ZUN Puts White Canvas' Right to Sell Touhou merchandise on Hold

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N-Forza:
He said they never gave him any trouble in the past, so it's rather unfortunate that it has come to this.

Vyrien:

--- Quote from: N-Forza on December 21, 2011, 07:21:15 AM ---He said they never gave him any trouble in the past, so it's rather unfortunate that it has come to this.

--- End quote ---

It's a shame that he he gave them a chance at redeeming themselves and they blew it by being twats.

Lepetit89:
WhiteCanvas's representative is a good friend of mine, talked with him yesterday and he definitely regrets the situation as much as ZUN. Only hope their sales won't take any hit because of this.

Edit: Comment has been published on WhiteCanvas's website http://w-canvas.com/html/WhiteCanvasComment20111221.pdf.

English comment to follow next week、definitely glad to see they're not just accepting the accusations, though, this situation is alarmingly irritating.

Sabino:
It's been a while since I was last around here, but I wanted to know what people here thought about the legal case going on about the White Canvas versus Tasofro (SUNFISH).

So, here's a recap on what statement has been going on so far, it's a bit long and wordy, but here's what both sides wrote.

On Dec. 20th, ZUN stated on his blog the following.(paraphrased due to translation)

--- Quote from: ZUN ---
It's the end of the year. There has been no year as busy as this, both in public and private cases (Please let there be no more events this year, especially disasters....)
As always, I'll be skipping the winter comick market. I'll be going back to my home.

Also I have two notices. They're both of business matter, so people concerned about such matters, please read over it.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
○About the temporal hold put on White Canvas's sales on products by team Shanghai Alice

The commission of Touhou Shinreibyou (13) was announced at Comicke market 80, and began in September, but we decided to get White Canvas to temporary stop handling it.

With regards to commission and sales -since I can't deal with them all by myself- I'm getting assistance from Tasogare Frontier (Tasofro) to deal with the dojin stores about the matter. I received word from Tasofrom that White Canvas hadn't yet payed for their sales.
Also on the guidelines, when companies make and sell foods using the characters from Touhou Peoject I ask of them to get my consent, but I have confirmed that White Canvas had been creating goods that I haven't given permission to.

I fear it may be troublesome for Tasofro to begin the sales of the new game without the previous balance being payed, and since it seemed like they -White Canvas- were doing something rather illogical when everybody else was respecting the rules, we have come to the decision for White Canvas to stop sales of products from team Shanghai Alice.
Since they were a shop that have been favoring us for a very long time, I am truly regretful of this case.

○About the copyright and re-use of fan work

Touhou Project asks of fanwork (doujin) to be done along the guidelines set, but I have received word that those fanworks used were re-used and/or altered without the consent of the creator.

Gathering the important points;
"Rights of Touhou Project go to team Shanghai Alice"
"Rights for fanwork (with regards to production, distribution, and dealing with the product in general)　fo to the creator of it"

Thus when one wishes to re-use or alter the fanwork one should ask for the permission of the creator of the fan work.
Also, everything made from those fanworks should follow the guidelines set for Touhou Project.
(If in case the creator of the fanwork is unknown (as in case of AAs) and you wish to re-use or add alterations, please be sure to use it so that the viewers will not feel discomfort)

I hope you all a good year.

--- End quote ---

On Dec. 21st White Canvas responded to this with the following statement (Also paraphrased due to translation)

--- Quote from: White Canvas ---There has been a comment posted with regards to this matter on the official Blog of Team Shanghai Alice.

It is against our intentions to be presenting our company's answer towards this comment in this sort of manner, but for the circles, clients, and companies concerned about this matter, we would like to confirm on what has been happening.

1 "About the temporal hold put on White Canvas due to unpaid balance to Tasogare frontier"

It has on the Blog mentioned above, "I received word from Tasofrom that White Canvas hadn't yet payed for their sales.~I fear it may be troublesome for Tasofro to begin the sales of the new game without the previous balance being payed".

Currently, our company is settling this this matter in court with the operating company of Tasogare Frontier, SUNFISH Co. Ltd. (The representative being Tomohiko Nakajima, who is also in charge of Kourindou Co. Ltd.)

Since we are still in argument of the legal case, we would hold back on our comments, but our company is currently arguing at court after finishing the "unfinished payments" mentioned in the above Blog.

We find it inappropriate, and truly unsatisfactory that the above Blog commented on the matter as if our company had not finished our payments for no specific reason.

We also find it truly dishonorable that ZUN (Oota Junya), a third person to this case between our company and SUNFISH Co. Ltd. commented on this matter on his own official Blog, with a critical statement towards our company.

We are suffering inconveniences because ZUN had spread this false information on the internet towards the many miscellaneous viewers, and commented as if we hadn't payed off for all of Team Shanghai Alice's works.

As a company, we would like to declare a strong opposition to these points.

2 About "using White Canvas creating goods without consent as a reason to hold sales"

In 2007 June 23rd, our company had signed a "licensing contract" with ZUN, and due to this contract, we hold the rights to make and sell goods with Characters created by ZUN.

This contract was signed by a request by ZUN to replace the 2004 August 13th "Exclusive sales contract" (A contract allowing our company exclusively to sell products by ZUN in and out of Japan)

After that, our company had created products such as character goods that follows the "licensing contract", and had payed the royalty of those products to ZUN.

In the October of 2010, we received word that the copyright management of team Shanghai Alice had moved to Oyamada Fumio (Current manager of Kourindou Co. Ltd.). Oyamada Fumio had told us that "The copy rights to the works of team Shanghai Alice had moved to Kourindou Co. Ltd. and we would like to sign a new contract.".

The new licensing contract presented by Kourindou Co. Ltd. was something very apart from the original livencing contract that we had signed with ZUN, and not something that our company could allow. Also, at although we were told that "The management of the copyrights of Team Shanghai Alice owned by ZUN had been moved to Kouridou Co. Ltd." our company was not presented with any contracts documents that could become proof of the matter.

For our company, if the new contract does not prove fit, we can follow the previous contract (the "licensing contract" in 2007 June 23rd) to continue with our production of goods for it is still withing the validation period.
The precise details of the management of the copyright that ZUN held is not something that would effect the validity of this contract.

We feel that Kourindou Co. Ltd. does not understand these details.

Furthermore, about the licensing contract mentioned above, ZUN and Kourindou Co. Ltd. seem to have a different view that our company hold, and we are currently under argument about this matter through our lawyers.

--- End quote ---

From my understanding, White Canvas seems to be telling ZUN to back off from the arguments that they have with Tasofro, and that the blame they're being subjected is unjust because they weren't sure that the ownership of the rights had moved to ZUN's company.
Although some of the stuff being said does sound just, some details I can't really believe (like ZUN allowing for a monopoly of his games to a company other than his own)

GuardianTempest:
Corporate Evil, always twisting the words...

What ZUN says, goes. He has the power to influence the entire community to fight, buy his games, and provide him beer. In fact, if worse comes to worse, he might just make TH14 about the antagonist being a Gijinka'd White Canvas.

Epic Fail: Thought you guys would go single-minded. Nice job beating my meager expectations. Being around immature classmates forces me to adopt to their bandwagons.

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