Gross.

El oh el at the prospect of EA determining the actions of thousands of twelve year olds. Cause, you know, we all should do what large corporations tell us to, cause they're all large and shit.

OMG, Mom, we have to buy all this shit on the intarnets because EA told me too!

Murdoch. Myspace is a horrible abomination. I appologize for every single person that is my age who is responsible for its ickiness.  Yes, I do feel responsible, my roommate in high school was the original myspace whore.

I hate her.

Large corporations usually don't care what is happening with their stuff if no one is making money. In fact, it is now very well known to marketing and PR departments in the entertainment industry that taking away fans' freebies costs money. Marvel has been burned, as has Star Trek.

If they do care, they'll send a cease & desist letter as required by law before they can legally sue for infringement. It's up to the corporation then to make sure if the C&D has been complied with or not.  In most cases, it's too much of a hassle for them to spend the time on stuff that isn't exchanging monies. The only real instance I've ever heard of in this community is when Muffy at TSR had to change her username and (mayber) her avatar. And they only went after her because members of this community were starting to associate the name Muffy for her, and not the character franchise.

Since China entered the WTO, and was backed by more than a few US & Japanese corporations in making it the worlds industrial darling, China loves copyright. The government loves to please those with money. Unfortunately, that's exactly that. If, say, Disney or Toyota came knocking on their door, they'd listen. They'd jump through hoops and not only prove that the situation was taken care of, but everyone responsible was fired, everyone responsible for fixing the mess was given a raise, and they cured cancer along the way.

Poser artists, though, didn't invest billions of dollars in their economy.

They didn't even make the same quarter.

I love how she's so awesome, that it's her we have a problem with.

Oh noes! You're making money legally! We-hate-you-so-much-we-have-been-foiled-what-are-we-going-to-dooooo?

EA doesn't care what we do. Those two points you bring up make it pretty clear. If they cared, that would nipped in the bud immediately.

Actually, in their eyes, not answering this question and letting the community deal with it is very favorable to them. The more drama about this and the more people become involved, the longer their franchise lives. When people are in battle, they aren't just going to leave the community and stop buying the games. In fact, they are more likely to stay longer than they otherwise would have done, because now they have a purpose. They have to win!

Uh....spore may be free form pixel dollies, but still pixel dollies no less.

Uh, that's not  those either. Reincarnation, yes, but neither religion really believes in sin, or evil for that matter.

No, no, I understood you. And I didn't think you thought all third party work was stolen either. I think something got lost between my brain to fingers though, sorry about that. Painkillers, blah.

I was trying to explain that while being sued might be a big fear, it really shouldn't effect free sites because they'd have to get those cease & desist orders. They don't have to worry about residuals in paying for licensing for registered trademarks and such from corporations such as Disney. Paysites, however, have a lot to fear over that because they are profiting from something that under no interpretation of the law is theirs. Free sites are fine because if they get the C&D, they just remove stuff.

I'm curious as to how many members here are involved in related industries. Since I'm a guild member, its difficult for me to gauge just how much of this is a "those-in-the-know" versus "those-not-in-the-know" or just a "smart people" versus "sheeple."

If that makes sense. I have a feeling a lot of what I've been posting today and yesterday has sounded odd due to me being on massive amounts of painkillers due to surgery the other day.

Linda Bergkvist is Enayla?!  Holy crap that's awesome.

Being sued cannot happen with no first action. For legal proceedings to begin, a cease and desist order must be sent first. Lawsuits can't just materialize out of nowhere without this order.

In fact, if I recall, Retail Sims received such a letter from Starbucks over one of her sets.

Free sites would have nothing to fear because they aren't making monies off registered trademarks and such. It's just once you start making money, you not only have to remove the files, you also have to turn over all the profits you made.  Could get quite interesting, indeed, in paysite land.



On another note, not all third party artwork that is turned into stuff by modders is stolen. Stephanie Pui-Mun Law allowed all of her paintings to be put on painting meshes for Sims 1 (not sure about Sims 2) so long as you asked and placed credit in the file.

Holy crap, I remember when those guys went in to business. If I recall properly, they are the original implementors of Thomas's buying creators model. It was so long ago, I can't remember who it was, but I swear to it they bought off some Sims 1 sites to switch over to Simhost. Not anywhere near the payout of TSR though, I bet.

I just remember being so pissed off when they announced their little scheme, especially when Killer Sims hopped on their little band wagon.