Saving Derpy? Hold your horses! · 4:20pm Feb 5th, 2012
So... I haven't signed the Save Derpy petition, although I've been tempted to. I certainly share the sentiment and want to see Derpy stay with us. However... The big problem with this whole petition movement is that we don't actually know what's up with Hasbro, or what their reasoning is for what they're doing -- or even exactly what they are doing.
Yes, The Last Roundup was removed from the iTunes Store, but nobody knows why. Was it an accident or on purpose? Was it Apple's decision or Hasbro's? Since Hasbro still have the same episode featured on their own website, it seems unlikely that they called for Apple to take it off iTunes.
Assuming there is any problem with the Derpy character, is it because of the name, or could it be because of the voice? I remember when the episode appeared, everybody seemed happy about Derpy being called Derpy, but there were complaints about the voice either sounding too boyish (and we later learned the voice actress wasn't informed that the character was supposed to be female!) or too mentally deficient. What if somebody at Hasbro decided to have the voice redone to correct the mistake?
Then there's the trademark rumor. It's been suggested that there's a company selling a line of clothing under the "Derpy" name. Normally this wouldn't be a conflict, since Hasbro isn't in the clothing business, and two companies can hold the same trademark if they aren't in the same market and aren't likely to be confused with one another. However... With WeLoveFine selling licensed FIM clothing, including T-shirts with Derpy on them, suddenly it becomes a legal problem. That might explain the panicked removal of Derpy's name from the WeLoveFine website.
We'd all love to see Derpy stay Derpy, but how much can we reasonably ask for Hasbro to pay for licensing a trademarked name from another company? If you guys will remember, a lot of the original concept characters for FIM were actually changed because of similar trademark issues. That's why we have Pinkie Pie in the show instead of Surprise, and Rainbow Dash instead of Firefly.
