The sheeps are at it again!

[Marhis]

Technically speaking, copyright and legality (hope this word exists in english) of the matter will always be in a gray area, always: until at least one judgement at court is made. Which it will never happen, I suspect.
Even if we all were lawyers it would be so: of course a lawyer would be a much better expert on matter, but I doubt it would make any difference, 'cause if you have 10 lawyers, it's easy that you'll have 10 interpretations (well informed and such) of the same matter. Only a judge may do a real statement on it. I'm thinking about how legal stuff is handled in my country, but I think it's not very different either.

Anyway, one of the most important things this site, others (i.e. SFV) and the many people who fight this battle, had accomplished, in my opinion is the information spread.
The booty, in my opinion too, is the only effective way to annoy, shout out loud our personal ethical point of view, and force the issue to became critical and important.
Sorry for the mess (cit. Han Solo), but I think it's mandatory.

[LesserOr]

Technically speaking, copyright and legality (hope this word exists in english) of the matter will always be in a gray area, always: until at least one judgement at court is made. Which it will never happen, I suspect.

Honestly, there is no question of legality (it exists :wink: ) in this situation.
Fanwork for anything, game or otherwise, is never allowed to be sold unless the proper rights/permissions have been obtained. Hell, often completely free projects are shut down, simply because it dilutes the owner's copyright.

The sims community pretends there is a grey area, because that allows them to do as they wish. Just because EA has not pursued the matter doesn't magically make it legal. Or "not illegal". :roll:

The only argument that could be made is that EA's EULA holds no weight- but if you claim that, neither does any "agreement" paysite owners would wish to enforce.

[idtaminger]

Wow. Sometimes the ridiculousness of this community really just...:shock:

Hello Junior High!

As long as Pescado has his site up I don't really see the point of debate. EA isn't ever going to do shit. Arguing back and forth within the community isn't ever going to do shit. So the sum total of all this is just going to be a lot of wasted breath. (or wasted typing in this case?)

So why not just sit back and d/l or not d/l to one's own liking and rest those weary little fingers?

[Marhis]

hehe, I call it gray area because there is no judgement which definitely and officially states what is the truth. To me, it's not grey at all: the more I read - on both sides of the war field - the more I feel myself on the "right" side, or, if you prefer, with the most correct point of view. But I know that's only my own personal opinion: I may not say "shut up, the court have had the final word", I mean.

To me, altought they may sound reasonable, the copyright/partial copyright/agreements/etc. stuff seems much more a search for *browse dictionary and crosses fingers* legal quibbles than facts.

I run a MUD, the code is derived from a copyrighted one (Smaug, if you know it) and I must accomplish to the Smaug creator's copyrights and tos.  I have basically rewritten all the code, in these years: there is almost nothing left of the Smaug, it's a completely different thing now. But as I have started with it, as long as a single bit of that code is in my creature, I have to honor Smaug copyright. Whatever I'll do on that code in the future, it will always be under Smaug creator's copyright.
Thousands (and I'm sure it's more) of MUD creators like me had worked and rewritten that code, in 20 and more years; some of them tried to quibble on the matter, and were promptly rejected and boycotted by the MUD community. Only a few, on a huge creators' base, and in more than 20 years of existance of this community.

It should speak volumes, to me.

[Pariland]

Partially true, but that doesn't necessitate a good reason. Someone holds an opposing viewpoint, and is thus labelled a "cheerleading minion"? (In all honesty I think that is an awesome title, I seriously do! But the point still stands).

As opposed to being labeled uncool and unintelligent for not agreeing with Delphy?

Also, I wasn't aware that non-constructive means doesn't agree with Delphy and warrants a thead being locked.  Because that is all it takes for Delphy to lock a thread.  Furthermore, he made sure he had the last word before locking it.  Not even close to being a constructive action.

[Solowren]

So why not just sit back and d/l or not d/l to one's own liking and rest those weary little fingers?

Huzzah for resting weary fingers!

[LesserOr]

hehe, I call it gray area because there is no judgement which definitely and officially states what is the truth.

Oh, I wasn't complaining that you were using the term improperly- but the paysite defenders are.
They think that saying "grey area!" means they are excused of any legal wrongdoing. Which is odd because if it's grey, black is involved somewhere.

To me, altought they may sound reasonable, the copyright/partial copyright/agreements/etc. stuff seems much more a search for *browse dictionary and crosses fingers* legal quibbles than facts.

I agree. Paysites and their defenders are claiming the bandwidth donation permission is a loophole. But if any of them tried to sell their files in regular stores, I don't think anyone would be surprised when EA sued.
Yet because it's on an internet store, people somehow convince themselves that the situation is different.

Funny, it's always "I own this, so I can sell it!" but never "EA/Maxis owns part of this, I should give them part of the money!"
Credit isn't as important when it's not their credit, I suppose.

I run a MUD, the code is derived from a copyrighted one (Smaug, if you know it) and I must accomplish to the Smaug creator's copyrights and tos.  
...
Thousands (and I'm sure it's more) of MUD creators like me had worked and rewritten that code, in 20 and more years; some of them tried to quibble on the matter, and were promptly rejected and boycotted by the MUD community. Only a few, on a huge creators' base, and in more than 20 years of existance of this community.
It should speak volumes, to me.

I do know of SMAUG, though I don't often MUD.
And you're right- no other modding community allows this kind of nonsense.
All the games over the years, all the mods, and only the sims community thinks it's special enough to have the "right" to charge.

Obviously everyone else must be wrong. :roll:

[MMEStalker]

Personally I think that, while the legal situation isn't the same, there are a lot of similarities between CC and fanfiction. When Delphy (I think, could be wrong) posted about people being upset about having their content redistributed without their permission and taking their toys and going home (I'm paraphrasing), I thought about my fanfiction and the CC I have created.  

Both were created partly to challenge myself and partly to share with others (well, I haven't shared any CC yet, as I'm not yet satisfied with the quality), both have a lot of my own work in them, but even though the bulk of the fanfiction (plot, dialogue, blah, blah, even setting if it's an AU) and the texture and maybe mesh of the CC are created by me and maybe another fanfic writer/CC creator if I've borrowed something (with permission of course), they will never be totally mine, because vital parts of them are owned by someone else. If someone stole my story/CC and claimed it as their own, I would be a little pissed, because I'd put a lot of effort into it. I'd probably email them and tell them they're a fucktard and whine to my friends, but I wouldn't lose much sleep over it.

Now if we make the admittedly ridiculous assumption that all 'donations' are solely to help with bandwidth costs, I think that the issue of other people hosting your work can be compared. If someone redistributed my work and still credited me as the creator, why would I care? The only problem would be if I updated the fanfic/CC and the other host didn't, but this is hardly a huge problem, people would still know I was the creator and would still be able to contact me about my work, and presumably find the site that I put my work on. Even if I really wasn't happy about it being on another site (perhaps because the other site hosts things I have a big problem with, like fanfiction which contains the sexual abuse of children and tries to present it as acceptable behaviour (I wouldn't have a problem with fiction that contains child abuse, or hints at it, it happens and people should be able to write about it, I think most people are able to differentiate between people writing about it as something that happens and people writing about it as sexual titillation or attempted justification, but I digress...)) I wouldn't stop writing or creating CC, I wouldn't take down my work and go off in a huff. Because I don't create stuff to have absolute control over it, I create it for my pleasure and the pleasure of other people.

So it seems to me that people who have a problem with stuff being hosted here must be either worried they will lose money (after all, if they can't afford their own site, they can put their stuff up in several places for free) or worried that they don't have complete control over their work, and I don't see how losing those people would be bad for the community, since there are plenty of talented people in the community who don't charge and aren't ego maniacs. Fan communities don't crumble when they lose creators, even ones with a lot of talent.

Then there is the issue of 'intellectual copyright', a term that people on the other side of the debate use a lot. I don't get why these people are so desperate to hang on to control of things they've supposedly created for the benefit of the fan community. I don't doubt that some of them have worked very hard on their CC, but I don't think that it's sane to yell 'intellectual copyright!' every time you create something for the Sims and think that means that people who don't care about it are evil. Little in the Sims 2 community is unique (I should clarify, there are many unique bits of CC, but they comprise a tiny proportion of the CC out there)  and EA ownership of .package files aside, no matter how much people claim that they create everything from scratch, most CC is not made solely by the 'creator', I'm not saying everything isn't, but most things clearly aren't. If you create some piece of original artwork and make it into a painting for the Sims 2, I could see how you would be upset if someone stole it or used it in a way you didn't like, as it is something that might have value outside of the Sims 2 game, but most CC doesn't have any use outside of the game, so I don't get why you would care about your 'intellectual copyright', it's not really important in a Sims 2 CC context, so stop frigging whining about it!

OK, that was longer and less coherent than I intended. I realise that many people have said all of this before, but I'm sitting in the house waiting for the plumber to arrive and I'm bored.

[redisenchanted]

Echo, you make great things and freely distribute them, why be an apologist for paysites?

None of them have obtained licenses to resell remade EA items, all are violating the EULA. A fair number, maybe most, have ripped off or purchased other meshes and ignored the fact that most of said meshes and textures say that they cannot be used for commercial uses.

The only arguement they can muster is that EA is not enforcing their EULA.

Their existence actually diminishes the entire community. Both because others are enboldened to make "money for nothing" or quite directly as when Thomas of TSR pays free sites to close down and makes their content pay while taking his cut.

I used to think that this site was too combatative, but now I see that it would have no effect at all otherwise.

[yamikuronue]

I like how it ended with "well, we'll have to see in the future if the EULA still stands" -- meaning Delphy knows it opposes him but doesn't believe it holds water??

[Phelim]

Personally I think that, while the legal situation isn't the same, there are a lot of similarities between CC and fanfiction.

They're same in that neither group has the legal right to sell/resell these "products."  Both groups do (with certain exceptions in fanfiction by particular authors) have the freedom to create away and post their shiny things for the world to see and use/read.

However, in my opinion, it's a fair bet that an author (with his or her publisher backing) would be a lot more likely to swoop in to smite an erring fan than EA ever would.

Heck, if I never read another piece of fanfiction again it wouldn't prevent me (nor diminish my enjoyment) from reading the originals and/or purchasing new works, and even from authors I've never heard of before.  (That's not to say I'd stop writing fanfiction or reading it.)  I never needed the push from FF in the past to find things to read, and I don't need it now.

With Sims 2, however, CC is a huge part of what makes the game flourish, and without it, interest wanes fairly quickly.  Challenges can be included (in my eyes) under the banner of CC, though I suppose it'd be a damn sight harder to sell one of those.  (I remain suspicious of TSR's challenge hoopla, though.)

Hm, I'm not sure I even had a point here.

[Echo]

Starting with a clarification, because there are two distinct issues that are being discussed here, and they are blurring. The discussion that originally prompted my to contribute here was about whether custom content was owned by EA, or by the creator. This issue is no more relevant to paysites than any other sites. The issue does affect me in a way, because it makes the difference between me doing something for myself because I enjoy it, and me doing unpaid labor for EA. (Although it doesn't really cause me concern, if they want my stuff they can have it. They've already put rugs in the game and seasons will have harvestable crops, so meh...)

I think that it is fair bet that even if it were taken to court, EA would support the position that custom content is owned by the CC creator, simply because claiming otherwise would leave it open to a ratings nightmare given all the adult CC out there. Of course, that's not really a satisfactory legal argument, which is why I did my research into copyright as it applies to derivative works in the first place. And I still believe those findings hold true.

When it comes to paysites, my original statement made it clear that if one can prove that someone is making profit from Sims content, and one can also prove that no agreement exists between the creator and EA, then that is proof that the work is not authorized and so it can be treated it as if it were any other EA content. The only significant point there against your actions here is that the burden of proof is on the person redistributing, not the person creating.

(As a distantly related side note to this, EA made a modification to the EULA for the original Sims tools and materials after a similar discussion to this, specifically called out recouping costs associated with a website as legitimate and permissable. Not really relevant here, as it was for a different game, just an interesting tid-bit.)

The objections I made to the behaviour of members of this site that Jesse was referring to were not based on the legality of the behaviour (and I said as much in the addendum to it) but on the behaviour itself. As I said previously, if I make an agreement with someone then I will do what I can to make sure that I do not breach that agreement. If the other participant is legally questionable, then I will try not to enter an agreement with them. If I do still enter an agreement though, then I am responsible for keeping my end of it. If a creator has set out an agreement for downloading, and you download that content, then it is your responsibility to keep your word. This is the biggest thing that I find objectionable about the group's methods, and any amount of "but they're bad" won't restore that lost integrity.

Well, that, the bullying that goes on, and the fact that some of your number are doing this specifically to break down an uneasy peace in the community. But those individuals never claimed to be doing otherwise, so pointing it out is hardly worth it. These are all slights to my personal ethics though, nothing that could really be argued from a legal standpoint.

As for games allowing modders to relicense (and/or charge for) custom content, you are right in that very few games have done so in the past. However, at least one game (which I personally can't stand) is doing it now, and doing so extremely successfully. I think that as skills for custom content creation fall further from the techy few and further into the hands of the general community, the more potential such a system has. But that's just speculation.

Any creation placed into the .package is a derivative of EA's creations, EA's code. If it's a recolor, it sits on EA's meshes. If it's a new mesh, it's still in EA's personal format.

And that's why it's a derivative, which doesn't preclude a creator's copyright on the new content. And while it does preclude making a profit from it, I've already covered that several times over.

If it's providing someone's sole income, or is going towards paying other people to make files, it's no longer a bandwidth "donation."

Absolutely. Never disagreed on that front. Can you prove the profit legally?

Arguing back and forth within the community isn't ever going to do shit.

Well duh... But then what exactly is the point of membership in this forum? Or of actively starting threads to provoke such arguments?

As opposed to being labeled uncool and unintelligent for not agreeing with Delphy?

Point taken. Although for clarity's sake, I read "cool" as "cool headed" rather than the American high-schoolism of "popular". Just one of those cultural things I guess.

[lemmiwinks]

"If it's providing someone's sole income, or is going towards paying other people to make files, it's no longer a bandwidth "donation.""

"Absolutely. Never disagreed on that front. Can you prove the profit legally?"

Does the I.R.S. know about paysites? Does the I.R.S. know about TSR?
That would bring things to a head with crystal clarity. If you profit, you must pay tax. If you hide profits, you become a criminal.

[Echo]

Does the I.R.S. know about paysites? Does the I.R.S. know about TSR?

Given that TSR isn't American (at least, I don't think it is?), then probably not (The IRS is US specific). But as for the equivalent GO in their country, I can't say. But asking that question isn't proof unless you actually get an answer from said GO.

[redisenchanted]

Does the I.R.S. know about paysites? Does the I.R.S. know about TSR?

Given that TSR isn't American (at least, I don't think it is?), then probably not (The IRS is US specific). But as for the equivalent GO in their country, I can't say. But asking that question isn't proof unless you actually get an answer from said GO.

Didn't someone from Europe (UK I think) say that they had to pay a value added tax on their TSR subscription?

And please for proof that they are a for-profit industry, why do they pay sites to close down? Why do they refuse to let artists remove their work or cull the sub-par work? It's not about bandwidth costs, everything they are doing is increasing their costs. I have not one shred of pity for them and any of the silly Featured Artists who have sold out to them.