ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

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Drag
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by Drag »

I just got into an interesting conversation about the GPL and software licenses and linking and the combinations of stuff and everything.

I'm not a lawyer. If anyone is a lawyer, feel free to chime in and correct any misconceptions. With that said:

The IPS patch itself, provided it has no infringing contents, is legal on its own. You wouldn't be able to distribute both the IPS patch and the ROM together though. The copyright holder of the ROM wouldn't be able to get the IPS patch taken down, since it doesn't infringe on anything on its own; there's nothing in the IPS patch itself that dictates what it has to be used on, so you could use it on literally anything and get a derivative work from it. I could also use any IPS patch on the ROM and though I'd probably get garbage out, that garbage is still a derivative work and is just as infringing.

The copyright holder of the ROM would need to go after each individual who patched the ROM with the IPS patch. The patched rom itself infringes on the copyright, so you wouldn't be able to distribute it or sell it or do anything public-facing with it. It seems very precarious to be advertising the actual derivative work and saying "ok here's the IPS patch", so I really don't know where that falls in legality, but I'm pretty sure a copyright holder could tell you to stop, but even then, it's to stop advertising and to stop using trademarks, they can't really stop you from continuing the project.

Even if you had to pull all your advertisements and your videos and screenshots, you could finish the IPS patch and release it, and nobody would be able to do anything about that IPS patch because, as long as it doesn't contain infringing data itself, it's perfectly fine on its own. People using that IPS patch to create the intended derivative work, and then recording playthroughs and screenshots, that all can be taken down, but again, the IPS itself is safe.
tepples
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by tepples »

At least CBS and Paramount accommodate their creative fans by offering guidelines for fan works. Nintendo has refused to offer anything analogous.
8bitMicroGuy
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by 8bitMicroGuy »

To me, these guidelines are too harsh for my standards.
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tokumaru
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by tokumaru »

I found them a bit harsh too, but I can understand the reasoning behind most of them. The one that sounded just plain greedy is that you have to use official merchandise for everything, when available.
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Myask
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by Myask »

(IANAL)
The entire list is basically "Do not make products that are competing with Star Trek®, nor allow your creation of fanworks to give profit to makers of such products."
Being one-off, one-episode-length, no-series thing is a way of preventing establishment of a [competing] product-identity by a fanwork.
Only using amateur costumes/props, or official costumes/props when available means not allowing anyone to compete with manufacture of official Trek costumes/props.

It stinks of being run past their legal department, sure. But it's all quite coherent with the idea of copyright being the exclusive, sublettable right to make (and, thusly, profit from) copies of, and derivative works of, a work.

The extent to which derivative-works protection carveouts are moral is a separate question.
nitro2k01
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by nitro2k01 »

Drag wrote:The IPS patch itself, provided it has no infringing contents...

...as long as it doesn't contain infringing data itself...
That's the big if. In this case, it seems they included pokémon and/or other elemebts from later generations, so that in itself means infringing material. It also seems to be compiled from decompiled source code rather than a hacked binary image, so things would potentially be moved around and a simple binary diff probably would do little to separate the non-infringing content. So a simple IPS patch would be out of the question. Maybe you could make a specialized tool which takes multiple ROM images and extracts whatever it needs, including graphics, and builds the final ROM image and confirms the checksum of it. But at that point we're far beyond trivial, both from a technical and legal point of view.
8bitMicroGuy
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by 8bitMicroGuy »

Bottom line, get into a fandom that supports derivative works under a normal common sense copycenter license or make your own franchise. Also, NEVER make copyleft work! It will cause issues! For example, my game has a character selection screen with modifiable characters. If I made a Let's Play with Floraverse characters in that, my video would be GPL as well as my own characters which are distributed under a no-porn-nor-blasphemy kinda license and that would make the pornographers and blasphemers to avoid my restriction. So GPL and ShareAlike crap means "YOU DON'T OWN ANYTHING!".

Let's get to the facts. Freedom Planet was a fan game, but now is a full original product. Stephen DiDuro supports derivative works as well as fan games and fan characters and game mods as long as it's non-commercial. I don't know what he thinks about fan art commissions and fan character commissions, but game mods gotta be non-commercial and only for those who have the license to the official game. For one to let fan games be made out of a game that was a fan game sounds like a Golden Rule respecting idea! According to this, I can say that Freedom Planet fan games are a way to go if you want to make fan games. But that's so hard! Look at those slope physics! It's nearly impossible! But I could say it can be possible to be done on SNES as a homebrew game or in SDL2 as a whole engine from the ground up or in Clickteam Fusion 2.5 if you modify the code of Sonic Worlds which is the engine of Freedom Planet. Someone tried to redo FP from Sonic Worlds.
nitro2k01
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by nitro2k01 »

8bitMicroGuy wrote:Bottom line, get into a fandom that supports derivative works under a normal common sense copycenter license
I think you're misunderstanding what copycenter means. Copyleft means that there are restrictions in the license to force derivative works to stay copyleft, thus ensuring that they are available to the public. Copycenter means that this restriction on derivative works does not exist, and thus derivative works may be released under a more restrictive license, including both a copyleft license, and a commercial license. Copycenter does not mean the same thing as center in politics, but is a play on "copy center" a place filled with paper copier machines. It is meant to put minimal restrictions on the licensed works. A copycenter license is not suitable for protecting against porn and blasphemy.
8bitMicroGuy wrote:Also, NEVER make copyleft work! It will cause issues!
How would this create problems if you have nothing against "porn and blasphemy"? This advice seems to reflect your personal morals, but how is this good advice for anyone else?
8bitMicroGuy
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by 8bitMicroGuy »

Copyleft open-source licenses, according to OSI, must not discriminate against wrongdoing and that includes porn and blasphemy (going to call it P&B for short). Therefore, a copyleft license would definitely allow that along with everything else. https://opensource.org/osd Look at points 5 and 6.

But a copycenter license would be good if the fandom creators licensed their fandoms with it and then everyone could do with it whatever. Now, of course, there would be P&B, but that wouldn't affect my derivative works if I used my own license for them: a copyleft license that is not OSI-ishly open source, but open source to the point where it's all fair without P&B.

I guess that an anti P&B copyleft license for all open fandoms would be the solution then. However, I'd like it to be possible for those who make derivative works to make closed-source versions as long as there's no P&B.
zzo38
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by zzo38 »

It is a bad idea to include such clauses into the license. Such restrictions do not belong under the copyright law, if they are wanted at all; I would think free speech are more important. Just to do public domain or copyleft and it will do. I will not release my work under a "anti-P&B" license; instead it can just be public domain and you do with as you wish. I too would hope that you don't P&B, but I will not to stop you to do; the modified version will be your work, not mine; I did not write it so you can have the permission to make your own kind if you wish to do.
(Free Hero Mesh - FOSS puzzle game engine)
tepples
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by tepples »

I've created a new topic summarizing discussion so far about licenses that ban porn and blasphemy.
tcaudilllg
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by tcaudilllg »

Where does the Big N get off suing people for things Id, Valve, and Sega all sanction? The choice has been made by others, and it's time Nintendo submitted to the will of the fans.
tcaudilllg
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by tcaudilllg »

8bitMicroGuy wrote:Copyleft open-source licenses, according to OSI, must not discriminate against wrongdoing and that includes porn and blasphemy (going to call it P&B for short). Therefore, a copyleft license would definitely allow that along with everything else. https://opensource.org/osd Look at points 5 and 6.

But a copycenter license would be good if the fandom creators licensed their fandoms with it and then everyone could do with it whatever. Now, of course, there would be P&B, but that wouldn't affect my derivative works if I used my own license for them: a copyleft license that is not OSI-ishly open source, but open source to the point where it's all fair without P&B.

I guess that an anti P&B copyleft license for all open fandoms would be the solution then. However, I'd like it to be possible for those who make derivative works to make closed-source versions as long as there's no P&B.
Your license don't mean shit. Free speech comes before your copyright.
lidnariq
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by lidnariq »

... Uh, the right to free speech does not provide the right to infringe copyright, trademark, patents, &c.
tcaudilllg
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Re: ROM hacks now in Nintendo's crosshairs

Post by tcaudilllg »

lidnariq wrote:... Uh, the right to free speech does not provide the right to infringe copyright, trademark, patents, &c.
The judges make the call and I assure you, liberal American judges are in no mood to accommodate right-wing overreach.

It's about time people got money together and took the Big N to court over this shit. And you should know 8bitguy that BHDN has already vowed to desecrate your bits.
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