Shutting down some paysites - thoughts and re fair use.

[bethgael]

If your aim is to have paysites shut down rather than having them see that it is actually illegal/immoral/unethical/whatever to make stuff and charge for it against EA's TOS (the one we all agree to when we install the game), therefore making the content free instead, then here's a thought:

There are many sites who make shops based on a commercial venture (eg McDonald's or Krispy Kreme). These corporations are rampant regarding their trade mark images and will send an automatic "cease and desist" order to anyone who usess them. Likewise, Disney, The Simpsons, KMart etc. Note: I am not against anyone making toys/shops for these corporations for the sims -- I am against people expecting to be paid to use IP owned by EA Games and trade marks owned by others. The same people will accuse this site of "stealing" files. Hypocrisy at its best.

Also (and this is a HUGE bugbear to me), sites that download artist's images (such as, for example, the wonderful Jonathan Bowser at http://www.jonathanart.com ) and then throw them on a Maxis mesh as a picture or clothing item (*grr Sapphire Sims*) and expect payment for doing that, need to get a reality check. These people have clearly stolen that artwork. Let the artists know. They will usually send a note or two.  :wink:

Again, I have no objection to clothing and pictures based on other people's art, provided the original artist is fine with it. I also have no objection to people who do this getting kudos throughout the community for their extra work, provided credit is given to the original artist and the content is free. These paysites are the true pirates, if they charge money because they stole someone else's original art.

I tend to respect TS2 custom content artists' wishes simply because that's who I am, whether they have the right to make that assertion or not (eg, I don't mind not sharing an original free mesh, and I am happy to give credit where credit is due). But I will tell non-TS2 original artists when a paysite has used their work without permission. They have the right to know, and then decide if they're happy with the situation or stop it.

I am a huge believer in copyright and trade mark law being there to protect the original creators of IP, but also to promote creativity (as the original legislation intended before conglomerations got involved). Mesh makers and the talented makers of custom content for the sims 2 should be credited, thanked and lauded if their stuff is good. They do put a lot of work into their stuff. They just shouldn't be paid for making something from an intellectual property base that doesn't belong to them.

For the record, I work in the arts industry and am well-versed with US, Euro and Australian copyright, patents and trade mark law. All custom content for any computer game is covered by "fair use" and it is therefore neither illegal to make or share such content, whether the custom content creator charges for it or not, provided such content is free.

It becomes more complicated when textures are involved.

An example: Enayla's wonderful skins (they're free). The skins cannot be governed by copyright, as they are based on the maxi's code and mesh and for the game. However, the paintjob she did for them is covered by copyright, as Enayla is the originator of that art. By putting her original art in a maxis game, she has (according to her agreement with EA in TS2 TOS) therefore given tacit permission for her skins to be distributed freely.

BUT, if anyone was to take the art used on the skins (the leaves and patterns) and use them in another (non Maxis/EA) media, then charge for it, she'd have the right to have that person sued for use of her original art.

The broohaha about this site "stealing" work is uninformed at best (how can you steal something you paid for?).

[Soup Parrot]

I thought about this, but based on what I saw in Poser Community, bad idea it could impact all sims creations negatively. Let me tell you a story.

There was once and artist creator and her husband team, they created a competetitor website to Renderosity, 3D commune, 3D Daz, RDNA, called Poser Pros. I think at one point she was branching into Sims 2 with a small forum, I remember seeing her small site, I think it had some sims pay stuff. She had two collections of swatches, which people had bought to make commercial textures with mostly for Poser models. LOTS of people had these sets and she made a lot of money off them. Well their site had grown, had really taken off. Then one day she got in a bruhahha about 2-3 years ago (how time flies), with a famous web designer of good repute, who had, had some products up at Poser pros. Well, the tiffs got posted publicly in her forum.

The webdesigner wanted with her permission to make a package of swatches based off hers. She sent her a sample of what she'd like to do. Mehndi cried copyright violation. Well the web designer had commercial icense to William Morris patterns, so she was upset, and suggested that Mendhi's swatches were stolen. Well now other members involved, started investigating. They found that Mendhi's seamless patterns of Morris were matching a wallpaper company's online swatches. Someone had contacted the company with samples and questions. They were told they had bought commercial rights to use Morris works, but their pattern was slightly altered and copyrighted. Both Mendhi and this wallpaper company were American. Now the wallpaper company's lawyers was contacting Mendhi and her husband to sue for copyright violation. Poserpros fate was up in the air. To save it she  sold the site to DAZ3d, current owners. I never heard what all happened with Mendhi and wallpaper company afterwards, as she lost all reputation, and had a lot of angry people at her. All the swatches were not legal to use, every site they had to pull their commercial works and revise them.

So this produced a ripple of fear through all Poser sites, they toughened up laws for free and commercial product submissions, to protect themselves against being sued. So can you imagine the panic, MTS2 other sites would feel, at the threat of a lawsuit, so much free stuff could be pulled, even though I don't think free sites are at jeopardy. The only thing is I had taken a class in copyright, by copyright lawyer. In Exnem, and others who countries obey copyright laws, and all them they are looking at if caught getting sued, pecause they are taking a copyrighted image, etc, and selling it commercially. But, in the case of using something freely that is used for fun freely in a game by the public, no charge, it would be hard case to fight in court.

 I laugh at all these copyrghts term of use things that are coming with freebies. Car models and cars are copyrighted by car companies, I found this out in poser world. Basically illegal to use in advertisement, then some little content creator is going to dictate terms to me of usage, on a trademarked item, with a borrowed model. Same with electronic brandname stuff, or fashion designers photo made clothers. Do you know the original artist that took the picture of the dress owns that photo. tHey wouldnt of been able to create tthe dress without the photo, etc. if you originally created or designed it bravo, but there are lots of #D models out there for free that could probably be convered to game meshes like the cars. Some artists are honest and say this isnt my model, I got it here etc but I think to give us a terms of use is too much.

   :evil:

[stim]

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.

[Marhis]

Thanks for this thread and your posts, they're very very interesting, as they opens mind even more to this complex issue, and add very useful infos.

Now I'm thinking that the fact that real professional artists and programmers are just those who care less of the profitability of sims' custom stuff, and the most open to free use of their works. There has to be a logical reason for this.

This make sense: the most professional you are, the most you know for real HOW this things work. Besides, the most idiotic your terms of use or "copyrights" demands are, the most you are only a loser wannabe.
I don't know exactly why, but all this makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside .

I could bet that the most part of great modders are also real programmers, who's job is writing code. Uh-oh, coincidence: the same most part also share their mods for free.
Personal story: I'm a Linda Bergkvist's works fan by many years, as she is a famous world-wide fantasy artist, and I felt very (and happily) surprised when discovered that she were Enayla in this community.
Guess how many paysites she has and how restrictive is her policy?

[stim]

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

[bethgael]

Yes, she is very, very talented.

See, professionals in the industry (coders, artists) understand what copyright really means.

[stim]

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.

[Soup Parrot]

Stim Im not saying  all free stuff is stolen. On the autos, I will search and find the forum dialoque over at DAZ3D that explains this, about cars as one freelance professional found out. There are strict rules on poser and most meshes with free stuff to, you do not have the right to redistrubute, alter mesh in any format, they are copyrighted. They were not made in EA games product or for that format.

Stim POSER artist do mind  and do not allow their meshes to be converted and distributed in games, thats a violation of EULA. I know because I have seen these questions asked in copyright forum over at Renderosity, and how mad they get and its a no no even if its free. When you buy a mesh set or textures , you can only use it to make artwork with, these cannot be put in any kind of distributable format whether its free or for profit. You cannot alter the meshes either.Now if you buy skin kits etc, different EULA. Many artists are not aware of their work being stolen, or the person is in a nation where they cannot enforce international laws. If you have proof meshes are being stolen, you need to contact the Artist and site their mesh is sold at. They have ways of opening stuff up and looking at it to know. I have lots of EULA for Poser as I have boughten much, if I could attach Eula I would. i will have to see if I can find several online. They may in some countries if the cant sue to shut down the site. They have done it, I have seen it.

also., I think you lost my point. If say Harry goes over to Brad who has a bunch of Car models he created, gets permission for game use. Converts it, puts it at MSs2 and gives you his copyright, and terms of usage, not Brads whos the meshes copyright holder. he has no authority to because he's not the mesh owner, brad is the owner. now do you get it?

Anyways what you didnt understand was I was saying that fear went through all sites, whether item was free or pay fear of being sued changed  how everything was done, severely. Some things had to be pulled. If there was a massive crackdown from various places on paysites, and paysites were forced to shut down fear could ripple down to Insim, MTS2, putting stricter guidelines up, etc, even though their free. When I was working on my portfolio close to graduating you could have nothing from Disney, real company, etc. You could make up companies, even though a portfolio is not a product you sale, its a no no. We were told horror stories about Disney. One Daycare center painted a wall of Disney characters, they got reported, had to take it down. You think Disney would love Kids around the stuff, so they would want all their movies and stuff. Doesnt work that way though.

[bethgael]

You're making perfect sense to me. I hope you feel better soon.

But this is what owners of paysites don't undestand when they say that they are only charging for their work. Stephanie Pulman-Law is a good example, for she gave permission for (limited) use of her original work.

EA/Maxis have done the same with their game. In effect, this is called a limited "creative commons license". What that does is say, "Ok, you can take our work and modify it, under these conditions" (and conditions follow). This is the original intention of copyright law: protect the original owner of the original work, while allowing others to make use of it, build on it and encourage creatvity. It does not allow for anyone making any sort of profit from their work, unless the original owner specifies they can, because their work on the packages, while creative, good work in many cases, is still using a base the creator doesn't actually own. They cannot copyright the resultant package.

And, even if they tried to, copyright law in the US doens't allow for prosecution unless that copyright is registered (this is not currently the case in euro/australia, although I suspect with Australia's new Free Trade Agreement with the US our much more balanced copyright law may fly out the window).

Under world law, copyright only protects original work. Any created package is not an original work, it is an extension of EA/Maxi's original work under creative commons. Therefore, paysites have no legal right to charge for the packages.

I have had some trouble trying to explain this to mesh makers (who pm'd me on another site), because of the insistence that they should be rewarded for their work. No. These (very talented in many cases) creators do what they do voluntarily under the agreement they made with maxis when they installed the game. Good cc makers understand this, and offer their stuff for free and choose to bear the cost. They may ask for donations, but it shouldn't be a precondition of download -- the policy MTS2, Insimenator.net and others work under is legal, paysites are not.

While it is absolutely NOT OK for another person to use another's meshes or textures and claim them as their own, neither is it OK for ccers to use the .package format and charge for it, for it is, likewise, not theirs to charge for.

Another analogy is this:

Why don't people charge for sims stories and other fanfic? We pay in the shops for books. The reason is this: we understand that, while the story I write is itself my copyrighted work, the images that go with them are not: they are based on a game I did not create and therefore can not demand payment for (or, in the case of most fanfic, characters I did not create).

I could take out the sim images, rewrite the story later and sell it freely as a novel, stripped of sims references (including well-known Maxis sims like Goopy, etc), because I do own the story, and I own the story from the moment I write it down/type it into my hard drive, with or without registration or a copyright symbol (although, in the US, I couldn't take action on a copyright violation without registration but publishers take care of that).  And yes, online stories are covered by this copyright in every country that follows world copyright protocol, including the US, Australasia and Euro: online publishing is still publishing.

What I cannot do is breach the CCL granted to me by Maxis/EA when I installed the game and sell the pictures that go along with it, even if I did work very hard on getting the camera angles just so or spent many hours making cc for my personal use (as I do).

I hope that makes what I've been saying clearer. I'm sorry for the long ramble, but I'm hoping some of the pay owners will read this and see some sense, and this is probably the only forum I can freely try to explain the actual law without being flamed/banned.  I have the utmost resopect for the creativity in the sims2 community.

It is true that "cease and desist" orders must be produced before legal action -- and, in point of law, many of these are handed out willy nilly in breach of "fair use" and are done so to scare people off (I could point to one here in Oz where a man surnamed McDonald was "requested" to remove his own name from his business name, along with sporting Tshirts for a footy team his business sponsored, because the US conglomerate didn't like him using it.  the case went to court. The restaurant lost). But that's the point. In the case of paysites, willy-nilly wouldn't apply, though. They are clearly disregarding the license they agreed to by installing the game.

[bethgael]

You think Disney would love Kids around the stuff, so they would want all their movies and stuff. Doesnt work that way though.

Yes. I hold Disney responsible for some of the less legal "cease and desists" people get. They are one of the companies that overdo copyright protection and fenagle fair use (the daycare co would/should be protected under fair use). The irony is that Walt himself was a huge believer in what we now call creative commons. He'd be twisting in his grave.

To elaborate on the rest of your post: it is not OK for Harry to take Brad's mesh and claim ownership on it for the Sims 2 packages. Brad does hold the copyright, on the mesh alone. However, Brad does not own the copyright to the resulting Sims car, and neither does Harry. Why? The resulting package made is a code owned by Maxis, and the car he based the auto on is owned by the company who built it. In fact, that last bit could even negate Brad's "ownership" of the mesh, as he copied it from someone else. Having said that, I believe the mesh would fall under the same useage as it would if he had painted an image of the car: the artist owns the picture, not the car company.

Over-reaction by any site doesn't negate the law.

[Soup Parrot]

beth,
I think where the issue is lets take the car issue here a minute. Though the artist that created the car model, the car company gets em because it bears their trademarked company logo and name of it. My point was one guy, made the model to use for all or most 3D apps. The sim content maker converts it to work in  the game and then tells us what we may or may not do with it, like hes the copyright owner hes not. I was merely talking about the illogic etc. the reason why I brought that up I was over reading Delphy's post on the board. That bothered me a lot. I'm seriously thinking of writing EA for clarification, whether they will answer me or not, Im tired of all these copyright claims. I saw this with PSP when the  people stole the images for the tubes etc. It was ridiculous. Anyways I think Maxis, after reading through tons of Spore data is going to have control of that content, it sounds like there will be all these sophisticated things in the game, to keep people from being able to do what they did with Sims. I was reading an article where Will Wright said too much of the sims CC has too much noise and whistles in it.

[bethgael]

Soup, I don't think we're disagreeing here.

I used to be a member of the PSP User's Group, way back in... my god, was it really 7 years ago? I was heather_ozzie then, iirc.  I remember a brouhaha there re tubes, and in this case, the image makers were rightfully upset... except that no-one was actually charging for the tubes (that I ever saw, anyways). The issue was credit, I thought, and using original work without permission. I think I've already mentioned that I don't agree with even free sites using an artist's original work without even giving that artist the right to object.

I have been involved in a lot of fun CRPG communities, too (usually as bethgael) and I have never, ever seen anyone charging for any of the game mods or add-ons for Baldur's Gate, Age of Wonders, NWN, etc., even where some (myself included) have spent, literally, weeks in actual time recoding mods and add-ons for a game. One BGII fan spent almost nine months building a game add-on that put a decent romance plotline into the game for females and also an alternative Kiven/Deheriana plot for the guy players who didn't really want to fall in love with Kivan, a popular BGI NPC who wasn't actually included in the sequel. If anyone tried to charge *gasp* money for them, they'd be flamed off the forum.

The Sims Paysites are unique in the gaming world that way, I think.

[BlueSoup]

lol I posted a link to this thread on S2C, but it got deleted.    You guys should really post some of this stuff in the paysites thread there.

[Soup Parrot]

I played Zoo Tycoon no one ever charged either. They asked for donations, then the company did a second release and ruined the game.
Lets hope seasons doest bury sims with glitches!

You know what do you think will be next after seasons, I hope they bring in some Sim City Elements.

[bethgael]

lol I posted a link to this thread on S2C, but it got deleted.    You guys should really post some of this stuff in the paysites thread there.

Good fucking grief, Blue. Keeping an eye on flaming and what-have-you is one thing, but when did education become anathema?

PS Feel free to quote me, as she suggests.