Yuga Says It Has No ‘Copyright Registrations’ For Chained Monkeys – ARTnews.com

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Yuga Labs, the parent company of Bored Ape Yacht Club, said in a new lawsuit that it does not have “copyright registrations” for the 10,000 images that make up the successful NFT collection.

The new documents were submitted as part of the ongoing lawsuit between Yuga and artist Ryder Ripps, who used images from the BAYC collection for his own NFT collection, titled RR/BAYC.

“Counts 2 and 3 ask the court to declare that Yuga Labs does not own the copyright in the Bored Ape images,” the document filed by Yuga Labs’ attorneys states. “Registering a copyright is not necessary to own one; suing one is necessary. The Court should not go into whether Yuga Labs owns a copyright in its Bored Ape images, because such an opinion would be advisory only; Yuga Labs has not registered a copyright, so there is no imminent threat of a copyright infringement lawsuit.”

Last June, Yuga Labs sued Ripps, accusing him of, among other things, false advertising, trademark infringement and cybersquatting. Ripps has denied the allegations and said he has been open that the collection is intended to draw attention to his belief that the BAYC NFTs are laced with alt-right, neo-Nazi symbolism, and challenge the belief that large PFP collections were protected by copyright. Furthermore, Ripps and his lawyers have argued that RR/BAYC is a type of artistic expression in the form of appropriation art.

As legal experts have noted, Yuga did not sue Ripps for a copyright claim. A number of possible reasons have been suggested, from a lack of copyright registrations to Yuga wanting to avoid having Ripps use a Fair Use/Freedom Of Speech defense.

During the NFT boom, the creators of Yuga Labs were the first to offer a new benefit: by owning an NFT, they claimed that copyright interests were also handed over, meaning that if you owned a BAYC NFT, you could make everything from t-shirts to TV shows using the image of Bored Ape that person owned.

Comedian Seth Green, for example, claimed he was developing a TV show based on a Bored Ape he owned, when his Ape was stolen in a hack in May 2022.

“I bought that monkey in July 2021, and have spent the last few months developing and leveraging the IP to become the star of this show,” Green told Gary Vaynerchuck during a Vee-Con panel. “The days before he is to make his world debut, he is literally kidnapped.”

Legal outlets, as well as mainstream entertainment and news publications, followed the copyright benefits with interest, especially after Green’s Ape was stolen, questioning whether the IP rights to the Ape had been transferred to the thief.

Yuga Labs, for its part, said the copyright of BAYC images is solid, regardless of copyright registrations.

“Lack of federal copyright registration does not mean a device does not own copyright. When provenance is documented, as with BAYC NFTs, copyright protection is automatic,” said a Yuga Labs spokesperson ART news in a statement.

Further, Yuga said there is “no confusion” about NFT holders’ rights.

“Yuga Labs has released the IP license and commercial rights to holders of the BAYC, CryptoPunks and Meebits NFT collections. Yuga maintains the underlying copyright of the artwork,” the spokesperson said.

It may seem strange that Yuga has stated to the court that it does not have copyright registrations for the images, but Ripps filed a counterclaim, asking for a declaration from the court that Yuga Labs had no copyright, which he believed was relevant to his defense strategy. Yuga Labs then filed a motion to dismiss this counterclaim.

“[Yuga’s] The argument to the court was “We sued for trademark infringement, not copyright infringement, so it’s not right for the court to reach out and decide whether we have copyrights or not,” Van Loon explained.

Yuga appears to be making a move to avoid the court’s ruling on whether large collections of NFTs can even be protected by copyright. Whether the copyright applies to computer generated work or procedurally generated work, such as BAYC and other large NFT profile pictures, is not legally determined.

If the courts rule that Yuga does not own the copyright to BAYC images, it could be legally problematic for the company, said Erica Van Loon, partner and IP attorney at law firm Nixon Peabody. told ART news.

“If there was any language in the terms of use, or if copyright was advertised when you offer the NFTs for sale, that could be a real problem for Yuga Labs,” Van Loon said. “There are a number of claims that could be brought against them by people who bought their NFTs, such as false advertising and unfair competition.”

Ripps has argued that Yuga cannot own the copyright to the images.

“Yuga Labs lifted their terms of service from Suum Cuique labs, used a trendy (in 2021 NFT scam world) when they launched, tried to convince people that the value of NFT was being able to own copyright, computer generated content is not claimable for copyright,” Ripps wrote in an email, referring to Suum Cuique laboratoriesan NFT company whose name he claims derives from a Nazi phrase that translates “to each his own.”

“The monkey images are also too similar, which creates an additional problem for trying to issue 10,000 copyrights to extremely similar images (some of which are identical monkeys),” he added.

[Editor’s Note: This article previously stated that Yuga Labs admitted that the 10,000 images in the BAYC collection have no copyright. It has been corrected to note that Yuga said it does not have “copyright registrations” for those images. It has also been updated with statements from Yuga Labs on the matter.]