SEATTLE — Seattle cartoon artist Matthew Inman celebrated a win Monday and prepared to deliver more than $200,000 to charity after apparently prevailing in a drawn-out dispute with the owner of a website that Inman claimed stole his work.
The saga started last year. Inman noticed many of his popular web comics from TheOatmeal.com had been copied and uploaded to a site called FunnyJunk.com, which ostensibly hosts user-generated content (i.e. images and files that users upload themselves). [Editor's note: many of the links in this story lead to pages with content that some may consider obscene/vulgar/otherwise NSFW. Proceed at your own discretion.] Inman openly wondered what to do about the situation and eventually, FunnyJunk responded and removed his content.
But then, in early June, Inman was served with papers accusing him of “false accusation of willful copyright infringement” in relation to his earlier post about FunnyJunk. A lawyer hired by that site informed Inman that his client planned to file a federal lawsuit unless Inman paid FunnyJunk $20,000.
Inman responded to FunnyJunk by posting the letter with lengthy annotations and a counter-arrangement. He wrote:
"1. I'm going to try and raise $20,000 in donations.
"2. I'm going to take a photo of the raised money.
"3. I'm going to mail you that photo, along with this drawing of your mom seducing a Kodiak bear. [Follow the link for full illustrations.]
"4. I'm going to take the money and donate one half to the National Wildlife Federation and the other half to the American Cancer Society."
Inman dubbed the project "Operation BearLove Good, Cancer Bad."
That $20,000 was raised in a little over an hour, but rather than scuttling the threat of a lawsuit, it only upped the ante.
Facing a tidal wave of criticism online, FunnyJunk's lawyer, Charles Carreon, filed a lawsuit against Inman and the charities he was raising money for claiming "cyber vandalism." A post on ars technica detailed some of what Carreon claimed to have been subjected to: "Others have taken Carreon's pretty-easy-to-find e-mail address and signed him up for all sorts of things, including Club Nintento, the Olive Garden newsletter, and porn sites like Tube8."
Inman lawyered up with help from the Electronic Frontier Foundation and last week, Carreon dropped his claim.
That led to a post Monday from Inman, who, as promised, photographed the money he'd raised – a total of $211,223.04 – as well as a "care package," including the aforementioned Kodiak bear drawing, he intended to send to Carreon.
The battle may not be completely over. Inman noted on his blog that Carreon intends to seek a restraining order that would prevent Inman from delivering the money. Also, legal blog Popehat points out that Carreon dropped the lawsuit "without prejudice," meaning he could conceivably re-file at some point.
We'll keep you posted on any developments.
Photo credits: The Oatmeal and Liang Shi / Flickr