What's the legal implications for this meme monetization? Just like what I pointed out on another meme based project
a few days ago, meme is protected by copyright, and just by posting those meme themselves for fun, let's say like in 9gag or others, is (as far as I can conclude from the snippets of explanation I quote below) a violation against the content owner's right. I could imagine how ugly it could turn to be with the case of monetized recycle.
Memes are protected by copyright law. This means that the creator of the meme has special rights in the meme.
Although it may not seem like it – the reuse of a meme, whether by posting or sharing – violates copyright law. And the fact that often times the creator of a meme is unknown does not absolve the individual’s infringement or prevent the creator from enforcing their copyright.
Well I did ask one of the team members regarding this topic:
"Knorry | NEO
afaik copyright issues are with the creators/imposters, not the platform on which they post/repost
you can sue someone that uses a picture of you on twitter to promote their article
cant sue twitter
but most memes have copyrighted material in it, as they are usually illegal derivative works using some other original work as their foundation."
You can also downvote one, if you don´t like the meme - or in worst cast - theres a copyright violation. This way he/she cannot make money with it at least. Additionally there is a report function in the NUDES discord, mostly for gore/nsfw memes. But I think it´s for copyright violation too.
Nevertheless thanks for pointing out this topic, I guess there is still room for improvements.
Maybe it's just me, but the way I read it, they seemed to washing their hand of the legal implications. As they state themselves, the platform (namely them, "NUDES") are not sue-able, while the poster (namely you and other users) are subjected to the copyright infringement if the original content owner escalates the case to the court.