20 Aug, 2010, Runter wrote in the 81st comment:
Votes: 0
We need some social software justice.
21 Aug, 2010, quixadhal wrote in the 82nd comment:
Votes: 0
Tyche said:
Rarva.Riendf said:
Square made lot of money with FF… whatever the system used , original or not,people would have wanted to copy it,.


The people at SquareSoft obviously work pretty hard on creating games, if people like them. Those people who want to copy or mimic shouldn't act like greedy bastards. Rather, they should pony up some of their own cash to license it, instead of acting like maggot infested hippie parasites expecting free handouts. >:->


Agreed. Or at the very least, stop whining like children when they are told they can't have the candy unless they eat some veggies first.

Rarva, if you want to be a pirate and steal other people's work, go right ahead. *I* won't stop you. But if the guys you pillage from happen to catch you, let us know how your arguments work against their cease-and-desist orders.

The amusing thing is, if you put the kind of effort and passion into making a system that works like (but not exactly like) the Final Fantasy system as you're putting into trying to convince yourself that copying it verbatum is acceptable and legal, you'd probably be done AND in the clear.
21 Aug, 2010, Rudha wrote in the 83rd comment:
Votes: 0
The irony is delicious, yea.

Maya/Rudha
21 Aug, 2010, Ssolvarain wrote in the 84th comment:
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So I'm guessing no one on this forum would jaywalk in front of a cop. :tongue:
21 Aug, 2010, David Haley wrote in the 85th comment:
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If you're in a city where cops enforce jay-walking laws, then yes, it would be pretty stupid to do that. You are turning serious statements into the absurd – which is perhaps not surprising considering previous things you've said about how you view these forums. :sad:
21 Aug, 2010, ATT_Turan wrote in the 86th comment:
Votes: 0
I don't jaywalk even without a cop, unless the light has been stupidly long about changing…
21 Aug, 2010, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 87th comment:
Votes: 0
quixadhal said:
Rarva, if you want to be a pirate and steal other people's work, go right ahead. *I* won't stop you. But if the guys you pillage from happen to catch you, let us know how your arguments work against their cease-and-desist orders.

The amusing thing is, if you put the kind of effort and passion into making a system that works like (but not exactly like) the Final Fantasy system as you're putting into trying to convince yourself that copying it verbatum is acceptable and legal, you'd probably be done AND in the clear.

Err for the record, I would not copy FF (or any other game) combat system, I do not like FF system anyway, and I code my own…(but probably infringe on some patents or games I never heard off; for the reasons I already gave)
And i do not say copying verbatim is fine, I am saying most of the system is NOT original. (the hard work is more in the story telling and graphism and music, and from what I know of FF the combat system change every game they make ).
21 Aug, 2010, Cratylus wrote in the 88th comment:
Votes: 0
David Haley said:
This conversation kind of reminds me about people who pirate music because they say the law against it is silly.


So for my Bachelor's, I had to develop a for-serious research project and paper and submit it
and blah blah, and I decided to do some statistical yakety schmakety on music pirating on
college campuses (which was a red hot topic at the time, not old and done like this thread).

What an insight into the stunning stupidity and shallowness of American college students!
(And if you're an American college student, I am not talking about the guy behind you. I
am talking Right. At. You.)

My surveying had various inputs for collecting information, as well as general "feel free to
express yourself further" elements, and there was one sentiment that came up fairly
frequently, that simply staggered me. Summarized:

Quote
It's ok for me to pirate music because I pay a lot of money for my internet connection.


I have to confess that this stupid response in particular made me regret the anonymous nature
of my surveying. It really made me want to track them down and cram some sense down their throats.

But it wouldn't have done anything…just like this thread wouldn't convince a violator to quit
violatin, cuz it isn't really about the arguments made by Ssolvarain to justify it, it's more about a
sense of entitlement that will always find some justification in words, regardless of coherence.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net
21 Aug, 2010, Ssolvarain wrote in the 89th comment:
Votes: 0
Meh. What a bunch of squares. You enjoy waiting for that light. I'll see you back at the office where my sammich is waiting. :3
21 Aug, 2010, Rudha wrote in the 90th comment:
Votes: 0
I, personally like my money right where it is, instead of in some company's hands, but I suppose Im just odd like that.

Maya/rudha
21 Aug, 2010, ATT_Turan wrote in the 91st comment:
Votes: 0
Cratylus said:
So for my Bachelor's, I had to develop a for-serious research project and paper…on music pirating.

What an insight into the stunning stupidity and shallowness of American college students!


You are so not wrong…just last year (when I was still in school!), I had conversations with a number of classmates who mentioned that they pirate music. These are people studying to be professional musicians, who hope to make a living off of writing and/or performing music, but even when I confront them with that obvious fact they don't see anything wrong with doing it to someone else. The complete lack of logic and morals, so long as it happens over the Internet, is terrifying to me.
21 Aug, 2010, David Haley wrote in the 92nd comment:
Votes: 0
Many aspiring software developers have the same issue with pirating software but say that of course pirating their stuff would be wrong because it's different, or something, bla bla bla. It's interesting to what lengths the human brain will go to rationalize something that the person knows (or once knew) to be wrong.
21 Aug, 2010, Rudha wrote in the 93rd comment:
Votes: 0
Forewarning written in mithril ink by the pope's cat: The following post is long. (Not as long as some I've seen, but its still long.)



David Haley said:
Many aspiring software developers have the same issue with pirating software but say that of course pirating their stuff would be wrong because it's different, or something, bla bla bla. It's interesting to what lengths the human brain will go to rationalize something that the person knows (or once knew) to be wrong.


I can't see how that's a problem for aspiring software developers with the proliferation of all kinds of FOSS tools, languages, and miscellanea. One of the chief selling points of Python is the whole language and interpreter are available for free, the same goes for PHP if you can call it a programming language. I don't think I've ever used a software tool or language I had to pay a dime for save for back when I had an internship at IBM, but even then I didn't have to pay for it :P

There are situations where pirating a game or piece of music can be justified, I think, but even then its certainly less justifiable than people make it out to be. Jeff Vogel of Spiderweb Software (makers of the Blades of Exile, and Avernum games) had a pretty pragmatic point of view about it: Sometimes its okay to steal my games (http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2010/07/s...)

At the same time even when we do rationalise it as "okay" sometimes, that by no means means its legal, and even if I go ahead and say "its okay to copy Elvenblade" that is not at any point revoking the right to, at a later time, decide its not okay. It would be a pretty dick move of me, but I still could. In legal terms even if everyone agrees doing something is "okay", no one has surrendered their legal rights.

Jeff's concerns in the blog post he wrote are pretty valid ones, because you know people will use it to rationalise things themselves:

Jeff Vogel said:
I admit to being a little bit nervous about writing this. The sad truth is that, these days, it is so easy to pirate single-player PC games that most gamers only have to pay for them if they want to pay for them. And there is strong evidence (links below) to indicate that they usually don't want to pay for them. So giving people ammunition they can use to convince themselves that they shouldn't pay for my games seems perilous, especially since they are, after all, how I support my family.


I also have to remind myself at least as regards the field of game design and development however, that paid or not, we're in the business/field/whatever, of entertaining people. I, personally, don't develop my MUD out of a hope of stunning financial success wherein I hope to live in a house hewn out of marble by deep dwarves and inlaid with fine etchings of fine art and statues and that kind of thing, there was a time when you could get away... (http://www.play.net/gs4/) but that time has since come and gone. A few muds manage to still make decent money of it, but for each one that does, there's hundreds that will probably never even come close to covering server costs, and I expect I'll probably be in the latter rather than the former.

So why do I do it, you might ask? Well, there's a reason I quoted Jeff's post, and its not just because its a relevant and pragmatic look at piracy. He puts it better than I:

Jeff Vogel said:
I consider myself a reasonably bright person, who works hard to make something people like. When I'm old and crumbling, I want to be able to feel that I had a successful life in which my work brought happiness to a lot of people.

I feel fully financially compensated for my time when one of my games (which usually takes a year or so to make) sells 5000 copies. However, from the game industry perspective, 5000 copies is nothing. Even the crappiest flop from a real publisher sells a ton more than that. So am I wasting my life? If I really care about the number of people I reach and the amount of happiness I bring, shouldn't I try to get a job somewhere where my work has a chance of reaching far more people?

But then I remember that for everyone who buys my game, dozens more just tried the demo. And a lot of those people will play the whole demo, have fun, decide they had enough, and move on. That counts as providing fun for people, sort of.


Food for thought, Jeff's articles. I'm not making money here, but I figure if I make things fun for people, that's reward in it's self.

So why then, do we have intellectual property laws if all of us developer types get our jollies off making people happy? Well, the obvious answer, is that some of us like having money. Many of us don't care too much beyond "keep lights on" and "food in the pantry" and other such necessities, but the invention of patents, copyright, and trademarks come out of a very legitimate desire and necessity - the need to protect the quality of one's own work and name from being diluted by knock offs, look a likes, et cetera. I'm sure I don't have to say that this happens anyways, especially in the games industry where I have to say, if I have to take many more power-armoured marine through environments coloured in all the varieties of colour from the 'dirt' spectrum I'm going to be sick, but the spirit of these laws are to protect someone from going along and say, making a crappy knock off of your work, and thus making your own game look bad.

I'm not sure where I'm going with all this. I suppose my bottom line is that the law exists, and there are times when circumventing it isn't out of line with the spirit of the law, but that doesn't mean the letter of the law has changed, nor the consequences. If you're going to be making a decision where you might be crossing the line with the law, be sure of two things A: you can justify it in a way that a reasonable person (or twenty reasonable persons on a jury) can be convinced of and B: you're fully aware of, and prepared for, the consequences if you can't convince them.

I'm probably not going to convince anyone who was going to infringe on intellectual property rights not to do so by saying this, so I suppose all I've really accomplished is a long-winded explanation of my own views. It is what it is I suppose.

Maya/Rudha
21 Aug, 2010, Cratylus wrote in the 94th comment:
Votes: 0
Rudha said:
<incoherent crap>


That's pretty much the sort of foolishness I was referring to in my post about people
feeling justified in their actions independent of coherence of the words they use to rationalize them.

Your post said exactly dick.

As to the reason for intellectual property law, it's actually enshrined right in the Constitution of the USA.
Article I, Section 8 said:
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries


The spirit of the law is plain and doesn't need to be distorted by the likes of you.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net
21 Aug, 2010, Ssolvarain wrote in the 95th comment:
Votes: 0
So Square should just gear up and take down every single instance of their work being used out of license/whatever?

Crat, you should get rid of that avatar, too. It's not yours. Well, neither is Animal, but you used a piece of fan art of him to mock Locke. Is that now different from using someone else's work for your own personal use?
21 Aug, 2010, Cratylus wrote in the 96th comment:
Votes: 0
Ssolvarain said:
So Square should just gear up and take down every single instance of their work being used out of license/whatever?


Only an utter fool would fail to distinguish the difference between advocacy of their right to do a thing,
and militating for their doing so.

Ssolvarain said:
Crat, you should get rid of that avatar, too. It's not yours.


It's nobody's. It's fallen in the public domain.

Does my position threaten you in some way, Ssolvarain/Epilogy?

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net
21 Aug, 2010, Ssolvarain wrote in the 97th comment:
Votes: 0
Not really.

But you must feel some reason to go on dragging out both of my handles and trying to taunt me, Crat. So mebbe you're the insecure one?


And as far as I'm concerned, you can quote laws until your fingers go numb but it doesn't change the fact that if the OP used the mechanic, guess what? Nothing would happen.
21 Aug, 2010, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 98th comment:
Votes: 0
David Haley said:
Many aspiring software developers have the same issue with pirating software but say that of course pirating their stuff would be wrong because it's different, or something, bla bla bla. It's interesting to what lengths the human brain will go to rationalize something that the person knows (or once knew) to be wrong.

Do not compare software and musics.
First music is aired for free (for the end user) and then they complain you actually record it…..(but want to sell you the mean to record it (And advertise about it !) at the same time (Sony, Philips to name them)

Software (that you have to pay for) are NOT distributed for free in a way and asked to be paid in another. (ok some did it…plain stupid too)

So when a piece is aired for free (for the end user) on the waves or in a show on tv, what logic is behind the fact you should have to pay it if you use another channel to listen to it ?
There is no logic, and so no one can understand why it is wrong to do so.
It is only wrong in the head of the MEDIAS…it is like complaining when you upload an advertising on youtube, when they PAY other medias to deliver it to you…(and actually they would wish to FORCE you to record them to watch them but not distribute them…whatever…it is so crazy in their head I do not even understand why our paid for legislator actually back them ( err in fact I do…corruption…that makes their claim even more invalid…if LAW was really respected as you wish for).

It is so ridiculously funny it makes me cry sometimes. (answer to initial post: ask a good patent lawyer and contact Square Soft, is the only answer you actually need, and be ready to open your pockets…either for the lawyer or Square…if not…just do like any sane people, and do your stuff…no one really cares about muds in 2010)
21 Aug, 2010, Rudha wrote in the 99th comment:
Votes: 0
Cratylus said:
Rudha said:
<incoherent crap>


That's pretty much the sort of foolishness I was referring to in my post about people
feeling justified in their actions independent of coherence of the words they use to rationalize them.

Your post said exactly dick.

As to the reason for intellectual property law, it's actually enshrined right in the Constitution of the USA.
Article I, Section 8 said:
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries


The spirit of the law is plain and doesn't need to be distorted by the likes of you.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net


I like how you didn't address anything I said in my post at all. That's great. You keep doing that.

Maya/Rudha
21 Aug, 2010, Cratylus wrote in the 100th comment:
Votes: 0
Rudha said:
I like how you didn't address anything I said in my post at all. That's great. You keep doing that.
Maya/Rudha


I pointed out its incoherence.

Perhaps if you compose it in the form of reasoned argument, you can benefit from more detailed analysis.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net/crat_100.jpg
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