The interesting thing is that we can argue about IP and it’s ramifications all we want.
What is not open for debate is what the Staff decides to do in terms of action needed. Citing overuse of powers isn’t going to cut it when we have to fight GW in court as to why we did not take action. I’d rather we overreact the no action at all. I don’t know about you but the last thing I want to do is get involved in a legal battle all the way to Europe.
In short you’ll find we rarely drop the hammer if ever, or do so without due consideration.
Finally considering we have had IP troubles before, GW sending cease and desist to sites… The Staff is going to be hyper vigilant rather then lax. Sorry, but the over all community is more important than whether or not GW or the Staff is overstepping bounds. Debate it sure but this is where we are coming from.
Why are we debating the moral philosophy of IP infringement and copyright theft? Bottom line: CDO is not a site that’s interested in flying under the radar so it can give its members stuff for free. This is not a forum for file sharing. CDO is trying to raise its profile, and not by drawing the ire of an international games company, so they have a vested interest in obeying the law. Now, you and I may disagree with the law for whatever reason, and maybe if we hired an expensive lawyer and went to court to debate the whys and whereofs of the situation we might even win…but that’s not going to happen, is it?
There is no benefit to CDO allowing IP theft, but there are a lot of drawbacks, so you do the maths.
Usually GW doesn't actually own rights to it. but rather leases it from the original artist.
Perhaps that was once the case, but last time I checked the deal was 'They own the IP and the artist doesn't'. At all. They got some noticeable negative press from that among illustrators I seem to remember, Rights grabbing and so forth. Probably depends who is commissioned; Mark Gibbons can probably get a good deal out of them, some newbie would not be so lucky.
I’m pretty sure all their art is done in-house these days, so they would own the rights. Their artists are employees of the company, performing services for a fixed salary rather than being commissioned for individual pieces. At least, that’s what I imagine.
There were a number of problems with copyright in the past so GW now do everything in-house, all is owned by them (except for the deals they make with other companies like the PC games).
The big filesharing sites can get away with copyright infringement because they can’t check every file. YouTube were sued for it and barely got away with that excuse (with 20 hours of video being uploaded every second apparently). With a forum of this size, there is no way we’d be able to use that, it is more than reasonable to expect that the mods can check everything within a short amount of time.
by giving out something for free, even from their website, GW forfeits copyright, and that can be read in their own license.
Gar Shadowfame
However, if that is true (I have no evidence either way), the download conditions of this file ("Click here if you agree" etc), state that you agree not to re-distribute them. This can be taken as a contract, so they're covered under other laws in that case.
Now, people do tend, as you seem to have, that morality and legality are the same
my thoughts are contrary...
Gar Shadowfame
I sit corrected, however, that seems to be the intent of your posts from my reading of them.
I'm pretty sure all their art is done in-house these days, so they would own the rights.
Thommy H
Basically, following a rights debacle in the late 80's/early 90's (I forget exactly when), they now have everything as in-house and/or work-for-hire (that is, a specifically commissioned piece to which the creator surrenders rights), so it can't happen again.
using something ,what YOU have in original- you MAY do copy.
You CAN’T sell copys, you CAN’T sell “free items” and you CAN’T claim rights to the materials which are not your own invention- but still you CAN do copies for personal use NOT for sell.
(And so is with movies, mp3, books etc…- as told me my friend lawyer)
Summing-free magic card, you can use freely, copy, etc… but indicating that it is a GW product.
If it were the opposite - 99% of players would violate the law. Each makes a copy of this or that. Even the “casting” of the GS would be breaking the law. Therefore, if you have the original, or something is free you can do this copy and use.
I don’t think Gamezone are affecting GW’s profit margin in the slightest. They’re a niche within a niche, and if they ever were to make a dent with their derivative products, they’d likely get crushed. Right now though, destroying Gamezone probably isn’t worth the amount it would cost to prosecute across borders.
From common sense. They’ve never taken legal action against Gamezone - if it had ever gotten as far as a court it would have been all over the internet (or at least this corner of it). They may have attempted sending them cease and desist orders, but GW generally don’t kick up a fuss over models that are similar to theirs, since their own products are fairly derivative. They certainly wouldn’t take legal action against a company from another country because it would be prohibitively expensive to do so, and Gamezone aren’t eating up enough of their profit margin to make it worthwhile.
Scibor is smallest than Gamezone but for some reason you do not like Scibor more..
:)
Balseraph
I have no idea how these two things are related.
The reference to Scibor was about how he got started: press-moulding and casting GW parts to put in his conversions which he sold on eBay. Now he sculpts his own stuff, which just happens to not be very good - my dislike of his work isn't related to the copyright infringement he committed back in the day.
Gamezone can do what they want. I think they're boring because, hey, we already have GW producing figures that look like GW figures. Why do we need more of the same? But I don't think what they do is that morally questionable.
now you can actually check how Gamezone models look compared to GW “originals” i apologize for not beliveing when u say what is better quality
price is higher than last summer but thats cos all minies i found are bought through intermediaries, i used to buy them directly and it was much cheaper than gw plasticks
