Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[The13thRonin]

It seems ridiculous that WB can own the right to ANY video-game adaptation.

I mean what's next... EA copyrighted the concept of video-games and suing anyone who tries to produce one? Copyright was meant to protect existing works not potential future works .

[Itnetlolor]

It seems innovation and art are no longer a priority these days. They are aware that they're screwing their kids out of a fun future, right? Or do they think they're immortal? Even so, they'll still run out of things to do if they keep doing this stupid crap. They seem rather shortsighted, and uncaring of their future/next of kin in regards to entertainment.

[Sharp]

LotR should be in the public domain by now. 60 fucking years since their first publishing

According to the current laws... LotR will be copyrighted for another 90 years

Since Copyright lasts 50 years and can be renewed as of today two extra times.

It depends on what media is being argued for copyright infringement. I believe WIPO standard is 70 years after death of author which covers the books but can you copyright a franchise? WB might argue that they are infringing on the movies (50 year copyright after made available to public IIRC) (and/or other media they have created) if the mod bears a striking similarity to content WB have created (which might be true?) which means the mod is dead in the water regardless of how long they have the copyright of Tolkiens work or if it becomes public domain as the infringement is of the depiction of WB created characters in the movies and other media they have created.

You might be able to draw a hobbit and call it Frodo but if it looks like Elijah Wood then ye be screwed.

AFAIK you can't renew copyright internationally under WIPO law, but I think you can renew copyright in the US but that copyright renewal will only be applicable in the US.

Anyway in my opinion WB should be too bothered about this, it's more likely to get bad PR for them and I doubt the mod is going to be competing with any LotR games they have made/are making.

[Shadowlord]

See, the problem here is that you're saying "But they should be able to make a game and base it on someone else's work and intellectual property and there shouldn't be anything anyone can do about it" - this isn't allowed. I'd argue that the owner of the rights might worry about people making bad work based on it, but considering that in practice bad games happen all the time based on movies and books, and bad movies happen all the time based on games, that doesn't seem to be a concern - it's more "you aren't paying us, so you aren't allowed to do this. Someone might choose to play your thing instead of one of the official games, or any future game(s) we make!"

Obviously some copyright owners don't bother stopping people from making their own games or mods based on their own works, and some even encourage it. There are a bunch of mods for games based on the A Song of Ice and Fire books, all unofficial, including a CKII mod, for instance. Recently there have been a couple official games, but they've both received generally bad reviews. The TV show has met more success but has not really been completely accurate, eventually diverging from what actually occurred in the books (besides that the ages are all wrong, it's filled with sex and nudity, etc):

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

There's no chain.

Similarly JMS does not stop people from making games set in the Babylon 5 universe, and has given his encouragement for their creation in the past. I think his thinking is that fans are far more likely to obsess enough about it to make a faithful and good game (even if they take forever to do it), rather than a game studio which most of the time seem to do terrible jobs on adaptations unless they are really enthusiastic about them and have a lot of time and money. That's what I think, anyways, and I am for some reason assuming that his thinking is similar because of his policies on the matter and the way he has never licensed B5 out to any video game companies (there have been non-video game adaptations, e.g. an RPG I think, also a game with cards, neither of which is as expensive).

[fenrif]

It seems ridiculous that WB can own the right to ANY video-game adaptation.

I mean what's next... EA copyrighted the concept of video-games and suing anyone who tries to produce one? Copyright was meant to protect existing works not potential future works .

In relation to this: Namco own the copyright to having games play when a loading screen is up. Only their games do this because they literally own it. I think they first did it in one of the Ridge Racer games with Galaga as the loading screen.

WB owning the rights to all video game adaptions is just how the industry does buisness. Whoever owned LoTR probobly got a pretty huge payout considering. This is also why you get situations like the recent one with Marvel trying to trade the rights to use the character Galactus for the rights to use the charater Daredevil with fox. Marvel wanted galactus in the next Avenger movie, but Fox owned the rights. (Fox didn't go for the trade BTW, so no Galactus in Avengers 2) The recent Spiderman movie was made pretty much entirely because if the studio didn't make another Spiderman movie they'd lose the rights. So it was worth it to crank out an arguably poor film on the rush just to keep hold of the property. It's kinda wierd but it's how these things are handled.

Absolutely nothing to do with this, the thing that Blizzard was arguing was that since DotA was a mod/map for WC3, Valve couldn't have the rights. That was the official maker of a game claiming the rights to a mod of their game (which is 100% bullshit). This is a copyright holder with an already-existing copyright, which is a COMPLETELY different situation.

Copyright is dumb, etc. LotR should be in the public domain by now. 60 fucking years since their first publishing.

I thought it was something to do with both companies having hired a person who had a substantial claim of ownership over the DOTA (The original creator and the guy who took over and spent years refining it)?

A lot of the truely pessimistic people believe that eventually copyright will never reasonably run out.

They've lengthened the duration of copyright every time it's come close to running out for them. There's no reason to believe it ever will run out unless theres a drastic change at either Disney or in the US government. It also doesn't help that the US has realised that a sizable chunk of their economy depends on intellectual property and have been haranguing their way around the world trying to bully other countries into accepting their copyright laws.

[Knight of Fools]

Warner Bros definitely has the high ground, but they could have pulled a fast one and tried rolling with it. Getting with Bethesda and making an agreement to do the mod wouldn't be a huge deal. Bethesda would be happy to get some easy income off of their game, WB would just have to provide funding to the "contractor", even if that funding only came once the game was finished. The makers of the mod would have to form a business agreement of some sort, but since they're already organized enough to actually produce a mod that isn't too far out the window. It's certainly an optimistic outcome (Two large businesses agreeing on dividing profit from something a third party creates? Unlikely), but if they set the precedent it'll become more likely to happen in other games and settings. That's the true loss, here.

I don't see it as WB losing an opportunity for some free advertising - I see it as a loss of potential profit, whether they let the mod be made or not. After all, while some LotR games haven't been all that spectacular, they have pulled in money, so the precedent of preventing loss of potential sales in any form is understandable.

[Sensei]

It seems ridiculous that WB can own the right to ANY video-game adaptation.

I mean what's next... EA copyrighted the concept of video-games and suing anyone who tries to produce one? Copyright was meant to protect existing works not potential future works .

You know funny enough, I believe some odd company nobody ever heard of patented the very idea of an MMO and tried to sue some other, older company (probably hoping for an out-of-court settlement). I might see if I can find the pertinent thread later.

[fenrif]

You know funny enough, I believe some odd company nobody ever heard of patented the very idea of an MMO and tried to sue some other, older company (probably hoping for an out-of-court settlement). I might see if I can find the pertinent thread later.

It was Worlds.com. The best thing about that was that they filed the patent in 2000, or thereabouts, years after the first MMO was released.

[Shadowlord]

In relation to this: Namco own the copyright to having games play when a loading screen is up. Only their games do this because they literally own it. I think they first did it in one of the Ridge Racer games with Galaga as the loading screen.

You can't copyright an idea or invention. That's what patents are for. Put another way:
I don't think that word means what you think it means.

(Or was that just a mental glitch? I don't see posters, I just see posts! :V)

[tootboot]

This is nothing new.  Aliens Doom got a C&D from 20th Century Fox back in 1995 or somesuch.

[fenrif]

In relation to this: Namco own the copyright to having games play when a loading screen is up. Only their games do this because they literally own it. I think they first did it in one of the Ridge Racer games with Galaga as the loading screen.

You can't copyright an idea or invention. That's what patents are for. Put another way:
I don't think that word means what you think it means.

(Or was that just a mental glitch? I don't see posters, I just see posts! :V)

You are correct, it is a patent. That's what I get for misremembering something I read years ago and only checking the first google result before I wrote about it.

[Goron]

It seems innovation and art are no longer a priority these days. They are aware that they're screwing their kids out of a fun future, right? Or do they think they're immortal? Even so, they'll still run out of things to do if they keep doing this stupid crap. They seem rather shortsighted, and uncaring of their future/next of kin in regards to entertainment.

LOL
How is reusing existing ideas innovation? Wouldn't being forced to create a NEW setting/world be considered promoting innovation?
I will rally against poor implementation of patent law all day long, but I cannot support an argument against copyright law when it comes to promoting innovation. If you seriously think that redoing the same thing over and over is innovation you really need to consult a dictionary.
Maybe now the molders can go and create their own setting and actually innovate instead of using stale, old existing work.

[ECrownofFire]

It seems innovation and art are no longer a priority these days. They are aware that they're screwing their kids out of a fun future, right? Or do they think they're immortal? Even so, they'll still run out of things to do if they keep doing this stupid crap. They seem rather shortsighted, and uncaring of their future/next of kin in regards to entertainment.

LOL
How is reusing existing ideas innovation? Wouldn't being forced to create a NEW setting/world be considered promoting innovation?
I will rally against poor implementation of patent law all day long, but I cannot support an argument against copyright law when it comes to promoting innovation. If you seriously think that redoing the same thing over and over is innovation you really need to consult a dictionary.
Maybe now the molders can go and create their own setting and actually innovate instead of using stale, old existing work.

Innovation and creativity cannot be forced. Sometimes people want to innovate in smaller steps.

[Biag]

It seems innovation and art are no longer a priority these days. They are aware that they're screwing their kids out of a fun future, right? Or do they think they're immortal? Even so, they'll still run out of things to do if they keep doing this stupid crap. They seem rather shortsighted, and uncaring of their future/next of kin in regards to entertainment.

LOL
How is reusing existing ideas innovation? Wouldn't being forced to create a NEW setting/world be considered promoting innovation?
I will rally against poor implementation of patent law all day long, but I cannot support an argument against copyright law when it comes to promoting innovation. If you seriously think that redoing the same thing over and over is innovation you really need to consult a dictionary.
Maybe now the molders can go and create their own setting and actually innovate instead of using stale, old existing work.

Innovation and creativity cannot be forced. Sometimes people want to innovate in smaller steps.

Is a LotR mod for Skyrim really the pinnacle of innovation, though? It seems like a fairly obvious choice to me.

I'm all for attacking copyright abuse, but I feel as though Warner Bros is completely within their rights. It's a shitty thing for them to do, but there's no way to protect people's individual property without allowing room for stuff like this. Remember that this goes both ways- if WB was funding a movie or game based off some small author's book without their permission, that author could kick their ass in court.

[UltraValican]

It seems innovation and art are no longer a priority these days. They are aware that they're screwing their kids out of a fun future, right? Or do they think they're immortal? Even so, they'll still run out of things to do if they keep doing this stupid crap. They seem rather shortsighted, and uncaring of their future/next of kin in regards to entertainment.

LOL
How is reusing existing ideas innovation? Wouldn't being forced to create a NEW setting/world be considered promoting innovation?
I will rally against poor implementation of patent law all day long, but I cannot support an argument against copyright law when it comes to promoting innovation. If you seriously think that redoing the same thing over and over is innovation you really need to consult a dictionary.
Maybe now the molders can go and create their own setting and actually innovate instead of using stale, old existing work.

Innovation and creativity cannot be forced. Sometimes people want to innovate in smaller steps.

Is a LotR mod for Skyrim really the pinnacle of innovation, though? It seems like a fairly obvious choice to me.

I'm all for attacking copyright abuse, but I feel as though Warner Bros is completely within their rights. It's a shitty thing for them to do, but there's no way to protect people's individual property without allowing room for stuff like this. Remember that this goes both ways- if WB was funding a movie or game based off some small author's book without their permission, that author could kick their ass in court.

I normally all for copy right but the difference between WB making a movie or game(Million Dollar ventures that  are sold commercially for profit) based of an small authors book and a guy making a mod based on a series/mythos for free and fun is just that. One venture could cause someone millions and the other costs nothing. WB is loosing no money from someone making a mod for a game completely unrelated to them. If anything they should be happy, it might get some more people interested in the series.
The only way a mod could hurt WB is if they insist on making shitty LOTR cash-grab games in the first place.