You probably want to read this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42364033
I've never heard of itch.io before but from what I can tell:
- Itch.io is a platform where people unaffiliated with itch.io can create pages and sell video games
- An itch.io user created a game that used Funko's brand without authorization
- Itch.io (correctly) removed that page when they were made aware of that by their registrar and server host, then responded to both letting them know they'd taken care of it
- The server host (Linode) said that was great and closed the issue. The registrar (iwantmyname) did not respond, then a few days later yanked the domain.
This is exactly the sort of thing the DMCA exists for (assuming itch.io is located in the United States) and it's exactly why the safe harbor provisions exist.
It's like if someone posted a copyright-infringing picture to Facebook and Facebook's registrar responded by taking down the entirety of facebook.com.
So no, this is not on itch.io's shoulders, this is on iwantmyname's (for disabling itch.io's domain even after being made aware of the circumstances) and Brand Shield (for not submitting a complaint to itch.io first and waiting to see if they'd take down the infringing user's content before escalating to itch.io's ISP and server host).
I have read that.
Itch Corp might be in the USA - but their registrar is in New Zealand. That seems like a poor strategic choice for both customer service reasons and legal compatibility reasons.
I never said this was Itch's fault. But I do wonder how many takedown requests iwantmyname received, and whether that caused them to drop their customer. E.g. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22tagged+marvel%22+site%3Aitch.io...