EmuParadise has removed its entire library of retro game ROMs and ISOs

[Gentlegamer]

Let's say we apply copyright law to other forms of income.

 

How about if you take a job out of college, and you love it, and you work there straight for 14 years. The company loves you and you get promotion after promotion, and earn a large salary because you're the best in the company at your job.

 

Then on the 14th anniversary of your start date, through no fault of your own - they fire you and give your job to someone else - at the same pay rate and titile level you had to work 14 years to earn - and on top of that, you are no longer allowed to work in that industry, and now have to go back to college again, get a new degree in a different field, and start all over from the bottom again.

 

That's what 14 year copyright expiration are to artists.

 

I guarantee the artist in your example used public domain things for his work, no one exists in a cultural or technical vacuum creating things out of whole cloth. So consider this "paying it forward."

[pacman000]

Public things: "Brown" "Yellow" "Fox" "Dog" "Quick" "Lazy"

 

Creative work: "The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy yellow dog."

 

No one can claim the rights to the ideas at the basis of a work; no one needs to create those ideas; they come from experience in life. But the work itself must have a creator.

 

There are a thousand ways one could combine a kind escaped slave, a trip down the Mississippi, and a run away kid without coming up with Huckleberry Finn. There are a thousand ways you can turn two circles into a cartoon character without coming up with Felix the Cat or Mickey Mouse.

 

Of course trouble arises when we try to determine the how many ideas two works may share, & which exact order in which they may share them. But for the most part we still seem to be able to create without infringing on anything. Star Wars was released when Flash Gordon was still copyrighted; Superman was released when John Carter was still copyrighted.

 

If you want to make a scrolling platform adventure game with a super-fast character, go ahead! Just don't make him out of two blue circles with triangles along his back.

 

 

With software, it's ususually the guy hiring the contract programmer that has to watch out. Otherwise, he doesn't get to own the software he's paid for.

Was going to edit my post to include: "If you have someone create a work for you make sure the contract says 'work for hire,'" but you beat me to it.

 

Seems odd that a photographer gets to keep the rights to photos he's hired to take by default. What can he do with them? I'm the only person who wants to see my face!

[Tempest]

Public things: "Brown" "Yellow" "Fox" "Dog" "Quick" "Lazy"

 

Didn't UPS try and trademark the color brown a few years back?

[pacman000]

I think so. I know STIHL® claims trademarks on a certain shade of orange & a certain shade of grey. Or maybe it's a combination of a certain shade of orange & a certain shade of grey. Something like that. I'm too lazy to look it up right now.

 

Trademarks are different than copyrights; generally simply displaying a trademark isn't enough to violate it; you have to use the mark in a way which would confuse consumers. That's different from copyrights, where any significant use is a violation of the law. Think of it as a form of consumer protection. There may be a thousand people named McCoy, but you want some sort of guarantee that you're getting the real McCoy if you're buying an automatic locomotive oiler.

 

I suppose, if someone uses a colour consistently on their packaging or products, the public at large may begin to associate those colors with that company, which could be trademark-able.

 

STIHL® is a registered Trademark of ANDREAS STIHL & AG Co. KG Waiblingen.

[Inky]

 

Didn't UPS try and trademark the color brown a few years back?

 

A certain recent political official tried trademarking the phrase "You're Fired."

[Gentlegamer]

Michael Buffer owns the trademark to "Let's get ready to rumble!"

[pacman000]

Obviously, trademarks can be taken too far too: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140122/03554625951/king-cries-trademark-over-banner-saga.shtml

 

Dr. Pepper should make an Orange Crush game...just because...

Edited August 17, 2018 by pacman000

[zzip]

Just because pirates find loopholes, or crack copy protection, doesn't make it ok to pirate software. They are violating the software's stated TOS at time of purchase. Again, it's unreasonable to you, because you want extra free copies of something you're not actually entitled to. That doesn't make it legal, or ethical. Convenience is not a justification for theft.

 

Earlier you were complaining that copy protection causes software to be lost forever because we can't make copies. Now you're saying it doesn't work so they shouldn't bother. Honestly, I'm having a hard time understanding your point here.

Simple, copy protection prevents ME from copying my disk because I don't have the skills or hardware to defeat it. It doesn't stop the pirates. The pirates cracked virtually every protection scheme and make protection-free copies online.

 

If I want a backup copy of the software, which I am entitled to by law, I have to go to the cracked copy.

 

So the copy protection didn't stop piracy, it merely prevented me, a legit user from backing up my disk, but it also entices me to go to the cracked copies so that I can still use the software I paid for today.

[zzip]

Capitalism is at odds with preservation. Nintendo's not going to have any difficulty keeping Super Mario Bros. alive for generations to come, but they have no interest in keeping around games with expired licenses, by defunct companies. There's just no money in it.

Not capitalism, current copyright law.

 

Under the older copyright laws, the games we are talking about would have passed into Public Domain by now and all this debate would be moot.

[zzip]

Nobody is saying that a property shouldn’t enter the public domain. It’s just that 14 years is way too short. I think that lifetime of the creator plus 75 years is better because it allows the children of the property holder to properly benefit from their work.

14 years is too short, but indefinitely is too long (Congress to Disney: don't worry we'll change the copyright length yet again when Mickey Mouse is at risk).

 

Not everything needs life of the author + 75, they are effectively dead now and not collecting money and have no hope of becoming viable. Best solution would be periodic renewal for IPs that are still viable.

[Flojomojo]

(Congress to Disney: don't worry we'll change the copyright length yet again when Mickey Mouse is at risk).

Disney to Congress, your check is in the mail

https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?id=d000000128

[phoenixdownita]

In general if a third party profits from any work it did not develop the original authors should be rewarded.

Also in general if you work for a company they pay you to "invent" something so the fact they get the rights to it is somewhat fair all considered ... granted you should get a bigger piece of the pie if it turns out your idea generates enough money (so many ideas go nowhere, are wrong or plain out of time).

 

Finally, wrt entertainment it is hard to draw the line. Videogames (as well as movies, music, sculptures, paintings, table games etc...) live and die to entertain an end user ... if you get to enjoy them you should pay for them ... wrt how much though that's a different story. These days any "mobile game" is either free (yeah .. whatever) or extremely cheap (again, yeah ... whatever) so we kind of expect that 30+ years old games would go for pennies (as it should) but alas .... I have no issue if I had to pay say 50US$ for the entire SNES library (they can even get to decide who gets what) .. but even just say an a-la-carte for 1$ would make the exercise futile ... the same it's not true for systems with short libraries .... say for the Jag I would not mind paying 50c a-la-carte given that it's only 70 or so games ... weird but that's my opinion, the systems are so old it should be possible to enjoy the full library for not much at all.

 

I guess for such old systems I don't care so much for Game A vs Game B instead of System A library vs System B library .... I know the big N will never allow it ... but then again it is a matter of time, Atari went the way of the dodo, Konami went the way of the dodo, Sega went the way of the dodo, Capcom/SNK are close ... big N is not that far off so maybe with a little bit of luck they would just stop the lawsuits and find a way to get some money without trying too hard to "mint" nostalgia.

[Tanooki]

Another blow has been optionally struck which I'm surprised I've not seen anti-Nintendo blame squad rattling fools rambling on about as of yet. ISO Zone one of the very primary resources of warezed out ISO (and smaller) sized releases has shut down their operations too because of the climate and will be reorganizing in some form where you can get the goodies while somehow being fair to the original makers. I don't see how that will work out well trying to contact anyone they stole from to then get some agreement to get them paid or whatever the intent is. With them out of the way, and multiple ISPs being true bastards about using file sharing torrent apps, it's hit a new level of challenge to find some stuff on larger scale sized downloads like discs.

 

In all fairness I was looking for an ISO of something I wanted to buy on ebay to make sure I could run it first, and I'm 3 days into coming up with a dead end still and they did have it like a week or two ago otherwise I would have never noticed.

[John Stamos Mullet]

Disney to Congress, your check is in the mail

https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?id=d000000128

The vast majority of society: Yeah Mickey Mouse belongs to Disney, so?

[JBerel]

This is a tempest in a teapot to cater to attorneys, big businesses and other people who are not direct beneficiaries of created works, so it has always been a disingenuous argument. Copyright protections should be for 20 year initial terms and require formal registration and filing every 5 or 10 years thereafter to demonstrate the works are still being sold in the commercial space. Otherwise they should fall into the public domain where they continue to have protections whereby nobody else can profit directly from the work without risking their product becoming public domain also. That would be to expressly prevent some dumb ass from picking up a formerly copyrighted work and saying it's his now. It would have to be properly purchased from the registered holder and re-registered while the copyright was still in effect, and nobody gets to produce some backdated receipt after a copyright term has expired. Essentially a work should always have a valid registration after the original 20 year term.

 

Trademarks are more of an advertising thing that provide some assurance that your business, say McDonald's Hamburgers, doesn't have to deal with a competitor in the same sector cribbing off your name and advertising investment, say McDowell's Hamburgers. When a trademark has lapsed and is no longer is use, it's not harming someone else if the same or similar mark is used again in the same sector, but it should be regulated to avoid fraud by some douchey no talent hacks who want to pose as the former trademark holder, but didn't buy the trademark when it was in effect. Cough**colecovision **Hack**cough.

 

At least that's how it will be when I run the world.

[derFunkenstein]

wellllll I'm convinced. Of what, I'm not sure.

[JBerel]

Thank you mind stone. Now if I can just remember where I put that reality stone, I'll have a complete set.

[Tempest]

This is a tempest in a teapot

 

Just for the record, I have never been in a teapot and I find this post offensive.

[JBerel]

Should I have said Tempest 4000 in a teapot perhaps?

[pacman000]

This is a tempest in a teapot to cater to attorneys, big businesses and other people who are not direct beneficiaries of created works, so it has always been a disingenuous argument. Copyright protections should be for 20 year initial terms and require formal registration and filing every 5 or 10 years thereafter to demonstrate the works are still being sold in the commercial space. Otherwise they should fall into the public domain where they continue to have protections whereby nobody else can profit directly from the work without risking their product becoming public domain also. That would be to expressly prevent some dumb ass from picking up a formerly copyrighted work and saying it's his now. It would have to be properly purchased from the registered holder and re-registered while the copyright was still in effect, and nobody gets to produce some backdated receipt after a copyright term has expired. Essentially a work should always have a valid registration after the original 20 year term.

 

Trademarks are more of an advertising thing that provide some assurance that your business, say McDonald's Hamburgers, doesn't have to deal with a competitor in the same sector cribbing off your name and advertising investment, say McDowell's Hamburgers. When a trademark has lapsed and is no longer is use, it's not harming someone else if the same or similar mark is used again in the same sector, but it should be regulated to avoid fraud by some douchey no talent hacks who want to pose as the former trademark holder, but didn't buy the trademark when it was in effect. Cough**colecovision **Hack**cough.

 

At least that's how it will be when I run the world.

I generally like this, but that part I highlighted concerns me. Would that put every episode of Rhoda into the public domain? They used a public domain song as the theme tune. Would mavies based on Shakespeare or Treasure Island or The Lost World be illegal? I've wanted a new Lost World movie for awhile now...

 

Also, wouldn't that make a lot of cheap DVDs illegal? I know The Vengeance of Rannah probably is in the public domain, but the internet connection I'd need to download the movie's more expensive that a $5.99 DVD.

 

 

Shoot, could YouTube even host this? Wouldn't the commercials make it illegal?

 

Also, if no one's allowed to directly profit off public domain works is there any incentive for restoration or archiving? Even if someone decided to archive or restore a work for a nobler cause than profits, could he or she get funding if it's impossible to profit from public domain works?

 

Of course your post could be a satire. Sometimes it's hard to tell who's being serious on the internet.

Edited August 20, 2018 by pacman000

[mr_me]

The vast majority of society: Yeah Mickey Mouse belongs to Disney, so?

One day it won't be, at least according to current laws. The lawmakers have already decided that it all goes into the public domain.

[Flojomojo]

Have you seen the modern Mickey Mouse cartoons? They're great -- and a little Ren & Stimpy gross/subversive, too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Mouse_(TV_series)

 

now back to our regularly scheduled bickering about law and morality

[00010000]

Atari went the way of the dodo, Konami went the way of the dodo, Sega went the way of the dodo, Capcom/SNK are close ... big N is not that far off

 

Wait, what? What is this in reference to? Other than Atari all of these companies are still around making games. Some of them may've made consoles before but they never stopped making games or staying relevant to the main gaming markets. Heck even Konami's kinda still hanging in there w/ the Metal Gear stuff.

 

Also in what world can you say Sega died but SNK is "close" if you're using prior platform maker status as a qualifier, when SNK discontinued their console division around the same time as Sega (and unlike them, also withdrew from the arcade markets)? In what world is Nintendo "not far off" from dying? Switch is doing gangbusters xD.

[JBerel]

I generally like this, but that part I highlighted concerns me. Would that put every episode of Rhoda into the public domain? They used a public domain song as the theme tune. Would mavies based on Shakespeare or Treasure Island or The Lost World be illegal? I've wanted a new Lost World movie for awhile now...

 

Shoot, could YouTube even host this? Wouldn't the commercials make it illegal?

 

Also, if no one's allowed to directly profit off public domain works is there any incentive for restoration or archiving? Even if someone decided to archive or restore a work for a nobler cause than profits, could he or she get funding if it's impossible to profit from public domain works?

 

Of course your post could be a satire. Sometimes it's hard to tell who's being serious on the internet.

Naw, I was totally serious. I've given a lot of thought to this because I've had to work in that space a lot, and the copyright laws are a pain in the ass. I'd expect use of public domain stuff would be easy to manage like the use of licensed content. As long as it's used in a derivative work, it's not profiting directly from a peice of public domain content. Any production based on prior work is a new work while the underlying story, music, or imagery etc. remains in the public domain. Something like YouTube doesn't sell public domain works, it just provides distribution for them and should be entitled to ad revenue like tv stations, but not entitled to pay per view like cable companies.

[xenomorpher]

The iso zone thing really bums me out. They had a lot of great homebrew and apps for the Dreamcast and original Xbox. I probably got most of what I wanted from there though but still. Guess I'll have to find another go-to site.