Think about what you just said. Hasbro knows they made the game, knows who they are and threatened to sue. How can they do anything anonymously?Aaron Sylvester said:
Fighting is Magic gets ordered to Cease and Desist from Hasbro
- Thread starter Darren716
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What is directors senior film? It have something to do with for a final exam for your college?Verkula said:
Look, it sucks for the people that spent all their time working on it, but you cannot make a big, highly public product (weather free or not) based on somebody else's intellectual property that you don't have permission to use and expect that everybody will be fine with it. There are enough cases of this happening that this shouldn't be a surprise at this point.
What they should have done is start development on it, not anywhere near completion, but far enough that there's something to show and it's clear they're serious about making this, then asked Hasbro for permission. If permission is granted, great! Development can continue without any fear of legal action. If permission isn't granted, then that sucks, but at least you haven't spent years developing something that you don't know will get released.
What they should have done is start development on it, not anywhere near completion, but far enough that there's something to show and it's clear they're serious about making this, then asked Hasbro for permission. If permission is granted, great! Development can continue without any fear of legal action. If permission isn't granted, then that sucks, but at least you haven't spent years developing something that you don't know will get released.
Actually according to copyright law they have to defend the copyright anytime they find an infringement or else the lost it. Its a weird part of it but it forces their hand.Newtonyd said:
Probaly something like that, I never went to any animation or art school so I dont know all the details, but I guess the main point is that Hasbro and any other companies are more willing to lend their properties if it has something to do with school projects/learning. Plus the basic rules ofc: non profit, and cant take any donations either.SweetShark said:
Anyway, I dont really care about any drama thats going on in the fandom, but this kind of made me sad, I was following the games development from start, and wanted to play it badly. Hell even the creators of the show said in interviews they were looking forward to it.
Im just a background artist, our director, Zachary Rich asked while in pre-production(storyboars+animatic creating), as far as I know it only took an email. I guess he still had to come up with a professional looking email, but that was all he had to do. However as I said above the fact that it counts as a school project probably helped getting it.wombat_of_war said:
EDIT: We did had to wait for a while(1-2 weeks) to get a response though.
I'm not sure why this seems to surprise anyone, same thing happened to that Elder Scrolls Middle Earth mod, they always end up sending the C&D close to when they are finished, because that's when they notice the project. Because of the momentum it picks up online from the fans etc that can't wait to play it.
Exactly, the characters etc aren't the fans property to use as they see fit, as much as I believe fandom helps create some of the best things for any show/book/game etc. Yet people act like they are theirs, which always makes people come across as spoiled brats.tehroc said:
I see. So in other words, the developers of this game could asked for permission for this at first before Hasbro object to this project.Verkula said:Probaly something like that, I never went to any animation or art school so I dont know all the details, but I guess the main point is that Hasbro and any other companies are more willing to lend their properties if it has something to do with school projects/learning. Plus the basic rules ofc: non profit, and cant take any donations either.SweetShark said:
Anyway, I dont really care about any drama thats going on in the fandom, but this kind of made me sad, I was following the games development from start, and wanted to play it badly. Hell even the creators of the show said in interviews they were looking forward to it.
I am very sure again the answer would be no again, cause of the original audience Hasbro is targeting [young girls]. However because you said the creators of the show knew about this project and approve it to be made, maybe they could "reason" with Hasbro's lawyers or other official to convince Hasbro at least to market it "somehow" that make sense [if this is possible of course].
On the other hand, I believe the original mistake for this mess, was the "advertisement" of this game on EVO without asking even Hasbro for permission. Plus the game helped a lot for charity if I remember right. Sure, I approve that if it is for charity and not for personal profit making, they used a copyright of Hasbro to make money for charity without permission.
If they used permission, then use it in EVO [unlikely of course], then I thing this could be a success.
I've heard that several places. I've also heard it's a myth, and that this idea applies to trademarks only, not copyrights.chris11246 said:
A quick search found this: http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2011/08/how-to-lose-your-copyright-in-three-easy-steps/
So they can't use this as a valid excuse.
*Edit* Whoops, wrong website.
Remove all marks of their identity off the released product and/or use alias names that the community can associate with. Hasbro may know who they are but if they can't connect them to the final product then they won't have a case. The creators can simply say "we stopped the project when you told us to. Someone must've taken our data and continued where we left off, go chase them". Keep in mind Hasbro won't be able to remove a torrent.Lono Shrugged said:
Was it surprising? No. Was it Dickish? Not as much as others would think. Yeah, they spent months of work on it; but that is the risk they took. They did all that work and got shut down BECAUSE it's not their property to use in any form. Copyright is a wonderful thing Kiddies. And sometimes, we need a story like this to remind us that we don't own that property and that it's never belonged to us and never will.
I guess there are some shades of gray there, but I would not be trusting something like that when the possibility is a heafty lawsuit. What if the company gets a court order to examine the source code to prove it's the same game. That stuff is called digital dna for a reason, it's quite unique.Aaron Sylvester said:
As you may be able to tell from the avatar, I am a brony. From my point of view, Hasbro was well within their rights to send a C&D to the game makers. Yes, it was free. However, it still infringed on their copyright. As for the timing, well, you don't really want to waste the time sending out a C&D order every time something that might not even happen gets started. Besides, would Hasbro really have looked better by sending it right away? I don't think so. To me, it would have made them look even more litigious, smacking down anything that even remotely infringes on their copyright the second they hear about it.
I also highly doubt that Hasbro is doing it just to spite the bronies. After all, who has more disposable income? Parents of kids who have to either convince their parents to buy them the merch, or buy it themselves with allowance, or college students who have no obligations outside of taking care of their bills, and are buying it for themselves?
Edit: And I'm aware that not all college students have much disposable income (myself included), as well as that there are parents who are willing to buy their kids every single thing they want. I'm saying that overall, who would be willing to spend more money on merch? Turning away the adult audience intentionally is basically dooming the show to the same fate of the last 3 generations, rather than being the smash success it currently is.
I also highly doubt that Hasbro is doing it just to spite the bronies. After all, who has more disposable income? Parents of kids who have to either convince their parents to buy them the merch, or buy it themselves with allowance, or college students who have no obligations outside of taking care of their bills, and are buying it for themselves?
Edit: And I'm aware that not all college students have much disposable income (myself included), as well as that there are parents who are willing to buy their kids every single thing they want. I'm saying that overall, who would be willing to spend more money on merch? Turning away the adult audience intentionally is basically dooming the show to the same fate of the last 3 generations, rather than being the smash success it currently is.
While I understand that Hasbro have a copyright, there is a thing called fair use, where copyright protection doesn't matter. There are four things to consider for something to be fair use.
1. The purpose of copying, like whether it's for commercial use, or education, or criticism
2. The nature of the original work
3. The quantity of copyrighted material used compared to the amount of copyrighted material as a whole
4. The effect on the market for the copyrighted material
Now, these are rather nebulous and vague criteria, so I did a bit of research and found this paper by a judge about the nature of fair use and the standards used.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1341457?origin=crossref&
After reading this, I reckon that Fighting is Magic does fall under fair use, though of course it's not my decision to make and I can see that there could easily be disagreement. I would definitely recommend reading that commentary, though.
1. The purpose of copying, like whether it's for commercial use, or education, or criticism
2. The nature of the original work
3. The quantity of copyrighted material used compared to the amount of copyrighted material as a whole
4. The effect on the market for the copyrighted material
Now, these are rather nebulous and vague criteria, so I did a bit of research and found this paper by a judge about the nature of fair use and the standards used.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1341457?origin=crossref&
After reading this, I reckon that Fighting is Magic does fall under fair use, though of course it's not my decision to make and I can see that there could easily be disagreement. I would definitely recommend reading that commentary, though.
I don't really understand how you can use a cease & desist on a not-for-profit fan game.
I mean legally it's sound, but what's to stop the source code from being "leaked" and disseminated to other people who then release it independently/anonymously?
From a forensic standpoint it's practically impossible to prove in court whether a security leak is intentional or not.
Then once it's leaked and put on a torrent site, it's impossible to stop its spread.
It seems little more than hollow intimidation.
I mean legally it's sound, but what's to stop the source code from being "leaked" and disseminated to other people who then release it independently/anonymously?
From a forensic standpoint it's practically impossible to prove in court whether a security leak is intentional or not.
Then once it's leaked and put on a torrent site, it's impossible to stop its spread.
It seems little more than hollow intimidation.
I know, I know... really though, I don't see the point however in shutting down a FREE game however. It's kind of like going to a fan-fiction site and claiming that people couldn't post stories online because they "didn't have permission".wombat_of_war said:
Edit: It's just seems really ridiculous to me.