copyright infringement?

[rom90125]

I'm not sure which forum this should be in, thus I decided to drop the question here and will let the moderators decide if it needs to be moved.

My group is expected to begin CoTSQ adventure path in the very near future. As such, I decided to transcribe the adventure book to rich text so I could import the adventure into a 3rd party RPG software suite. With the add of OCR software, I've completed half the book to date and suspect I will finish the second half in the next few weeks.

I've seen other copyright material transcribed and posted in the yahoo forums that support this RPG software suite and I was wondering if this is legal?

For example, if I take the rtf files and move them into the software suite and save as a file specific to the software suite, can I then distribute this application-specific file to other users of the software, provided I password-protect my work?

It seems to be a common practice to transcribe copyright material and share it in the yahoo forums, in so long as the person downloading the work can authenticate they own the copyright material (usually with a keyword taken from the source material and used as a password to unlock the transcribed material).

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

As long as you do not distribute it in any fashion, this is legal-- you're allowed to copy media you own as much as you want, in any format you want, as long as you keep all of the copies yourself.

 

[Janx]

technically, sharing the file with others, regardless of the password protect schema is naughty.

WotC chased after TheGameHub.com for a while for this same issue. They had content from the books. They protected it with their own schema for verification of proof of ownership. WotC still wasn't happy.

Part of it has to do with protecting their property, another part has to do with WotC has sold the rights to another company to do software "stuff" and was therefore required to pursue others doing the same thing.

Janx

 

[reveal]

PS: It's spelled 'copyright' not 'copywrite.'

 

[rom90125]

technically, sharing the file with others, regardless of the password protect schema is naughty.

WotC chased after TheGameHub.com for a while for this same issue. They had content from the books. They protected it with their own schema for verification of proof of ownership. WotC still wasn't happy.

Part of it has to do with protecting their property, another part has to do with WotC has sold the rights to another company to do software "stuff" and was therefore required to pursue others doing the same thing.

Janx

I'm definitely not looking to incur the wrath of anyone who has put their time and effort into publishing copyright material. My intent was to share this work with other users of the software, provided they owned the source material from which it was transcribed and could prove ownership. I would never release the raw RTF file.

 

[rom90125]

PS: It's spelled 'copyright' not 'copywrite.'

Thanks for the correction, and since I require my kids to write their misspelled words ten times each...

copyright copyright
copyright copyright
copyright copyright
copyright copyright
copyright copyright

 

[Ranes]

I'm not sure how you'd be able to confirm that the person downloading your file owns the original. Are you? Even if you are, it still infringes copyright. Whether or not you think it's unreasonable to restrict the electronic transcription to those who own a copy of the original is another matter. Korimyr is mistaken. Janx is right on the money.

By the way, copyright infringement issues aside for a moment, of all the album sleeves... What's wrong with a Roger Dean cover?

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

My understanding is that this would be a big no-no. Regardless of the format, you're still distributing Wizards IP. Statblocks and such might be arguable, but any spells names that aren't SRD, NPC names, locations, flavor text, etc., is going to be off-limits.

The chimps at CodeMonkey Publishing probably understand the ins and outs of this better than anybody.

 

[rom90125]

By the way, copyright infringement issues aside for a moment, of all the album sleeves... What's wrong with a Roger Dean cover?

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! I wasn't sure if I would get more heat for using a classic cover with the handle rom90125.

Perhaps I need to come up with a new handle, something more inline with my personal favs from the band... something along the lines of 'The Revealing Science Of God'.

 

[Odhanan]

I've seen other copyright material transcribed and posted in the yahoo forums that support this RPG software suite and I was wondering if this is legal?

If you have the authorization of the publisher, this is legal.
If you don't have the authorization, or didn't ask, this is NOT legal.

As long as you do not distribute it in any fashion, this is legal-- you're allowed to copy media you own as much as you want, in any format you want, as long as you keep all of the copies yourself.

This is legal as long as you are the only one using them.
As soon as you decide to share them (i.e. put them online for download and/or distributing printed or unprinted copies to people who are not direct family members), this is a copyright infringement.