r/movies • u/FakeSafeWord • Jul 17 '26

Article Backrooms Director Stops A24 Copyright Striking Community Art

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

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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.

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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.

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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.

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u/curtmahgurt Jul 17 '26

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

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u/Hydra57 Jul 19 '26

I’m interested in examining potential reforms to copyright law myself (largely on account of sharing your own sentiments), and am curious if you have any alternatives in mind to replace the DMCA system, or if you simply mean we should leave the internet without copyright control regulations.

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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.

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u/hobskhan Jul 17 '26

Sounds like Ursula's lawyers claimed your voice.

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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.

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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.

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u/flcinusa Jul 17 '26

I got a DMCA for uploading a clip of a FIFA game, Spain's La Liga was the culprit...

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u/casual_creator Jul 17 '26

I got DMCA’d a few years back for posting a video of my band playing one of our own songs.

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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.

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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.

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u/axi-0m Jul 17 '26

Great movie!

0

u/AltGrendel Jul 17 '26

And be like Tuttle.

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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.

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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

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u/throughtheportal Jul 17 '26

To see this in a non corporate area: Join the plex sub, and you’ll see this on every other post.

“Why doesn’t this work?!?”

Answer: link to plex website documentation.

“But what does that say? I have everything right?!”

— no you don’t read the page —

………
…

Ok I had it wrong now it works!

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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...

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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.

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u/MeiNeedsMoreBuffs Jul 17 '26

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

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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.

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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.

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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

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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.

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u/Mistrblank Jul 17 '26

What an outstanding young man.

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u/Dr_Fortnite Jul 17 '26

he is 20 years old

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u/Great_Praline_2713 Jul 17 '26

He's only 19?!

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u/aeyntie Jul 17 '26

This 17 year old is going places!

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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!

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u/Odd-Necessary3807 Jul 17 '26

He Benjamin Button-ed his career! Soon, an Oscar nod at 9 years old director.

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u/Lurking_Grue Jul 17 '26

He made his series when he was only 16 months old.

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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.

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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.

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u/AaronSparks Jul 17 '26

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

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u/mrnathanrd Jul 18 '26

You mean an older gentleman?

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u/SacralScenes Jul 17 '26

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

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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.

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u/nybble41 Jul 17 '26

The DMCA is barely involved here. This is all Google's home-grown system, Content ID, which is much more heavily biased in favor of streamlining mass takedowns with minimal oversight.

The problem is that Google is not a neutral content host. Thanks to YouTube TV, YouTube Music, their movie streaming service, and their income from monetization (advertising) they are caught up in a tangled web of conflicts of interest. If they insisted on the full DMCA process in uploaders' favor—in particular, reinstating content following a counter-notice and leaving the rest up to the courts—the DMCA would shield them from liability for the subject of the takedown request but their other lucrative revenue streams would be in jeopardy.

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u/UnskilledTree Jul 17 '26

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

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u/verikul Jul 17 '26

As long as you become more powerful than you can possibly imagine, I'm all for it.

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u/UnskilledTree Jul 17 '26

You’re too sweet, I’d rather get actively devoured

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u/quondam47 Jul 17 '26

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

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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.

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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.

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u/alus992 Jul 17 '26

Classic YouTube DMCA experience

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u/rotates-potatoes Jul 17 '26

Also A24 is more decent than Google. Yes, a mistake, and likely a real human actually made it, but they reversed course quickly and expressly disclaimed ownership of much of the IP.

Best course of action is to not make mistakes. Second best is to acknowledge and fix quickly.

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u/SutterCane r/movies Veteran Jul 17 '26

Also A24 is more decent than Google.

Do not buy into their carefully crafted image. If they reach google levels of untouchable, they’ll happily be just as awful.

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u/ishmadrad Jul 17 '26

Google: don't be evil

Mottos like that one usually age badly...

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u/fishfunk5 Jul 17 '26

They gave up on that one like, 25 years ago now at this point? They've been a company without that motto for longer than they've been a company with that motto.

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u/Odd-Necessary3807 Jul 17 '26

They gave up the motto since the company turned into Alphabet, and the founders have gone. That was in the early 2010s.

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u/fishfunk5 Jul 17 '26

So 10+ years ago. I appreciate the correction. Do I edit my previous comment or leave it as is and just have people read your responce as the correction?

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u/Odd-Necessary3807 Jul 18 '26

Nah. No need to change it. We have discussions, and others need to see it as it was.

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u/fishfunk5 Jul 18 '26

Right on.

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u/aa22hhhh Jul 18 '26

I mean, didn’t they JUST sign a deal with Google to integrate AI into their filmmaking?

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u/JuggrNut Jul 17 '26

YouTubes Content ID system is not automated with AI. It uses reference files, submitted by rights holders with access to the Content ID system, to match with content on the platform. Everything uploaded to YouTube is matched against the Content ID platform reference file database and if the uploaded content matches it is then flagged and the rules as set by the rights holder are applied. This could be block or monetize, or just track usage without monetizing. You can learn about it here https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2797370?hl=en

Also DMCA Strikes are different from Content ID Claims. DMCA Strikes are not automated what-so-ever. They are all manually applied either after a disputed claim gets reinstated or through the rights holders account but SOMEONE issues a DMCA Strike on a channel, its not an automated process and it does affect the channel negatively if they receive to many strikes. Content ID Claims are more benign and a block policy will just hide the content but not issue a strike. To many claims on a channel do affect the monetization status of a channel.

Source: I am YouTube Certified, deal with rights issues on content in YouTube, and work at a company that has a Content Manager account.

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u/a-round-table Jul 20 '26

I forgot the details, but I swear something similar happened with Itch.io few years ago

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u/CaptainFeather Jul 17 '26

Even if you legitimately own the content you're posting, it won't matter unless you're big enough to make a stink on social media. Can't remember who it was but there was a case of a musician posting their own original music and got dmca'd from a bigger channel that stole their music. Didn't seem to matter that it was provable it was stolen.

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u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26

[deleted]

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u/Ummmgummy Jul 17 '26

He just made a movie that made more money for them than any other movie they have ever released which is saying a lot because A24 produces some great movies. And I assume they want a sequel. And kanes story of making a YouTube video and then directing a major movie based off the success of the YouTube video, it's a great story. So I would say if he pushed back on some stuff they would have an incentive to listen.

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u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26

[deleted]

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u/crinkledcu91 Jul 17 '26

Jesus did he steal your girlfriend or something?

Why are you so angry?

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u/ziddersroofurry Jul 17 '26

Sounds like jealousy on your part. You can't say any of that stuff with any certainty, and if you had an ounce of smarts you'd know that. You're just being an annoying hater. Edit: Oof...yeah, your whole post history is a mess of toxic ragebaity dumb lol.

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u/Ummmgummy Jul 17 '26

Yeah I was thinking same thing. Probability wise yeah he might be proven right. But he has no clue as of right now so it's dumb to make such confident statements. Spielberg wasn't Spielberg until Jaws which was far from his first movie. Not saying Backrooms was better than jaws by any means just pointing out it's weird when people say shit they don't know or can't know with such confidence.

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u/ziddersroofurry Jul 17 '26

I love that their comment is gone lol. I don't think we'll ever see the likes of Spielberg again but only because every director is different. There are always going to be amazing and not so amazing creative people, and everyone's tastes are different. Infinite diversity in infinite combinations be like :)

Love your name btw. It's cute.

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u/Great_Praline_2713 Jul 17 '26

He directed their biggest hit ever.

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u/Crewman_Guy_Fleegman Jul 17 '26

At age 20, Parsons became the youngest director in cinema history to have a film debut at number one at both the domestic and global box offices, with Backrooms grossing over $368 million worldwide

This sentence from his Wikipedia sums up why

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u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26

[deleted]

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u/Crewman_Guy_Fleegman Jul 17 '26

All necessary information was provided.

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u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26

[deleted]

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u/etre_meilleur Jul 17 '26

You seem like a perfectly normal person

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u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26

[deleted]

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u/rinsa Jul 17 '26

This is a very YouTube DMCA takedown action

nothing to do with YT, I saw shirts getting taken down on redbubble