Hi Loden,
Thanks for your thoughtful and passionate feedback both here and elsewhere.
We need to step up our efforts here and will be adjusting how we handle issues around content theft and overall intellectual property (IP) infringements. It’s in motion so I don’t have all the answers, but I’m happy to address your concerns where I can as the Fab lead on these issues.
Stolen Content
Our top priority is addressing issues where someone is distributing work stolen from other creators. In the past, we’ve followed the DMCA reporting process, but we recognize that it isn’t enough by itself. We still recommend following the process for rights holders, especially if a dispute is inconclusive or sits squarely in a gray area.
However, we’re sensitive to the fact that not everyone has the resources to pursue legal action against someone who is not the copyright holder. If we become aware of a potential theft, we’ll investigate it, and take action on accounts found to be in violation of our rules. Our team will be actively monitoring reports of this type of theft in both forums and through direct support requests.
Content infringing on IP
The influx of content (migrated and new) is challenging , and we’re currently building better processes to catch issues during submission as well as address what may have already made it to Fab. We’re making sure to better communicate our processes and guidelines with sellers, and are going to be expanding the public-facing resources to better educate people on IP issues. We want to make Fab sellers more aware of their limitations in this area.
We will hold our community to all our guidelines, including the Infringing Content section, found in our Content Guidelines:
The content you create, publish, or use cannot infringe or violate someone else’s rights, including their intellectual property rights. You must own or have obtained the necessary rights to share and publish the content, and any such license must be broad enough to grant Epic a license to display the content.
We want Fab to be a place where our community can acquire content with confidence and know that the content that they distribute won’t be sold as an asset flip on Fab. We’re going to move fast to begin cleaning things up and hopefully you will soon see our efforts making a change on Fab. We won’t catch everything immediately every time, but with the help of our community, we aim to build Fab into the kind of marketplace that you can trust and rely upon.
Thanks,
Josh