Comments on: Emily the Rip-Off

By: randomemilyfan

randomemilyfan — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 00:48:59 +0000

the only picture that was plagerised is the original one which wasnt even made by rob reger!and since then they have had a court hearing court hearing which was ended with the original picture no longer allowed to be used since then rob reger and buzz parker have been trying to slightly change emilys image, like how emily’s cats now have distinguishing features emily now has her own style which is still slightly similar to rosamond but it is much different because emily is now a way of expression she now has many lines some of which are teachers pest and i want you to leave me alone and rob reger says that he has never drawn inspiration from nate the great seiries and that he never will and after the court hearing the writers of nate the great wished rob and emily well so i think that this missunderstanding is over.

By: AJ

AJ — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 05:47:24 +0000

I know this is an old argument, but I just wanted to throw in my two cents. Has it occurred to anyone that it might have been an unintentional rip off? I write and draw a lot for fun, and there are a few times where I’ve felt suddenly inspired and written or drawn something and later realized that I had seen it somewhere before. I didn’t mean to rip anything off, but my brain confused a memory with an idea. Since the Nate the Great books came out in the 70s, it is entirely possible that one or more of the Emily people had read the books and forgotten all about them. It could have been completely subconscious and accidental. Heck, I read those books as a kid too, and I barely remember any details about the characters. Besides, as several people have said, strange girls with long dark hair and several cats are not a new idea at all. Not new in the 70s either.

By: Ally

Ally — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 20:52:45 +0000

Guys, you’re all arguing about the same thing, what you need to realize is, everything today is unoriginal. Everything has been done.
You’re not going to walk into a book store, clothing store or turn on your television without seeing something that resembles something else.

I can see the obvious similarities that Emily has to Rosamond, but Reger took Emily and aimed to make her, her own because her gave her, her own world.

‘Cosmic Debris contended that Emily and Rosamond both drew from a tradition of similar characters including Vampira and Wednesday Addams, and argued that while the text of the initial Emily illustration was nearly identical with Sharmat’s text, that illustration had been withdrawn in 1998 and the statute of limitations had therefore run out.
On August 12, 2009, creator of Emily the Strange and the creators of Nate the Great jointly announced an agreement resolving all disputes between them. Each side agreed to give up all claims against the other as part of their settlement. “We recognize that Emily and Rosamond are both unique and original characters, and we are pleased that we were able to resolve this dispute,” said Marjorie Sharmat and Marc Simont. “We wish Rob, Cosmic Debris, Emily and her fans all the very best.”‘

Thats something from Wikipedia, and i know that site isnt always correct, but Sharmat and Simont never copy righted that phrase, and when it says ‘the statute of limitations had therefore run out.’ it mean that that phrase was older than twenty years, because ‘Nate The Great Goes Undercover’ came out in 1974 that meant the limitations went up in roughly 1995. Yes, that’s long after the bumper sticker, but by now, anyone could use that phrase.

So if tomorrow a new character came out, and some one used a the same text, but changed the name, would you sue them?

By: Lisa

Lisa — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 08:10:05 +0000

I do see what you mean, but I do have to point out that the teaparty shot with the cats sitting at the table and the slogan “we’re all strange here” is an homage (ie rip off) of an illustration from Alice in Wonderland, and a reference to the chesire cat saying “we’re all mad here”:

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rgs/alice25a.gif

By: Sakura

Sakura — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 21:50:44 +0000

Here’s some possibility’s for you:
1. Rob Reger saw the Rosamund character, liked it, and decided to change it a little bit. But it’s not like he did that to make money or anything. He wanted to say “It’s okay to be different, and if your different embrace it”
2. Rob Reger made up the Emily the Strange character. Then he saw a picture of Rosamund and thought it was kind of ironic. Then he drew Emily just like Rosamund in that picture as kind of joke.
3. Rob Reger decided to rip off a kids book character just to make money(yea, right)
4. It’s a total coincidence(yea, right again)

Anyways, who cares? You guys are acting like Emily the Strange is a terrible influence on young people.
I myself am a 13 year old girl, and Emily the Strange helped teach me its good to be an individual. I can just be me and not some stereo-type like everyone else.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 31 May 2009 04:49:45 +0000

@ Anonymous,
“Despite this, in the end, to whatever degree, Rosamond obviously was an influence on Emily, and the original creators deserve at least a mention.”

Too late for Cosmic on that one. They claimed that they had never heard of Rosamond (or the book, “Nate the Great” that she resides in) and originally took down the Emily character because of the ‘coincidence’. Now, they’re trying to sue the very group that gave Emily her character?

They dug their own grave.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 05:31:07 +0000

If I may, briefly, mention my own take on this? That old bumper sticker is pretty clearly plagiarism, pure and simple — it should be recognized as such. It’s, however, a bit of a stretch to go from there to claiming the entire character has been plagiarized, given that there’s a lot more to the character than one sticker she appeared on back in 1991. Despite this, in the end, to whatever degree, Rosamond obviously was an influence on Emily, and the original creators deserve at least a mention.

By: JD

JD — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 02:42:35 +0000

“romeo and juliet was stolen from greek mythology. hamlet was stolen from the egyptian legend isis and osiris.”

Not the same thing. Romeo and Juliet do not appear in Greek mythology. Hamlet is neither Isis nor Osiris. If Shakespeare took the inspiration for his plots from those sources, that’s as may be, but the works are quite distinct.

Besides, you can take as much as you want from Greek mythology. Google “public domain” sometimes. Just don’t take anyone’s translations, word-for-word, and try to publish it as your own. *That’s* plagiarism. And copyright infringement.

Much like the original picture/caption of Emily is almost exactly the same as the page of Rosamond.

Rosamond is not ancient history, part of the culture, in the public domain. If Emily was only a strange little girl with bangs and cats, that would be fine (if a little worrisome); but the original picture/caption from which the rest are derived is a clear-cut case of copyright infringement.

By: mia

mia — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 02:15:49 +0000

can i just point out that shakespear and van gogh both did this whole plagiarism thing?
romeo and juliet was stolen from greek mythology. hamlet was stolen from the egyptian legend isis and osiris.
that picture of the tree with the blossoms by van gogh is almost an exact copy of a picture by hiroshige, which has also been copied by a japanese pop-artist called chiho aoshima.
plagiarism is everywhere. and i happen to like emily the strange. no one’s suing shakespear because he did a good job of stealing someone elses idea. the creators of emily the strange did too.

By: Tenchuu

Tenchuu — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 20:36:43 +0000

Nicole, those shirts are ALSO copyright violations, unless they’re protected by parody/satire exceptions. Copyright is violated constantly, it’s a very strict standard, and extremely hard to enforce. You have to be aware of the injury and have the resources to stop the infringement. Most artists don’t have that. That’s why there’s peeing Calvins everywhere. Do the guys making those stickers deserve that money for their original input into the character, even though the entire reason people buy them is for the recognition of said character?

As for everyone making the Family guy comparison, there are substantial differences between those two works. The judge just doesn’t say “Gee, they’re both fat and stupid, must be a violation”. How old is that character type? Shakespeare used it, at least. Courts aren’t actually full of idiots, there’s a long process to the whole thing. There are a large number of differences between those two characters. They’re drawn entirely differently, Peter wears glasses, he has brown hair, a chin cleft, he’s significantly larger than Homer, he’s not yellow and those are just visual features in an audio-visual work with drastically different humor elements. No one could reasonably look at a picture of The Simpsons and a picture of The Family Guy and say one was artistically derivative just because they’re both animated. Nobody automatically loves The Family Guy because it reminds them of The Simpsons.
This situation is very different; the initial works are extremely similar, the layout of the cats, the unique style to them, Emily’s bangs, their shoes, and the nearly identical wording in some images. That’s not derivative, that’s a copy. And when those copies are successful and as a result you carry that idea on to new areas, you’re still basing your success on the original work of someone else. I don’t feel like retyping the legal analysis I did on another blog, but do a search for the same story to find it.