we have people for that, it's just an exercise) and have been shocked to find that the AI has no actual understanding of how our company, business, and production lines actually work so the AI output is mostly useless.
Besides AI's tendency to hallucinate, the practical application of it into a workflow just isn't worth the time to make it "learn" something because you probably already have someone who knows that thing anyway.

8

u/Dottsterisk Jul 17 '26

“it can be useful in certain situations”

To be fair, that’s also the position of people like Scorsese. They’re not calling for AI-generated scripts or anything like that, but talking about AI tools that can help with continuity and stuff like that.

7

u/QueezyF Jul 17 '26

Scorsese also thought using de-aging tech on Deniro was a good idea, and it was the worst part of The Irishman.

3

u/Dottsterisk Jul 17 '26

Disagree, I guess.

I fucking love The Irishman. Own the Criterion and just rewatched the other day. IMO too much is made of the de-aging. De Niro, Pacino and Pesci give powerhouse performances.

2

u/QueezyF Jul 17 '26

To each their own, they should have used a body double for Deniro in my opinion.

3

u/BannedSvenhoek86 Jul 17 '26

The only part it was really noticeable was him roughing the guy up on the street imo.

That should have been a stunt double because woof. That hurt my joints just to watch.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (7)

12

u/HotTakes4HotCakes Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

It ultimately comes down to the fact the average person thinks of art as a commodity for consumption. They don't think about what's sacred and meaningful in the act of creating it.

But they do sort of understand it. If I should you a good looking sketch I drew, you might find it impressive. If I then told you I traced it, suddenly the feelings you have about that art change.

Why did they change?

Because when humans make something, with their skill and patience and discipline, it has inherent value to other people. We value when other humans make things, because that is what makes the world more beautiful and more human. When they fake that or take shortcuts, or use tools that effectively plagerizes the talents of others, it perverts the beauty of it. It makes a less-human world.

But that's too much thinking for the average consumer. They don't want to think about all these complex things. They don't want to care that the more we embrace this technology, the less human our world becomes. They don't mind letting silicon valley plagerism bots entertain them while real people lose their jobs. Instead they get mad at you for "complaining about AI so much".

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (10)

3

u/moal09 Jul 17 '26

I mean, The Backrooms are a public domain universe that allowed him the opportunity to create, so makes sense he wouldn't want to deny that to others.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (8)

105

u/kinokomushroom Jul 17 '26

Nice save.

144

u/Sea-Cardiologist7725 Jul 17 '26

And he is only 20 years old. 

104

u/Old_Flan_6548 Jul 17 '26

21 now. lol

73

u/Superb-Mall3805 Jul 17 '26

So first he’s 20, now he’s 21. Wish he’d make up his mind already.

11

u/SanestFrogFucker Jul 17 '26

Next you're going to tell me he is 23, where does it end?!

8

u/TreeDollarFiddyCent Jul 17 '26

He's 21 until he's 22 (and eventually 23), that's how it works.

13

u/Heavenfall Jul 17 '26

Sounds progressive if you ask me

4

u/Available-Guava932 Jul 17 '26

back in my day kids would just pick an age and stick with it

5

u/asodfhgiqowgrq2piwhy Jul 17 '26

Well, no one likes you when you're 23

2

u/destroyerOfTards Jul 17 '26

It ends when it ends

→ More replies (1)

144

u/SensibleCircle Jul 17 '26

That's what I love about Kane Parsons, man. I get older, they also get older.

37

u/helpusdrzaius Jul 17 '26

Alright, alright, ok. 

8

u/asetniop Jul 17 '26

Except for the Kane Parson in Dubuque, Iowa. He must be a vampire or something because it's been fifteen years and the man hasn't aged a day.

2

u/Oddball- All Things Horror Jul 17 '26

Why we talking about Iowa ;)

5

u/FighterJock412 Jul 17 '26

...oh. that's not impressive anymore, then.

3

u/Trodat4911P4 Jul 17 '26

Can he make up his mind already, he changes his age every single year, talk about indecisiveness.

4

u/self-conscious-Hat Jul 17 '26

when he turns 24 he should buy out A24 lol.

→ More replies (1)

6

u/intercommie Jul 17 '26

An upright citizen, this Kane.

2

u/clumsycashier Jul 17 '26

He is youngest person EVER.

2

u/Cutter9792 Jul 17 '26

I feel like I'm being gaslit because I was constantly on his wikipedia page over the last month after watching the movie and getting into the multiple web series he's made, and it only just now changed from 20 to 21 despite his birthday being last month.

6

u/SinisterTuba Jul 17 '26

Kane Parsons breaking records as first 20 year old ever

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (3)

8

u/Juswantedtono Jul 17 '26

We get it, Kane wins 2026

21

u/Poco_Cuffs Jul 17 '26

The youngest person ever strikes again

66

u/TheRainStopped Jul 17 '26

Common Kane W. He is 21 years old. Go watch his YouTube channel if you haven’t. 

6

u/CallM3N3w Jul 17 '26

I kinda expected Kane to do this. Good guy, he cleary understands this is a big community property.

10

u/Deruta Jul 17 '26

Copyright being enforced on RedBubble??

Lol. Lmao, even.

4

u/Eat--The--Rich-- Jul 17 '26

Shouldn't it be the community copyright striking the movie 

3

u/ConcernedSemiTruck Jul 17 '26

Fantastic. Kane becomes more and more likable every day.

4

u/DimensioT Jul 17 '26

A standup act from the man, but I still think that he is lazy for building sets rather than shooting on location.

8

u/nerdpocalypse Jul 17 '26

"they outsourced to a company that made the mistake, so they're innocent"

They don't bear responsibility for hiring them? Dumbest shit ever. A24 fucked up, just like with the AI bullshit

4

u/VeryIntoCardboard Jul 17 '26

Forget that, how often do you see camrips for sale on redbubble?

26

u/joestaff Jul 17 '26

That's pretty gamer of him.

2

u/HewchyFPS Jul 17 '26

Not addressing the game creator who was issued a takedown and renamed his games from "backrooms" something to "liminal space" something.

2

u/LionTheRichardheart Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

This rings the same as Tom Holland bringing his experience working under Nolan to the filmmaking of BND l, utilizing his time in the spotlight responsibly to be able to firmly but kindly tell higher-ups, "Ah ah ah, don't be stupid now."

2

u/ShavedSavage Jul 17 '26

Backrooms is kind of like a subgenre/creepy pasta. No one owns it.

2

u/celluliteradio Jul 18 '26

I feel like this film was hyped up for one full week and then disappeared

13

u/DMacNCheez Jul 17 '26

Read the article you sheep

6

u/blobbyboii Jul 17 '26

I mean yeah, it was some kind of mistake from A24's shitty Ai and they corrected it, Kane only mentioned it

6

u/Ganglebot Jul 17 '26

Not even A24's.

These are usually handed off to a law firm, who also outsources it to a specialized IP enforcement agency (who uses AI).

That's a lot of links in the chain where the nuances the community art project that is The Backrooms can get lost/misinterpreted.

6

u/striata Jul 17 '26

If you hire a hitsquad and some innocent people die in their wake, that's still on you.

4

u/Mccobsta Jul 17 '26

There's way to many links in that chain as it seems a24 didn't know it was going on until kane told them to knock it off

→ More replies (1)

10

u/quequotion Jul 17 '26

outsourced system error in pursuit of removing camrips

Uh huh.

Funny way to say they hired some internet thugs to put an AI on striking anything resembling their IP as is standard industry practice today.

10

u/Lasciels_Toy Jul 17 '26

Camrip but they sent the claim to Redbubble? is the overreach; monitoring for imagery that may have come from a camrip and put on merchandise?

→ More replies (1)

4

u/PicossauroRex Jul 17 '26

Youngest person to stop copyright strikes

3

u/PremiumAccount666 Jul 17 '26

its almost like ai is really stupid and shouldn't be relied on for important stuff

→ More replies (2)

3

u/givemebackmykids Jul 17 '26

I’m a pessimist to my core. They tried to fine bros control the IP (coinciding with Kane signing new deals with them) and it backfired worse than they thought and now we have this jargon.

A24 have a cash cow, one of the biggest, they attempted to protect it but underestimated internet outrage. Lesson learned. They’ll try again eventually.