An Open Letter to A24 about Backrooms Copyright | BackroomsMovie.com

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An Open Letter to A24 about Backrooms Copyright

Posted on

July 16, 2026

By

The Backrooms Online

A24, we need to talk.

We need to talk about the fact that the Backrooms does not belong to you. The Backrooms concept was not "given" to you to own exclusively when you signed Kane Parsons to a movie deal, it was not something he could give.

In case you’ve forgotten already, The Backrooms concept began from an anonymous post on the message board, 4chan. The concept grew through the fan community with many contributing to the lores and stories based around it. Kane Parsons too created a story and lore. A concept cannot even be copyrighted – endless yellow hallways and rooms is a concept. And although the name "Backrooms" could technically be copyrighted, you did not create that term, therefore it is not yours to lay claim to.

Your recent behavior in slapping copyright infringement notices on fan creators on RedBubble is blindsided and never should happen. And while there certainly are some items on there which you do have every right to claim a copyright infringement against (such as knock-off versions of the Cap’n Clark T-shirt, people making money off the official cinema poster artwork, and even something like the Async logo), many of the people you have targeted have created things that don’t even have anything to do with the Backrooms movie. AND were created before the movie even began production.

To see items created by fans – not large corporations – fans who are just trying to make a little extra money out of their artwork – removed for no other reason than that they are related to the Backrooms is heartbreaking. These fans create things for other fans. Often unique and things that cannot be obtained anywhere else. But you have removed items that don’t even have anything to do with the movie. Fan versions of the Chevron wallpaper, artwork of liminal spaces, designs that relate to other Backrooms lores completely.

Most of us fans have a lot of respect for A24 as a company and studio. We love that you let Kane Parsons have creative control when developing the movie. We love the support you have given him and his team. We love the appreciation you have shown towards the Backrooms community.

Do not throw this away because your legal department thinks that anything with the word "Backrooms" in it belongs to you. We are a passionate community, we love the Backrooms and the many aspects to it, and we definitely support Backrooms creators. We may not love all interpretations of the Backrooms (although some of us do), but we understand the "shared universe" concept. We love to share and help others. Even Kane Parsons has provided assets to the community and let games use his creations.

On behalf of Backrooms fans everywhere, please reconsider these decisions. Let us be good at what we are good at – being fans and loving the Backrooms. While you can be good at what you’re good at – making movies and supporting young and upcoming directors.

The Backrooms Online / Backrooms Movie.com

For those wondering what this open letter relates to, recently fan creators have received copyright infringement notices and had their artwork removed from RedBubble. The items that are effected are in most cases not even related to the movie – fan interpretations of the chevron wallpaper design, liminal space images that are yellow, artwork relating to the extended wiki lore of the Backrooms, artwork showing the original Backrooms image (which was made public domain).

At the moment it seems as though A24’s legal department is issuing these notices to anything that has the word "Backrooms" in the title. There doesn’t seem to be any checking to see if it actually has used something from the movie that would fall under copyright. While on the other hand, there are items still on RedBubble that A24 do have legal claim to and haven’t been removed because the words Backrooms isn’t in the title.

I’m not a legal expert nor do I know whether there’s a loophole that allows them to do this. But I do know that if this proceeds it will be devastating for the Backrooms community – a community built on a shared concept and one where people accept that either "The Backrooms belong to everyone" or "The Backrooms don’t belong to anyone". It could have consequences beyond just items on RedBubble – it could effect indie game developers, YouTube creators who have monetized their channels. How would it even effect the wikis (which although completely operate under CC-SA3.0 they still use the name Backrooms – and have done so since 2019).

Currently we know that Kane Parsons is aware of the situation as well and has indicated that he is going to talk to A24 about this as it’s not meant to happen. Hopefully that’s all that will be needed to put an end to this. But I still felt that I wanted to say...