Copyrights

[StarSeekerVDS]

Any materials created here that incorporate any aspect of E&B are owned by EA even if EA doesn't have any current intention of enforcing their copyrights, and they could choose to at any time. Claiming copyrights on any of these materials is illegal.

Any materials created here that incorporate no intellectual property of E&B are owned by their respective creators unless a legally binding agreement exists between the content creators and Net7, and only that if Net7 is a legally recognizable entity. This cannot be made retroactive without consent of all parties. Claiming copyrights on preexisting materials can be actionable.

Please give these facts serious consideration before opening unpleasant and unnecessary cans of worms.

(And if you are brazen enough to try copyrighting stuff that belongs to EA or others as some have posted lately, would you please have the sense to name the organization something that isn't part of the IP you're messing with?!)

[Floss]

I don't think copyrighting anything holds any merit unless you legally copyright it?

Even then, you could only sue for damages if their were damages, which implies profits, which would piss off EA in the first place.

Encryption > copyright.

I'm not a lawyer, but copyrighting actually requires ... obtaining a copyright?

[Kyp [LDEV]]

I don't think copyrighting anything holds any merit unless you legally copyright it?

Even then, you could only sue for damages if their were damages, which implies profits, which would piss off EA in the first place.

Encryption > copyright.

I'm not a lawyer, but copyrighting actually requires ... obtaining a copyright?

EA owns clients, assets, and name. All code is capable of being copywritten by the project because the project created it from character number 1. We don't claim copyright over anything EA created.

Copyright requires that you say "I have a copyright" and it be an intellectual work. Trademarking and Servicemarking, as well as patenting on the other require registration with (in the US) the US Patent and Trade Office (USPTO)

The license is Creative Commons.

Kyp

[Floss]

EA owns clients, assets, and name. All code is capable of being copywritten by the project because the project created it from character number 1. We don't claim copyright over anything EA created.

Copyright requires that you say "I have a copyright" and it be an intellectual work. Trademarking and Servicemarking, as well as patenting on the other require registration with (in the US) the US Patent and Trade Office (USPTO)

The license is Creative Commons.

Kyp

What would the recourse be if someone else used the Net-7 code to run a game server? (assuming non-profit)

A civil suit = $0 in damages? Who would sue?

[Kyp [LDEV]]

What would the recourse be if someone else used the Net-7 code to run a game server? (assuming non-profit)

A civil suit = $0 in damages? Who would sue?

Nothing, it's technically open source, the agreement specifies HOW you can use our work, nothing more. Check out the header in a source file, and read the associated links. We're not going to pursue anyone that wants to try. All content though will have to be recreated as it is not provided for private shard/servers.

[StarSeekerVDS]

Nothing, it's technically open source, the agreement specifies HOW you can use our work, nothing more. Check out the header in a source file, and read the associated links. We're not going to pursue anyone that wants to try. All content though will have to be recreated as it is not provided for private shard/servers.

And why isn't it?

[Kyp [LDEV]]

And why isn't it?

Because it isn't required by the license and it gives you a reason to play our server.

Open source requires that we provide you the code and data necessary to make the project run, and that's what we will do. Now, after it's been available for several months on our server, we do plan on releasing such data, but those story publishes will be held back for a time to ensure players have had a chance to experience it on THIS server.

If the private shard/server wants to make their own, they can do so, otherwise they will have to grab it when it's made available.

[Mimir[IS]]

16) You will not create, use, play, or provide any emulator or other site where Earth &

Beyond may be played and you will not post or distribute any utilities, emulators or other

software related to Earth & Beyond without the express written consent of EA. You will not

attempt to play Earth & Beyond on any service that is not controlled or authorized by EA.

We all see this every single day we log on... now granted I think lack of action on EA's part for as long as this has been going on may be abandonment on their part. But to be safe legal advice should be looked into ASAP.

[Zap]

Enb is not open source, hence u had to build it up by making your own code for the game itself.

So does the Emulator have any written consent by EA at all?

Cause iff not we are infact breaking the law here.

So i think emulator should infact contact EA and ask about this.

Cause i don't wanna see the people get in trouble for giving us our fav game back

[Tyran]

*does a future sight*

It is sometime in 2012 and the ENB-emulator is live for nearly a year. Many thousands of people play on multiple servers and most people have at least one level 150 and everyone is having a great time. But one day we all attempt to log in but the servers are offline...permanently.

We then learn that the emulator is over and never coming back because of EA....

I may be being pessimistic here and all, but can you really tell me this is an impossible scenario?

[Davidr99 [Admin]]

I just added a copywriter saying that all of the code that is made from this open source emulator is not allowed to be used to make money or sell. Anyone that uses the source code must also open source their project. We can copywriter anything that we make our self’s. We are in no way copywriting anything that EA owns. This is more to project the open source community and keep people from selling services using it.

Thanks,

David

[Kyp [LDEV]]

Enb is not open source, hence u had to build it up by making your own code for the game itself.

So does the Emulator have any written consent by EA at all?

Cause iff not we are infact breaking the law here.

So i think emulator should infact contact EA and ask about this.

Cause i don't wanna see the people get in trouble for giving us our fav game back

This is not a problem because as David says, we're not claiming copyright over anything they did and because we are not distributing the game client or selling it.

[Toreava]

I used to know quite a bit about literal copyright. I've forgotten most of what I learned. Digital copyright is a different animal than literal.

Someone brought the fact that people sold high-end items looted in the game on Ebay. Now - that is most likely a huge copyright infringement and worries me. I did see items being sold on Ebay just by chance when it EnB was live, and, wow, what can I say... Talk about ruining a game... So if you couldn't afford to pay $s for items to facilitate play you couldn't play a game? Give me a break.

Are there going to be any guidelines restricting the actual sale of high-end items outside the game?

[Kyp [LDEV]]

I used to know quite a bit about literal copyright. I've forgotten most of what I learned. Digital copyright is a different animal than literal.

Someone brought the fact that people sold high-end items looted in the game on Ebay. Now - that is most likely a huge copyright infringement and worries me. I did see items being sold on Ebay just by chance when it EnB was live, and, wow, what can I say... Talk about ruining a game... So if you couldn't afford to pay $s for items to facilitate play you couldn't play a game? Give me a break.

Are there going to be any guidelines restricting the actual sale of high-end items outside the game?

We don't want it to happen, but would have no way to enforce it unless we caught someone doing it.

[Floss]

We don't want it to happen, but would have no way to enforce it unless we caught someone doing it.

Do items have tags?

Is Hellbore #1242 distinguishable fom Hellbore #430?

[Kyp [LDEV]]

Do items have tags?

Is Hellbore #1242 distinguishable fom Hellbore #430?

Currently no, but something like this would be one way to enforce it.

[Floss]

Currently no, but something like this would be one way to enforce it.

I'm not sure how much spam or lag that would create (thinks of ammo if each piece was an item).

Even if an item was just time stamped, that could identify who looted and who traded, assuming those sort of logs exist (again, no clue on this).

[Kyp [LDEV]]

I'm not sure how much spam or lag that would create (thinks of ammo if each piece was an item).

Even if an item was just time stamped, that could identify who looted and who traded, assuming those sort of logs exist (again, no clue on this).

Wouldn't really create any lag, we could just take a timestamp and an IP and save it when you looted it. Or a user account, and if we see high end stuff that trades hands we could take closer looks but herein lies the problem with RMT (real money trade) while we can see these things, in most cases the items CAN change hands through normal means. We have no means of determining if it was bought from another player with real money. See what I mean?

[Floss]

The simplest way to deter 90%+ of RMT is make "ubers" BOP (bind on pickup, non-trade, etc).

Pros:

Kills RMT

Deters monopolization of spawns (no resale value) and gives more people a "fair chance"

Cons:

Makes cash relatively worthless at end game

The Live game had some odd mix of the two, which never really made sense to me. Why is a Hellbore tradeable, but a Rage isn't? Who knows. Balancing the economy and stopping runaway inflation (seen it in eveyr mmo I've ever played) is obviously an afterthought right now, but maybe a mix of highly sought after craftable items could keep cash moving, and make the "ubers" BOP. Making some of the craftable components hard to get can keep some of the prestige to them.

I tend to favour BOP for end game epic items, as that deters a guild/group from sitting on something 24/7.

[Kyp [LDEV]]

The simplest way to deter 90%+ of RMT is make "ubers" BOP (bind on pickup, non-trade, etc).

Pros:

Kills RMT

Deters monopolization of spawns (no resale value) and gives more people a "fair chance"

Cons:

Makes cash relatively worthless at end game

The Live game had some odd mix of the two, which never really made sense to me. Why is a Hellbore tradeable, but a Rage isn't? Who knows. Balancing the economy and stopping runaway inflation (seen it in eveyr mmo I've ever played) is obviously an afterthought right now, but maybe a mix of highly sought after craftable items could keep cash moving, and make the "ubers" BOP. Making some of the craftable components hard to get can keep some of the prestige to them.

I tend to favour BOP for end game epic items, as that deters a guild/group from sitting on something 24/7.

Having watched some guilds on my server camp and sell loots for large sums of money I could concur with that. We'll be considering it very carefully when we look at balance and economy. High end craftables is probably something that we'll definitely see but for the most part the Items team is going to be managing items and the economy. Those individuals could possibly give better insight on what they want to tell right now. Aschera and Riia are the two most responsible for that stuff at the moment.

[Ryle [N7R]]

The only argument I could see being made would be for formerly constructable to 200 items being set bind, and thus no longer craftable. Now, if the items were to drop at the 200 mark, considering the fact the only "good" manufacturable item is a 200 it seems, that would counter that argument.

Examples being Hellfire Ballistae and DG

[Azasha]

Honestly I'm going to add this.... 2 things actually.

Record of IP or even MAC address sends you on wild goose chases: person changes ISP , person has dynamic IP (edit blond moment put ISP instead of IP), person gets new computer, person changes network card (due to other one frying), person moves.

Secondly making things BOP did not make them have $0 cash value. It was quite the opposite. People would sell looting rights where the person pays to loot the item after the kill or see attached picture (this is not my char I took screens of it for god knows what reason probably the fact someone actually PAID that):

[Basileus]

To be honest I dont think we need to worry too much abour EA. I find it very unlikely that they do not already know about this project. I'm sure they have a few people working only with keeping en eye on their copyrights and "hunting" on the net for things like this (all they have to do is google!). So why havent they done anything about us? Copyright issues are seldom crystal clear. If they should find it worth the effort to do something about this they have more to loose than to win. Imagine if this would go to court and they would loose (which perhaps isn't likely but not impossible). Then they would have opened up a very nasty can of worms.

We're playing around with an "ancient" game that they have no interest in. We're simply not worth the effort and the potentil risk (even if it is small). If this wasn't the case we would have been shut down long ago.

//Leandra

[Mimir[IS]]

To be honest I dont think we need to worry too much abour EA. I find it very unlikely that they do not already know about this project. I'm sure they have a few people working only with keeping en eye on their copyrights and "hunting" on the net for things like this (all they have to do is google!). So why havent they done anything about us? Copyright issues are seldom crystal clear. If they should find it worth the effort to do something about this they have more to loose than to win. Imagine if this would go to court and they would loose (which perhaps isn't likely but not impossible). Then they would have opened up a very nasty can of worms.

We're playing around with an "ancient" game that they have no interest in. We're simply not worth the effort and the potentil risk (even if it is small). If this wasn't the case we would have been shut down long ago.

//Leandra

While I mostly agree with what you have said, the bottom line is up until very recently (ST3 and now ST4) very seldom were there more than 200 players on at any given time.

The project leaders have done a great job keeping it a low profile and not rubbing it in EA’s nose.

My fear is that the exuberance of newer players and the desire to promote the game the project will gain more and more notoriety. The more the project is out there the more likely EA will have to do something about it.

As I suggested before it may be prudent to at a minimum check to see what the liability actually is. If it is only a cease and desist order, then no worries, pass the ball to the next underground server and go from there.

If it is more than that, and EA can get punitive as well as actual damages then I would think the project leaders should have some definitive answer.

But until that time comes…..

PARTY ON DUDES!!! And DUDETTES!!

[Floss]

The actual damages would be zero, unless EA could prove that this somehow hurt their sales of other games which would be a ridiculous assertion. They could dig into the "donations" and view that as revenue, which could open a small can of worms.

Also might be some tax implications for whoever actually owns the server/pays the bills/etc as it is income (even if it makes just $1 net over the fiscal year) whether you are incorporated or not, would hit a personal return for somebody. This really depends on the jurisdiction of the owner of the project (person paying the bills, renting the server, paying for the website, etc) and while I'm familiar and have practiced US and Canadian tax, I'm not going to pretend to be competent in other country's tax laws. I would assume whatever jurisdiction they are in is similar, where if the project makes nothing ($0 or less) on a cash-basis for the calendar year (assuming the tax system operates on a calendar basis), then there is no income to report and EA wouldn't have anything concrete to chase.