Dread toy-peddler Funko Pop gets cool, handsome Itch.io taken offline via dodgy "AI-powered" brand protection
Among my last-resort tactics for generating precious PC gaming news is to go on holiday - for as sure as toast lands buttered side down while cats always land on their feet, as sure as the number 13 breeds calamity and Star Citizen committing to a release date guarantees a delay, myself going on holiday will always, somehow, conjure a big story from the crevices. It's basic physics. In this case, I was on holiday from Friday through Monday, and this fact and this fact alone appears to have coaxed some toy manufacturer into taking the internet's most cherished indie gaming platform offline by means of a "bogus" phishing report, sent by "AI-powered" brand protection software.
The situation has now been resolved, thankfully, and you can access Itch.io as normal, but I will never pass up the opportunity to cast shade on Funko Pop, whose NFT-garlanded bobbleheads I hate as I do veruccas and forest fires. So here's a quick recap if you, too, missed the drama.
The trouble started on Sunday, when Itch.io mysteriously went offline. According to a post from Itch.io's owner Leaf Corcoran on Bluesky (Twitter's relatively unspoilt cousin), the culprit was a phishing (i.e. internet scam) report automatically sent on Funko Pop's behalf to Itch.io's domain registrar, who proceeded to cork this wellspring of arty smallscale game development without due process.
"I kid you not, itch.io has been taken down by Funko of 'Funko Pop' because they use some trash 'AI Powered' Brand Protection Software called Brand Shield that created some bogus Phishing report to our registrar, iwantmyname, who ignored our response and just disabled the domain," reads the post. "I hope you're all having a nice Sunday evening."
Using my advanced journalist brain, I deduce from this communique that Corcoran was not having a nice Sunday evening, and would strongly prefer that Itch.io stayed online. He had more to say over on Hacker News, commenting that the provocation for the BrandShield report was probably a
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