19 Feb, 2009, JohnnyStarr wrote in the 1st comment:
Votes: 0
Hey all,

Just a quick question.
I have a SciFi mud in the works, and its going to be kind of a crazy
mix of all my favorite SciFi Movies, Shows.
The codebase is a ROM derivative, so of course its going to be FREE to the public.

However, i'm sure production companies would only care if i was charging or something?

What steps need to be taken in order to "legally" use non-origonal storylines, chars etc?
19 Feb, 2009, Cratylus wrote in the 2nd comment:
Votes: 0
staryavsky said:
What steps need to be taken in order to "legally" use non-origonal storylines, chars etc?


Short answer: It depends.

Lucas doesn't care if you use Star Wars stuff, so long as you don't make money.
Paramount used to care if you did Star Trek stuff, apparently no longer…or maybe so?

Some authors have deals with muds already meaning you'd be subject to
for-real legal persecution if the muds that pay for that IP get wind of your infringement.
Yes, persecution. You know how mud admins are.

Some have deals with video game companies but secretly give a nod and wink
when asked for permission, then "forget" when asked in public.

Some of them could not possibly care less what you do. Some of them feel
personally raped and murdered if you use their stuff without permission.

The only simple answer is "It depends".

Beyond that: "ask for permission".

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net

PS "legally"
19 Feb, 2009, Guest wrote in the 3rd comment:
Votes: 0
Copyright and trademark are two different things.

For copyright, they don't have to do anything in order for that copyright to remain valid. So in a lot of cases people can get away with a lot before a company finally steps in and orders you to stop. Generally companies aren't going to go on witch hunts against copyright violators unless they start hauling in money or distribute in large quantities. Just don't get the idea that this means you're in the clear for operating for free. As Cratylus points out, a lot of authors are aggressive about it.

Trademark though, that's a whole other animal. For instance, if you run off and call the MUD "Battlestar Galactica" there's every chance that you'll get sued, and sued hard. The Sci-Fi Channel may have little choice. Trademarks must be defended in the legal arena or they run the risk of losing their value. So while Lucas may be OK with you using the Star Wars universe and the general "Star Wars" name, he may not be able to be so forgiving if you insist on having Luke Skywalker and Han Solo in your game.
20 Feb, 2009, JohnnyStarr wrote in the 4th comment:
Votes: 0
You know, that just doesn’t make any sense to me.
Like, people get famous for stupid stuff like "Chad Vader".
I don’t see why a FREE text game would not be allowed to include
some characters or worlds from a companies stories.

Just for fun, say i had a blog, and in this blog i had a conversation
about star wars, galactica, and firefly?
Here's the similarities:

Multi user environment.
Open to the internet public.
Members, guests.
Channels, posting.
Friends.

The list goes on and on.

Yet, what, is Lucas arts or SciFi going to go shut down all the blogs and forums
out there? I guess its more an Ethical question than a Legal one.

No, i don’t think that it makes sense that a company is going to go after a 40+ end user text game. But my argument stands that if it is illegal to have freedom of speech in a mud, than 90% of the internet (blogs, forums, networks) is illegal, full of copyright infringements.
20 Feb, 2009, Cratylus wrote in the 5th comment:
Votes: 0
I don't think you understood the answers you were provided.

Star Wars, for one, is an example of a property that is generally
regarded as safe to include in your free game. Whether Han Solo
being a focus of the game is a red line, dunno, maybe debatable.
But broadly speaking you can have stormtroopers and jedis and
wtfever and nobody will care. That's SW. For other properties, you
need to do your homework.

As for 90% of the internet infringing…well, welcome to the internet.
You asked about how to do things legal like, those answers are
a good start.

Some more interesting reading:

http://mu.wikia.com/wiki/MUDs_and_Licens...

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net
20 Feb, 2009, David Haley wrote in the 6th comment:
Votes: 0
staryavsky said:
I guess its more an Ethical question than a Legal one.

In the end of the day, no, it is an entirely legal question, and we can only hope that ethics inform the legal system (while knowing that that isn't always the case). You can't reason about these things based on how you think things should be, because in the end of the day that is irrelevant. If the Big Guys disagree with you, and care, they'll sue you; if other "normal citizens" of the MUD world disagree with you, you are likely to be persecuted, as Crat said (note the difference between persecution and prosecution – the latter is probably a gentler fate in this case… :tongue:)

staryavsky said:
Just for fun, say i had a blog, and in this blog i had a conversation

Talking about something is very different from producing a work based on something that you present as your own. It's perfectly fine to talk about things: people do it all the time, for instance in magazine reviews, forums, whatever. But there's a big difference between doing that, and then going off and making your own Star Wars movie that you present in cinemas and so on.

There is also the issue of "fair use" when it comes to copyright. Making a whole game based on something does not fall into the "fair use" category, I would assume :wink:

staryavsky said:
I don't see why a FREE text game would not be allowed to include some characters or worlds from a companies stories.

Being free or for-pay has nothing to do with it unless the copyright holder explicitly licenses the work for non-commercial purposes or something like that. However, being free is likely to make people more indulgent toward you, or simply not care at all. For example, LucasFilm/Arts thinks that it is to their benefit to allow fan fiction, because it creates and maintains interest in the Star Wars universe, helping them sell their games, movies, books, etc.

staryavsky said:
But my argument stands that if it is illegal to have freedom of speech in a mud

This has nothing whatsoever to do with freedom of speech…
20 Feb, 2009, Guest wrote in the 7th comment:
Votes: 0
staryavsky said:
But my argument stands that if it is illegal to have freedom of speech in a mud, than 90% of the internet (blogs, forums, networks) is illegal, full of copyright infringements.


You already got good answers to the other stuff, but I feel this needs driving home in a big way. "Freedom of Speech" only applies to actions from the government. Basically meaning the feds can't stop you from talking about Star Wars. They can't (legally) stop you from talking about them in a bad way, or making fun of Obama, or whatever. When you shift over to the private sector though, all bets are off. You no longer have the same level of freedom. For example, your boss at work can tell you you're not allowed to badmouth the company. Or that you can't use work time to sit around and chat about your favorite songs or movies. You may even find yourself in hot water for blogging about your job in your spare time.

There's also the rather small detail that Freedom of Speech does nothing to protect you from criminal or civil liability in a copyright infringement case.
20 Feb, 2009, Skol wrote in the 8th comment:
Votes: 0
Cratylus said:


Quote
So my Diku-based mud will always have to display the credits?

Yes. You'll also have to follow all other stipulations in your license, such as not profiting from the work or taking donations.

Donations was cleared as acceptable by the original holders. I don't have the link in front of me, but I believe Tyche posted it? Just not donations for perks/pay for perk types.
20 Feb, 2009, David Haley wrote in the 9th comment:
Votes: 0
Skol said:
Donations was cleared as acceptable by the original holders.

I would be very, very interested to see this verified. It's been one of the sillier interpretations of the license IMO and it would be nice to see that they're not trying to cover donations, which I'm not sure is even legal to begin with.
20 Feb, 2009, KaVir wrote in the 10th comment:
Votes: 0
DavidHaley said:
Skol said:
Donations was cleared as acceptable by the original holders.

I would be very, very interested to see this verified. It's been one of the sillier interpretations of the license IMO and it would be nice to see that they're not trying to cover donations, which I'm not sure is even legal to begin with.



"I feel it is important that i make clear how i see the limits of the licence; You should know i am not against donations as such, and he may sell his merchandise as he pleases, but he may not use the game directly for this. The way i usually define this is if the players get some tangible modification within the game for their donations. Then it becomes commercialized. They pay for a service that is within the game.

I have no wish, nor any legal background for stopping donations made from commercials on the website, that offer no compensation game-wise. Nor have i any wish for preventing people selling merchandise on their website, that is related to the game (titled tshirts, mousepads etc..) .. in fact i recommend that you get your money this way."

– Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt (29th August 2000)



"I just want to make clear where exactly the licence applies. And that is of course where using the sourcecode we have supplied, or sourcecode derived from our work.

If you give people any in-game benefits for their donations, you are in fact giving a service for the money you have rescieved. That is a commercial transaction, and thus you are commercializing our work. This we object to.

What i wanted to make clear, is that legally and morally we have no control of what you do, that you do not use our work for. Thus, if you want to sell mousepads and whatever from your website, we will not object.

If people want to donate money to you, personally, without having any services rendered using our software, we will not object to this. But if you use our software to render services for money or goods you rescieve, this we object to, as you are then commercializing our software. That we object to."

– Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt (1st September 2000)
20 Feb, 2009, Hades_Kane wrote in the 11th comment:
Votes: 0
As others have said, your best bet would be a bit of research.

I would suggest you first make a list of the sci-fi elements you wish to incorporate.

Let's say you have a short list consisting of: Star Wars, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Firefly

Next I would then do a bit of googling to see if there is any precedent or reliable answers already existing. I think posting on MUD forums if anyone has any concrete answers would be good too. This would be a good starting point. Checking the official websites, if any, of any of these themes would be good too, particularly FAQs and the Terms of Service on a lot of the websites will often times list what you can and can't do. If you can't find any reliable answers this way, generally there will be contact information on these websites and if you are wanting to keep things as legal as possible, asking would be the best way to go about it.

If in the future you want to expand to any further themes, repeat the process.

This would be the safest and most legal way to go about it.

However, not everyone necessarily goes about things in this way. I would be especially careful to make sure you aren't infringing upon any other MUD's exclusive rights to material, because that's probably the easiest way to make sure you get in some sort of trouble. But, generally speaking, "themed" games that haven't obtained official permission from the companies are very, very prevalent in the MUDing community, and so long as those games are abiding by all of the licenses of their codebases and aren't infringing upon any of the other MUDs, a good portion of the community tends to be accepting enough of those games.

Now I'm not encouraging you not to do things the legal way, I'm just stating my experience. Generally, most people seem to be accepting that I'm running a Final Fantasy themed game, but I have been the target of some ire from a few certain individuals over that fact. I understand the risks I'm taking, and I understand I could be shut down or sued over it. I personally feel that I'm doing nothing wrong, despite I understand what I'm doing may be illegal. Others disagree. The law would probably disagree. I'm not convinced Square Enix would genuinely disagree, despite the cookie cutter legal response listed on their website.

But, I really, really don't want to turn this thread into another one concerned over whether or not in my particular instance I'm doing something right or wrong, legal or illegal.

The point of my post is you have options as to how to proceed, and while I would recommend you do things the legal way, I just caution you to know exactly what you are getting yourself into should you choose not to.
20 Feb, 2009, David Haley wrote in the 12th comment:
Votes: 0
:sigh: I wish I'd seen those before. (Do you have a source? I'm not questioning, just curious where it was published)
If this has been out there for so long, why have people still been debating it?

EDIT: I was replying to KaVir, in case that wasn't clear.
20 Feb, 2009, KaVir wrote in the 13th comment:
Votes: 0
DavidHaley said:
:sigh: I wish I'd seen those before. (Do you have a source? I'm not questioning, just curious where it was published)


I'm afraid the quotes are from emails, they weren't posted publically. I know they're real because I was one of the people who received them, but you would need to contact Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt if you wished to verify them for yourself.

DavidHaley said:
If this has been out there for so long, why have people still been debating it?


I didn't think there was any debate over donations without benefits, except perhaps for people running CircleMUD.
20 Feb, 2009, Hades_Kane wrote in the 14th comment:
Votes: 0
DavidHaley said:
If this has been out there for so long, why have people still been debating it?


I didn't think there was any debate over donations without benefits, except perhaps for people running CircleMUD.



I'm quite surprised you've never actually seen this before. I've seen KaVir post these quotes numerous, numerous times.

The popular argument against this, though, is that is simply ONE creator expressing his wishes and that it isn't a part of the license, and clarifying intent later on would have no affect on the original license.

I choose to respect the Diku/Merc/Rom licenses myself, no matter what loopholes that could be argued against them.
20 Feb, 2009, David Haley wrote in the 15th comment:
Votes: 0
KaVir said:
I didn't think there was any debate over donations without benefits, except perhaps for people running CircleMUD.

I've seen it come up from time to time, even here I believe, although I don't know the links off-hand.
20 Feb, 2009, David Haley wrote in the 16th comment:
Votes: 0
Hades_Kane said:
The popular argument against this, though, is that is simply ONE creator expressing his wishes and that it isn't a part of the license, and clarifying intent later on would have no affect on the original license.

The creators are the only one who even could sue, so clarifying intentions is as good as changing the license for any practical purpose. The only relevant question is what power this one creator has over the license w.r.t. the other creators.

Hades_Kane said:
I choose to respect the Diku/Merc/Rom licenses myself, no matter what loopholes that could be argued against them.

If we're being technical, you're actually only respecting your interpretation of them – which can be rather orthogonal to what the authors think, especially if they state that as much. So you'd be respecting a license that nobody cares about. :wink:
21 Feb, 2009, Guest wrote in the 17th comment:
Votes: 0
Hades_Kane said:
I'm not convinced Square Enix would genuinely disagree, despite the cookie cutter legal response listed on their website.


This struck a chord with me for some reason, perhaps because a situation similar to this has come up with me personally before. I had two users awhile back who used my services to host their MUDs. Both of them decided they weren't going to pay their bills anymore. In the same month. When their paid time periods ran out, their accounts were locked out. When they failed to respond to attempts to collect after 30 days, I deleted their information. On day 31, the first guy nastygrammed me saying I was going to get sued and that he was turning me in to my ISP. About a week later, the second guy did the same. I dismissed them both as idle threats. Until my ISP contacted me to inform me they'd received two complaints about breaching their Terms of Service. It was just a courtesy notice. Nothing came of it.

Why?

Because I'd made prior arrangements in writing with the ISP to do what I do with my servers. Even though they swore up and down, left and right, when I first switched over to them that I'd not have any issues with it, I had their accounting and customer service people give me a verifiable written statement telling me I was ok with running paid hosting from my account. This arrangement has never been publicized anywhere, but I've mentioned it before. But it's one of those things end users usually don't know about. So they assume the terms they can find can be used as a bludgeon against someone. It was also good I made them send it to me in writing, because they'd made a notation in the account profile in their database about it. So we all got a good laugh at how someone on the internet thought they'd get someone into legal trouble over something they had no knowledge of.

For whatever that little story was worth :)
21 Feb, 2009, Igabod wrote in the 18th comment:
Votes: 0
sounds similar to what happened with evileyehosting. Michael had a deal with his ISP that contradicted the TOS. Somebody here (I forget who) made a point of contacting his ISP and complaining that he was breaking the terms. Nothing happened to Michael because he had a deal with the ISP, but similar story to yours samson.

In regards to the use of luke and han in a starwars game, Lucas has no problem with that either. He has stated numerous times in numerous different ways that this is ok. There is a TON of fan fiction that revolves around Han Solo before the time of the movies. Also, the swr and swfote codebases both have a Luke Skywalker mob in them and probably a couple other major characters as well.

[edit to add this link]http://www.mudbytes.net/index.php?a=topi... This is the thread about Michael's problem I mentioned earlier.
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