Zlatan Ibrahimović induced a stir along with his tweets in 2020: Who has the rights to his identify? Now he’s on the quilt of EA FC 26.
“Who gave FIFA EA Sports activities permission to make use of my identify and face? […] Time to do a little analysis.” – With these tweets, Zlatan Ibrahimović made in all probability essentially the most distinguished incendiary speech in opposition to the FIFA soccer sport collection within the fall of 2020. 5 years after the general public dispute, the Swedish celebrity now adorns the quilt of EA FC 26.
What actually occurred again then
In November 2020, Ibrahimović discovers his digital self in FIFA 21: as an alternative of being pleased about his digital presence, he makes severe accusations: he himself by no means granted EA Sports activities the rights to his identify and likeness. He has by no means granted the related licenses to both FIFA or the gamers’ union FifPro (which bundles the picture rights of {many professional} gamers for video video games worldwide).
Who gave FIFA EA Sport permission to make use of my identify and face? @FIFPro? I’m not conscious to be a member of Fifpro and if I’m I used to be put there with none actual information by means of some bizarre manouver. And for certain I by no means allowed @FIFAcom or Fifpro to become profitable utilizing me
– Zlatan Ibrahimović (@Ibra_official) November 23, 2020
For Zlatan it was clear: “Somebody has been being profitable with my identify and face for years – with out my consent”.
The story went viral, not least as a result of ex-Actual Madrid skilled Gareth Bale additionally publicly questioned who was actually allowed to make use of his picture rights. Shortly afterwards, dozens of different professionals and gamers’ unions spoke out.
EA Sports activities defends itself: The required rights had been acquired appropriately by way of the leagues, golf equipment and FifPro – as has been the case for many years.
For Ibrahimović, who all of the sudden sees himself as a symbolic determine within the debate about particular person versus collective picture rights, that is little comfort: “EA Sports activities, your video games are primarily based on particular person picture rights. However you didn’t purchase them from me, you didn’t purchase them from AC Milan and also you didn’t purchase them from FifPro. So from whom then?”.
It’s a great distance from the heated Twitter debates to the second when Zlatan smiles beatifically on the quilt of the Final Version of FC 26. The quilt staging displays his journey, comprises many references to his ex-clubs and alludes to a widely known picture of the younger Zlatan posing in entrance of a Ronaldo Nazário poster:
However apparently EA Sports activities has now reached a person settlement with the celebrity, and the brand new partnership is being introduced with fanfare. Many already see it as a certainty that Ibra will get an icon card in Final Group mode within the upcoming installment – and additional appearances, for instance in story mode, are positively a risk.
