Springheel on 4/10/2007 at 19:10
Quote:
All is game EXCEPT GAINING MONEY FROM FAN MISSIONS USING THIS TRADEMARK.
Yep, if you make a map and only play it yourself on your own computer, then you can do whatever you want. If you want to distribute it to others, then no, that's against the law. Which is why we won't be helping distribute any modifications to TDM that infringe on Eidos' IP.
Ringer on 27/10/2007 at 09:25
What you do will be dependant of the laws of the country you are living in...Can you really see Eidos suing individual map makers???? Of course not...
jay pettitt on 27/10/2007 at 12:06
It's well within the realms of possibility for a grumpy company to politely ask (via their solicitors) hosts and Internet Service Providers to cease hosting infringing files.
Copyright in most of the western world is about making copies. Financial reward has no bearing on the legal status of copying other people's stuff. If you have copyright you can legally make (or grant permission to do so) copies, if you don't you can't.
Copyright laws also usually forbid making derivative works. Let's not kid ourselves, DarkMod's entire raison d'être is to be derivative of someone else's intellectual property; changing the names of characters is a sweet goodwill gesture, but is otherwise nonsense. It's fortunate for all of us that no one at Eidos, or any of the developers at DarkMod, seems to think it's worth losing sleep over. It's in all our interests to keep things that way; it would be rude for DarkMod to support blatant and direct copyright infringements and we should respect their decision not to do so.
If the rights to our favorite sneak em up were owned by EA, I think it would be a very different story.
Shadak on 27/10/2007 at 13:11
Many also thought that big music companies would never sue individual teens for downloading illegal mp3s...
Mikael Grizzly on 27/10/2007 at 13:22
Since Poland is part of the EU, and our copyright laws didn't need special changes when being accepted, I believe they are representative of the current regulations in Europe (I won't delve into the common law in Britain or ignoran--, err, American common law).
Fair use allows for using the program for yourself (otherwise it'd be illegal to play games :]) and by people you are somehow tied to (generally family). There's alo an interesting part (in the act I'm using as reference), that it's not required to gain permission from the copyright holder (i.e. it's legal) to if copying of the material subject to copyright is temporary or incidental and is required for you to be able to use the program (I use that clause as an excuse when downloading a torrent of programs/videos I already posess but are damaged or otherwise unusable, like scratched CDs or VHS cassetes).
Generally, the act states that fair use is permitted if the original copyright holder's identity is stated and if no profits are made.
So in general, you can do whatever you want if you don't profit from it financially or damage the original copyright holder's reputation/goods somehow.
jay pettitt on 27/10/2007 at 14:21
Quote Posted by Mikael Grizzly
[In Poland] Generally, the act states that fair use is permitted if the original copyright holder's identity is stated and if no profits are made.
So in general, you can do whatever you want if you don't profit from it financially or damage the original copyright holder's reputation/goods somehow.
You believe wrongly. Poland's provision for fair use is restricted to public documents and special dispensation for certain groups (schools etc) to make limited copies of copyrighted materials not available on the market.
The (
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001L0029:EN:HTML) European Union Copyright Directive makes
no general provision for concepts of 'fair use'
The transient or incidental transmissions exceptions in Article 5 that you refer to mean that your ISP and telecoms provider can not be held responsible if you misuse the lawful service that they provide if they're not significantly profiting from it, not that you making copies is legal. (An ISP hosting a file is obviously not transient). It's the Telecoms company/ISP's businesses and networks that must be intended for legal use, not as in it's legal use for you to watch a movie you've already got a copy of, therefore you can download more copies.
There are numerous optional provisions member states can make, none of which apply to gamers distributing unauthorised copies of Eidos' IP.
OrbWeaver on 27/10/2007 at 15:55
So did I. What a pity it turned out to be Yet More Pointless Copyright Discussion.
:bored: :bored: :bored: :bored:
Mikael Grizzly on 27/10/2007 at 16:05
Quote:
You believe wrongly. Poland's provision for fair use is restricted to public documents and special dispensation for certain groups (schools etc) to make limited copies of copyrighted materials not available on the market.
Sorry, but that's not true. I'm reading through it right now, and in the paragraph that contains the norm you have mentioned there is nothing, absolutely nothing that would even imply that it's an exclusive and special dispensation.
I'm basing on articles 34 and 35 (translation mine, it's a bit rough):
Quote Posted by "Art. 34"
It is permitted to use creations within the limits of fair use under the condition of attributing the original work to it's author by full name and the source. [...]
Quote Posted by "Art. 35"
Fair use cannot harm normal use of the creation nor the creator's fair interest
And while the act itself does enumerate instances in which fair use is applicaple, it doesn't necessarily mean that what's not mentioned is automatically illegal (unless it has been deemed as such in other acts).
For the directive, look at article 1, indent 2, point a: " Except in the cases referred to in Article 11, this Directive shall leave intact and shall in no way affect existing Community provisions relating to [...] the legal protection of computer programs;"
Now, here's a thought that just occured to me: what do you mean by
distributing Eidos IP? Are the DarkMod devs going to port Thief/Thief II to the Doom 3 engine? Or are they doing a Thief-based modification for Doom 3?
Or is it the fact that (god forbid) they used a single NPCs name?
Quote:
watch a movie you've already got a copy of, therefore you can download more copies.
Bullshit. I never stated that. What I said was that I download a copy of the article in question to replace the one I posess but was destroyed or otherwise made unusable (as was the case with C&C Renegade, when the CD drive ripped the play disc apart and the distributor had none available).
imperialreign on 27/10/2007 at 17:20
someone correct me if I'm wrong here . . .
but, once ID finally releases the source code to D3 (as they have done with all their releases in the past) - at that point, IIRC, it renders the source code as freeware (where ID got their start), which means the public can do with as they please with it - except for compile and release the original version of that game, or re-distribute the source code or whatever for any nominal fee. So, at that point it should be fair game as long as no one is making any profit on it . . .
anyhow, I'm still one of those that goes by the old school copyright acts that were in place in the late 80s/early 90s (seeing as how they haven't officially been revoked, yet), instead of going by the DMCA. The old laws were that if you purchased a for of digital media, be it a game, movie, music, whatever - you were allowed to make and maintain a back up copy of that material (which is illegal per the DMCA), and modify it to your hearts content for your use (meaning, no re-distribution or passing that modified version on to others).
