01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 1st comment:
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01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 2nd comment:
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*thinks there's something wrong with the youtube video bbcode*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQC-zS8-s...
01 Nov, 2007, Conner wrote in the 3rd comment:
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:lol: Very very nicely done, but a two minute advertisement for your mud? And are you sure you're not stepping on George Lucas' toes by having it use his music and style and the name Star Wars like that, let alone 20th Century Fox's copyrights? :sad:
01 Nov, 2007, David Haley wrote in the 4th comment:
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Yes, it is quite well done, but yes, this is exactly the kind of stuff that attracts Cease and Desist letters. :thinking: (Actually, I'm kind of surprised that hasn't happened so far with SW MUDs flouting copyright/trademarks all over the place. I don't really have a problem with it but historically LucasFilm has… c.f. the history of SW-themed mods for various games/projects.)
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 5th comment:
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As for the legality of the issue, I was under the impression that LucasArts welcomed fan fiction. Now 20th century fox may not like that so much, but then again I don't see how it hurts them.

If anything, it'd increase popularity for star wars rather than take away from it.

And actually, it's not an advertisement; I had planned on using it as an intro for a website in the future.

Plus, I really don't see LucasArts coming after a MUD. (I actually think George Lucas might enjoy playing a Star Wars MUD)

- Zenn
01 Nov, 2007, kiasyn wrote in the 6th comment:
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Zenn said:
*thinks there's something wrong with the youtube video bbcode*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQC-zS8-s...


Nah, you're meant to use the video ID, not the full url. Fixed your post.

Also, its not George Lucas you have to worry about, its his legal team.
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 7th comment:
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Thanks :lol:

(And as I said, I'm pretty sure that they welcome fan fiction as it seems that it would PROMOTE Star Wars rather than take away from it)

Plus, if they haven't already come after MUDs, I doubt they're going to.

- Zenn
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 8th comment:
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One of my imms said I was on 'Dangerous ground'.

Perhaps.

But perhaps not.

Extract from http://www.intergalacticmedicineshow.com... :

Quote
According to Harold Feld, attorney and Senior Vice President of the Media Access Project, "The copyright act prevents people making derivative works, and recycling it into a story of your own, but there's a catch: The copyright act also permits fair use of someone else's copyright work."

Are authors who permit fan fiction at risk from lawsuit-happy fans? How can both authors and fans protect themselves? What about fans who try to sell their fan fiction, such as Lori Jareo, who wrote a novel-length Star Wars book without permission from LucasArts?


As MUDs are free of charge (most of them anyway, and ALL star wars MUDs) the owners and staff are not gaining in any way from them. As long as this is maintained, I do not believe MUDs are at risk.

- Zenn
01 Nov, 2007, David Haley wrote in the 9th comment:
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Well, sure, but evidence points against you. C&D letters have been sent to several projects based around Star Wars, such as mods for games. You can google for "lucasfilm cease desist" to get several stories, many straight from Star Wars fan sites. The projects were all free, by the way.

Would those C&Ds hold up in court? Good question, I don't really know; but do you want to pay the legal fees to find out? When LucasFilm has (relatively to you) unlimited resources to use against you?

And by the way, just because you're creating a free derivative work doesn't mean you can do whatever you want with it. Of course, if you are making money you are more likely to be noticed, but it doesn't necessarily mean you are violating whatever copyrights they have any less.
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 10th comment:
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Quote
Before Episode I came out, Lucasfilm wanted to ensure that it owned all domain names that could possibly be associated with the film. So it was the job of the attorneys to dream up and register every single domain name they could think of – from phantommenace.com to the-phantom-menace-sucks.org. In fact, fans first learned the name of the film when someone noticed all these domain names getting snapped up. All told, they registered over 500 different domain names.

Two weeks later, they realized they missed one.

A fan registered the domain PhantomMenaceNews.com and began posted news about the film. Lucasfilm consulted their lawyers, and the firm decided to send the fanboy a Cease-and-Desist letter, asking him to stop posting news under that domain name.

Now, for those of you who don’t realize this, a Cease-and-Desist letter does not necessarily mean that the sender believes the recipient is breaking the law or encroaching on the sender’s rights. All that a Cease-and-Desist letter means is there is something the sender would like the recipient to stop doing. The fanboy didn’t need a lawyer to know he was within his rights, and sent Crowell & Moring a letter stating that he was making fair use of Lucasfilm’s trademark – the domain was PhantomMenaceNews, after all, and he was posting news about The Phantom Menace.
New strategy – the attorneys decided to go with a non-litigation solution. They approached the fanboy and said, Okay, you like Star Wars. What can we do for you here? Is there something you want?

According to the prof, Lucasfilm got their domain name. All it cost was some branded swag, a poster signed by George Lucas, and a Wookie costume.


And another thing.

Why would they use infinite resources to go after a tiny, free, text-based fan fiction that 99.999999999999999999999999999999 % people don't know about? (When there are so many other things out there that infringe on copyrights way more[if at all]?)
01 Nov, 2007, David Haley wrote in the 11th comment:
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I'm not sure what point you are trying to make. LucasFilm asked him to stop doing something. They decided to settle it without going to court. If the fanboy had cared about what he was doing and refused to settle, it probably would have gone to court instead. Basically, they bought him…
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 12th comment:
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(I was actually specifically pointing to the part I put in bold, but it wouldn't have made sense unless I'd posted the rest of the related part, too)
01 Nov, 2007, David Haley wrote in the 13th comment:
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To reply to your edit:
Zenn said:
Why would they use infinite resources to go after a tiny, free, text-based fan fiction that 99.999999999999999999999999999999 % people don't know about? (When there are so many other things out there that infringe on copyrights way more[if at all]?)

That's not really the point. Just because they wouldn't bother doesn't mean they couldn't if they chose to do so. Like I said, being free and tiny makes you hard to notice, but it doesn't magically put you into the right.
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 14th comment:
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http://www.echostation.com/features/lfl_...

Just something pretty interesting I found about it.

(And why did we get into legality issues? My original intention for this topic was to see how people would rate the intro :thinking:)
01 Nov, 2007, David Haley wrote in the 15th comment:
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Well, I think Conner and I mentioned it in passing just because it might be something you should watch out for. :smile: There's also something of a principle issue here; I'm not sure I really like when somebody completely copies somebody else's logo but substitutes their name instead. (That said, you did a pretty good job of imitating both logos…)
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 16th comment:
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It was a program specifically designed for doing this.
(Mostly for fanfic movie makers)
Called Star Wars Scrolling Text Generator (SWSTG)
01 Nov, 2007, David Haley wrote in the 17th comment:
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I was referring to the logos in the beginning, not the scrolling text. The concept of scrolling text doesn't belong to Fox or LF, but their corporate identities/trademarks/etc. do.

EDIT: and the music, too…
01 Nov, 2007, Conner wrote in the 18th comment:
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David is right, I wasn't accusing you of anything or trying to elict nearly the response that came about, just alerting you to the fact that you're treading potentially dangerous waters, otherwise, as I said, I think it looks really good, especially if it's intended for part of a website for the mud rather than as a 'banner' or some such, even on radio and television they limit commercials to 30-60 seconds, and it's not just to be able to sell more advertising time, it's actually more to do with the amount of attention span most people have for blatent advertisements. :wink:

Zenn said:
It was a program specifically designed for doing this.
(Mostly for fanfic movie makers)
Called Star Wars Scrolling Text Generator (SWSTG)

Wow, and a program that implies it makes the text work the Way LucasArts uses text in their movie openings also creates an imitation of 20th Century Fox's title logo?
01 Nov, 2007, Conner wrote in the 19th comment:
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DavidHaley said:
I was referring to the logos in the beginning, not the scrolling text. The concept of scrolling text doesn't belong to Fox or LF, but their corporate identities/trademarks/etc. do.

EDIT: and the music, too…


Exactly what I was thinking, that's pretty amazing that a program exists to create the logos and music and such so closely resembling what 20th Century Fox and LucasArts use.
01 Nov, 2007, Zenn wrote in the 20th comment:
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It's true :lol:

Here's the link.

http://alienryderflex.com/crawl/

(The music I had to put together myself, however, and if needbe I could simply edit it to be a different version (noncopyrighted) of the same song)
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