Unearthed Arcana 3.5....where besides Kazaa?

[kenjib]

I know that with regard to mp3s to keep them on your hard drive you are SUPPOSED to have a physical copy of the product, hence fair use applies. You can download and listen to something and then delete it. All well and good. Nothing wrong there, that method is like listening to the radio. Most folks skip the last step. Keeping it afterwards IS the illegal part.

Are you sure about that? When a song plays on the radio, BMI pays royalties to the copyright holders based on number of plays. The radio stations pay BMI. If I recall correctly, recent law also made it so that streaming internet providers are subject to the same limitations (which shut down many small operators). By downloading, listening, and deleting, you are circumventing this infrastructure by which copyright holders get paid. It is most definitely not the same thing and I would be very surprised if was legal.

 

[Henry]

In NO WAY am I advocating or defending the illegal copying of books.

No problems here. However...

I'm NOT saying these people are 'legitimate'. Just that most (vast, vast, vast majority) were not going to pony up cash anyway, and should not be therefore be entered into the books as a 'loss'. Most probably never even read the books in question (it's quite difficult reading a whole novel at the computer). If they actually liked it enough that this became an issue, they probably went out and got a real copy.

If a person steals a soft drink from a store, and throws it in the trash afterwards without consuming it, is it still theft? Does that inventory still need to be written off as a loss by said store?

The fact that it's a physical copy versus an electronic one does not make a difference from a legal standpoint; the buyer is purchasing a license for one copy of the work in question. Many people seem to THINK it does, but the purchase price does not cover only the raw materials used in production; it covers the sale of one license as overhead and profit to the seller.

 

[kenjib]

Henry, the actual crime of downloading on Kazaa is not theft. It is copyright infringement. There is a big difference, and it is very important. The laws work completely, totally, different. Even morally the implications are very different (by which I don't mean to say that copyright infringement is ok by any means).

These terms have become quite tangled recently, much to the detriment of working through the new legal issues that the information age has ushered in. Essentially we are now at a revolution at least of the scale of the first printing press, for which current day copyright was invented in the first place. Before this there was no such thing as a crime of copyright infringement, but there was still theft, obviously. See this difference? These concepts will now possibly require another re-ordering of similar magnitude, so I feel that it's important to keep the terms clear.

Anyways, what does this have to do with re-distributing legally licensed open game content?

 

[Amal Shukup]

If a person steals a soft drink from a store, and throws it in the trash afterwards without consuming it, is it still theft? Does that inventory still need to be written off as a loss by said store?

Of course. But there is a factual 'loss' invloved: The store pays for inventory, which if stolen, equates to lost revenue.

This is not (financially speaking) equivalent to copying digital information - which does not impact inventory in the least.

I make no claims for the ethics of the act. I think those who create something of worth should be compensated for it. I was simply addressing the false premise of equating 'copying' with loss of revenue.

I agree that if someone steals 100 bottles of soft drink from a store, the store would 'write off' a loss on their balance sheet (which has revenue, tax and insurance implications).

However, if someone downloads 100 copies of a book, and a publisher were to write that off as a loss on their balance sheets, they would be perpetuating fraud on their shareholders, their insurance carriers, and the tax man by claiming as factual a loss that is merely hypothetical.

Virtual even.

A'Mal

 

[Teflon Billy]

...If a person steals a soft drink from a store, and throws it in the trash afterwards without consuming it, is it still theft? Does that inventory still need to be written off as a loss by said store?...

Man, that is a really flawed argument.

It hink a more apt one would be "If a person walks into a store and takes a photograph of a newspaper, then tosses out the photgraph without "reading" it, is it still theft?".

And though I think you meant the next bit rhetorically, your question "does that inventory still need to be written off by said store?" is answered with a deifinite "no", as the seller was not deprived of any product.

That's why the question is of copyright infringement rather than theft.

 

[LightPhoenix]

I know that with regard to mp3s to keep them on your hard drive you are SUPPOSED to have a physical copy of the product, hence fair use applies. You can download and listen to something and then delete it. All well and good. Nothing wrong there, that method is like listening to the radio. Most folks skip the last step. Keeping it afterwards IS the illegal part.

Completely, absolutely wrong.

Well, okay, 95% wrong.

Downloading something you already own is still criminal. Fair use only applies if you've physically made copies yourself of property you own. Fair use does not apply in the instance you've stated, since you didn't make the copy yourself from your own property.

It's also nothing like radio, since radio stations have to pay a (fairly hefty) royalty to record labels for playing their songs on the air, even though it's more beneficial for the artist/producer/label than the station. That's why all the internet radio stations were forced to pay money to the record industry. It's also part of the reason MTW and VH1 (US music television stations, for those not in the US) hardly ever play videos any more.

 

[Ranger REG]

With all due respect to everyone, I hope that Wizards will not consider adding OGC from the UA to the SRD ... as a convenience. The product contains designated OGC already. It's up to the publishers (of print and web) to DIY: scan and extract the OGC material you need and abide by the Open Gaming License.

Again, don't make Wizards feel it is a mistake to published products with OGC inside, including such statement, "Well, if they didn't want it, they shouldn't have done it" reasoning.

I mean do you really want them to continue or not? Or are you the type that prefer better gifts from your friends, otherwise you will nag?

 

[kenjib]

With all due respect to everyone, I hope that Wizards will not consider adding OGC from the UA to the SRD ... as a convenience. The product contains designated OGC already. It's up to the publishers (of print and web) to DIY: scan and extract the OGC material you need and abide by the Open Gaming License.

Again, don't make Wizards feel it is a mistake to published products with OGC inside, including such statement, "Well, if they didn't want it, they shouldn't have done it" reasoning.

I mean do you really want them to continue or not? Or are you the type that prefer better gifts from your friends, otherwise you will nag?

How will re-distributing the open content under license make WotC feel that it's a mistake? I have yet to see any conclusive explanation of this. In fact there are numerous counter-examples of harmlessly re-distributed WotC content extant that I have already cited in multiple posts in this thread.

 

[Ranger REG]

It's not the redistribution or re-use of open content, it's someone's attempt to redistribute alleged open content when they are intentionally or unintentionally violate the terms of the OGL. As I said before, that unless they're lawyers or have a lawyer standing by, someone will screw up.

As for Kazaa, it's only a matter of time before someone will exploit it for illegal and/or unauthorized purpose.

 

[SweeneyTodd]

It's not the redistribution or re-use of open content, it's someone's attempt to redistribute alleged open content when they are intentionally or unintentionally violate the terms of the OGL.

Reg, you've said this a few times, but I'm still not sure that I understand what you mean. Are you saying that Wizards would stop releasing OGL content if someone copies it in a way that breaks their rules? Cause they'd just do a cease and desist, easy enough. You break the license and you have to stop doing what you're doing.

Or are you saying that Wizards would stop releasing OGL if people reproduced their material *legally*, but in a fashion that was "excessive"? How much is excessive? I don't see degrees of OGL -- it's either open content or it's not.

My personal opinion is that they figure sales lost to people who just use open content alone is a drop in the bucket compared to flat out piracy, and so it doesn't hurt their business model. Like we already know, one can get a pirated scan of any WOTC book they want, but that doesn't keep WOTC from publishing them.

I just want to understand what you mean; I don't want to debate just to debate. If it's just your feeling or opinion that it'd maybe be bad in some way, fair enough.