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A brief synopsis of Duke, The Dancing Dog
8 years ago
Recent events have come to light that force me to make this clarification regarding Duke The Dancing Dog as performed by Oz Kangaroo. I wish to make some things clear so moving forward we can move past this and put things behind us. It’s hard to believe that the start of this saga goes back 15 years and it keeps getting brought up.
In the past, I have had dealings with Oz that left a bad taste in my mouth. I feel that his work ethic leaves a lot to be desired, failed to deliver on promises and offended several friends, but this discourse is about the Duke fursuit and not Oz. If only one thing is taken from here is this:
You have your OWN mind. use it! Take advice into consideration but form your own opinions. Remember that no matter how thin the coin is, it always has two sides. Here’s mine:
In 2001 I started working on a project. I didn’t have anything specific in mind, but as the suit started taking shape, I decided that it would be a German Shepherd. By FC2002, I had created the first Duke fursuit. It debuted at the Masquerade that year. For the next couple of years, Duke made several appearances, I got some artwork and badges but eventuallyI Duke became mostly relegated to storage.
During the next couple of years, Oz contacted me on occasion asking about the character, offering to buy him off me. As I am very critical of my work, I declined – stating that the character was retired and I didn’t want to see it in circulation any longer. I stated this in no uncertain terms and more than once.
Some time after that, I made a deal with a party in Florida to trade some of my older creations – I would send Duke the GSD and Domino A. Dobe to said party in return for a new fursuit.
There was one stipulation: These suits would be stuffed with polyfill and rendered unusable as walking characters. They would end their life as life-sized stuffed animals. With that understanding, I sent out these two suits to Florida and in return some time later I got my end of the deal: a brand new fursuit.
Fast forward about a year, I find out that the suits I traded away had not only been made wearable again, they were making appearances at various cons. I was livid. The terms of the verbal agreement I had with the Florida party had been broken and the suits were making the rounds in the furry circuit. Later still, I found out that the person I’d made the trade with had made a deal with Oz to obtain the suit. Oz started appearing at cons, dancing in costume when most people were simply walking around, waving.
The rest of the story as they say is history.
Fast forward to today.
Did I feel angry when I saw Duke brought out retirement? Yes I did. That was over 10 years ago and I no longer feel anything about Duke one way or another. I don’t have a claim on the suit nor did I transact anything directly with Oz. The details of the trade between the party in Florida and Oz are unknown to me. But what I can attest to is that I got my end of the trade which was a new fursuit. That concludes my ownership over Duke even if my wishes for the suit were not respected.
At one point early on, Oz appropriated artwork that I had commissioned of Duke. I called him on it and in all fairness to him he backed off and stopped using the artwork.
Is the character stolen? My end of the bargain was fulfilled with the Florida party. I had not dealings with Oz directly but one thing is for sure: I have no further claim on the character of Duke.
Since the time when he came out of retirement, Oz has put a lot of effort and sweat equity into the suit. He has replaced various parts of the suit until nothing of the original remains. There have been several remakes of the character further cementing his claim to the character. There is no question that he’s taken Duke in a different and vastly more popular direction than I would have. The aspect of Duke as a Dancing Dog is wholly Oz’s creation and it should be recognized on its own merit.
If you have any grievances against Oz, please take them up with him without bringing Duke or myself into the picture.
In the past, I have had dealings with Oz that left a bad taste in my mouth. I feel that his work ethic leaves a lot to be desired, failed to deliver on promises and offended several friends, but this discourse is about the Duke fursuit and not Oz. If only one thing is taken from here is this:
You have your OWN mind. use it! Take advice into consideration but form your own opinions. Remember that no matter how thin the coin is, it always has two sides. Here’s mine:
In 2001 I started working on a project. I didn’t have anything specific in mind, but as the suit started taking shape, I decided that it would be a German Shepherd. By FC2002, I had created the first Duke fursuit. It debuted at the Masquerade that year. For the next couple of years, Duke made several appearances, I got some artwork and badges but eventuallyI Duke became mostly relegated to storage.
During the next couple of years, Oz contacted me on occasion asking about the character, offering to buy him off me. As I am very critical of my work, I declined – stating that the character was retired and I didn’t want to see it in circulation any longer. I stated this in no uncertain terms and more than once.
Some time after that, I made a deal with a party in Florida to trade some of my older creations – I would send Duke the GSD and Domino A. Dobe to said party in return for a new fursuit.
There was one stipulation: These suits would be stuffed with polyfill and rendered unusable as walking characters. They would end their life as life-sized stuffed animals. With that understanding, I sent out these two suits to Florida and in return some time later I got my end of the deal: a brand new fursuit.
Fast forward about a year, I find out that the suits I traded away had not only been made wearable again, they were making appearances at various cons. I was livid. The terms of the verbal agreement I had with the Florida party had been broken and the suits were making the rounds in the furry circuit. Later still, I found out that the person I’d made the trade with had made a deal with Oz to obtain the suit. Oz started appearing at cons, dancing in costume when most people were simply walking around, waving.
The rest of the story as they say is history.
Fast forward to today.
Did I feel angry when I saw Duke brought out retirement? Yes I did. That was over 10 years ago and I no longer feel anything about Duke one way or another. I don’t have a claim on the suit nor did I transact anything directly with Oz. The details of the trade between the party in Florida and Oz are unknown to me. But what I can attest to is that I got my end of the trade which was a new fursuit. That concludes my ownership over Duke even if my wishes for the suit were not respected.
At one point early on, Oz appropriated artwork that I had commissioned of Duke. I called him on it and in all fairness to him he backed off and stopped using the artwork.
Is the character stolen? My end of the bargain was fulfilled with the Florida party. I had not dealings with Oz directly but one thing is for sure: I have no further claim on the character of Duke.
Since the time when he came out of retirement, Oz has put a lot of effort and sweat equity into the suit. He has replaced various parts of the suit until nothing of the original remains. There have been several remakes of the character further cementing his claim to the character. There is no question that he’s taken Duke in a different and vastly more popular direction than I would have. The aspect of Duke as a Dancing Dog is wholly Oz’s creation and it should be recognized on its own merit.
If you have any grievances against Oz, please take them up with him without bringing Duke or myself into the picture.
I'm terribly sorry to hear about what he has done.
I was a huge fan of Duke since I first joined the fandom.
Now Oz left the fandom because of reality biting him so hard.
I honestly don't know what to think of all of this.
He said to me, "I see you finally registered and got in suit." during his panel.
It just sucks that his business isn't doing too well.
Yeah Duke really has been on a journey.
First, let's acknowledge that these issues of characters being highly personal, but also their resale and re-use, are issues unique to the furry fandom. Nobody else does this exactly like this. So we're making up these rules as we go along.
And that's even now, to say nothing of 10 years ago when I was getting my first flip-phone.
I like Oz, generally. We're not close friends but he's never been rude to me. I just have so many people whispering behind his back to tell me how much he's going to hurt me some day if I ever do business with him and that's not the Oz I've ever seen. Maybe not yet. I'm willing to admit that maybe I've just never seen it.
I also feel like this is a good reason why having at least stuff written down beforehand and these things explicitly stated to all parties is a better idea. This isn't something anything would've thought about bringing into this weird fandom 10, 15 years ago. Contracts? Over fursuits? It's still a novel concept.
I don't even know what my point is. Maybe it's just that the Red Letter Oz has gotten out of this has outlived it's 'deservance,' if that's a word. Maybe it's that people need to decide these things for themselves. And maybe it's that there are a too few of whatever the opposite are of White Knights for the people communally decided are worthy of scorn irrespective of justice. Black Knights, maybe?
Just... I don't think anybody did anything really wrong. And I hope everybody gets better.
Lets take CosPlay. At a comic con you may see 20 or more Harley Quinns - each of them unique in their own way but still the same character.
But you definitely won't see the same at furry conventions unless its by prior agreement (Three Dingo's from Downunder come to mind, as well as the rainbow fox suits).
As such when a character is retired and sold on - it likewise can become an issue unless the original owner acknowledges that the character is nolonger theirs, or that a legally binding agreement is in place.
Again something I see a lot in the fandom nowadays (old fart rant) is that a lot of the newer fur's change suits and characters from one con to the next. So it is even more difficult to work out who is the original character, or a new owner of one.
I've known Oz for many many years now and have never had any issues with him, but it's good to get the background of this story as I have heard rumors for a long while.
https://youtu.be/h8YjrpX94Ok?t=20m27s
fun times.