The Pokémon Company is one of the companies that fiercely protects its intellectual property and is among the most active in the fight against piracy and copyright infringement of its franchises. Many fan projects are known to be carried out within the scene, but once a legal warning arrives, it's time to stop as no one wants to fight against a multi-billion dollar company. How are these projects discovered and proceeded to be canceled? A lawyer revealed the answer.
How The Pokémon Company Discovers Fan Projects
During an interview with Aftermath, Don McGowan, a lawyer and former general legal counsel for The Pokémon Company, talked about the process by which the company tackles those projects made by fans that somehow violate any law. According to the specialist, it's not that the company has a dedicated group snooping around the internet for what's happening within the community, because in reality, they find out thanks to the media that give coverage to these fan-made projects.
In this regard, Don McGowan stated that the press actually played an important part in their work: "Short answer, thanks to you. I'd be sitting in my office dealing with my own business when someone from the company would send me a link to a news article, or I'd stumble upon it myself. I teach Entertainment Law at the University of Washington and I tell my students that the worst thing in the world is when your project gets into the press, because now I know about you."
If The Pokémon Company Discovers Profit, that Fan Project is Doomed
Now, the lawyer points out that the fact that fans make a project using The Pokémon Company's intellectual property is not a reason to act immediately, because what is sought in a secondary order is the presence of money: "but that's not the end of the equation. You don't take it down right away. You wait to see if they get funding, if there's money involved, then you engage. No one likes suing fans."
So, it seems that what triggers alarms in these cases is when money is involved in one way or another, as was the case with Yuzu, the Switch emulator, which fell into the hands of the Japanese company when it found out there was a Patreon with premium access for those who paid.
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