Daybreak Sues The Heroes Journey EQ EMU Server Devs

moonarchia

moonarchia

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Old Man Potter said:
You just proved my point. Copyright was originally designed to protect and encourage creativity by giving creators a temporary monopoly, not to act as an eternal blunt weapon for corporations to squash passion projects and milk nostalgia forever. Protecting property is the mechanism, not the purpose.
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No, it is literally to protect Intellectual Property. The original goal and the current goal are aligned in that regard. What Disney did to pervert it was change it from 13 years from release date to 70 years after death of creator, or 95 years for commercial works. Once you can buy congress critters wholesale you are probably overdue for an antitrust breakup, but that's a different kettle of fish.

EQ still has 69 more years before it becomes part of the public domain. You will need to buy it from ENAD or buy enough congress critters to reset copyright lengths if you want to put it into public domain sooner.
 
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Synj

Synj

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forehead said:
This is the opposite of true. Laws are literally about protecting property.
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Old Man Potter Old Man Potter :

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Rali

Rali

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Old Man Potter said:
Cute cameo from the peanut gallery. Appreciate you proving my point about shallow drive-by takes. ;)
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Listen, it's not going to be like the rom-com you imagine in your head, where the judge will turn round and say "You know what, I know Enad own the IP, but the creativity of THJ is so good and Everquest means so much (a little too much to some, is quite evident) to so many, I am going to award the case to the little guy" and the courtroom erupts in cheers and hugs and you all live happily ever after.

Refer to my pic again.
 
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Mrniceguy

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yerm said:
If you charge money for your july 4th event and advertise it and very clearly establish it is a commercial endeavor that you profit from? Good luck if the recording industry comes after you.

You seem to have no concept of what's being talked about. Sites like magelo do not use everquest assets. They have a few pics. They aren't running the game files or doing anything remotely close to it.

Thj uses the entire eq platform. I'll double down. Not only launch, but the whole thing start to finish is lifted from eq. Disputing they are using the base everquest platform, launcher or game or otherwise, is lunacy.
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There has been no proof submitted that THJ is for profit. None, just accusations that "Donations" mean for profit. Non-profits are allowed to illicit donations and even make a profit so long as the profit is later used to further the non-profits stated goal.

Naggy, Vox, CT, FV ect are among the copyrights Daybreak has. Magelo, Allahkazam ect absolutely USE Daybreak copyrighted material and they are absolutely doing so for profit. THJ Does not actually use Daybreaks files, the game runs on EQEMU Open source stuff. The reason THJ tells people to DL the game off steam is because you need a legally obtained version of the a game to play on an EMU, P99, TAKP ect all do the same thing.

It's not lunacy it's reality sorry it doesn't fit the little narrative DBG is creating. THJ has it's own launcher. THJ has many of their own art assets, THJ uses EQEMU stuff to run the game. THJ does not even run the RoF2 cilent that they ask you to DL, they run the EQEMU created version of that client.
 
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Cinge

Cinge

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Trying to argue its "EQEMU" code and not everquest code. WHere do you think the EQEMU guys got all their code to start(all the base code is/was copyrighted)? It doesn't suddenly make it free to use when someone else used/manipulated the code first. And even if we ignore the code because a miracle happened and all of it was changed to something original(haha yeah right), there are other things. You realize all the art assets are copyrighted too? All the mob models, pet models, character models, item models.zones etc? THJ uses all that stuff(nostalgia drives the train).

There is zero hope for you, or any point responding further, when you cant tell the difference between something like THJ and database sites.

Just admit you are upset the thing you play on is probably getting shut down(as anyone would be). Play as much as you can and move on. Welcome to the risk of private servers.

Back to TLP servers where I know you played on multiple, because we everquest players have no self control.
 
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Tredge

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THJ is the best thing to happen to Everquest in the last 10+ years.
Daybreak is in a death spiral and everyone that has paid any attention, knows it.

As a fan of the game and the genre - I want to see innovation resurge to restore life to my favorite game. TBH I had given up much hope of that before THJ.

While I think the THJ guys are great, I dont have any personal investment. Selfishly, I just want the ideas to win. If Daybreak steals all the good ideas an actually executes well on them, I say that's a win. If they hire the THJ guys, thats a bigger win, and if Daybreak collapses into a burning pile of nothing and out of the ashes comes a new game or IP that serves my needs - thats the biggest win of all.

It's Daybreaks ball to drop IMO and they have everything to lose. They can either grip even more tightly and lose everything, or profit off the resurge.
 
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Cinge

Cinge

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Sad thing is, even if DPG died, their owner (the investment group) but still goes on.

Also not sure how copyright/IP is handled if the company owning it goes under. I dont think it goes public right away, probably still takes years. Though who is around at that point to enforce it. Such a weird thing.

The best hope is DPG grows a brain and just makes THJ a seperate server and charges a sub for it. Would be curious to see how many are willing to play if it cost $15 a month and how many drop it instantly because its no longer free. Though would have to hire the devs behind it too I would think, because do you honestly trust anyone working at DPG now to do it?
 
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Control

Control

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Mrniceguy said:
There has been no proof submitted that THJ is for profit. None, just accusations that "Donations" mean for profit. Non-profits are allowed to illicit donations and even make a profit so long as the profit is later used to further the non-profits stated goal.

Naggy, Vox, CT, FV ect are among the copyrights Daybreak has. Magelo, Allahkazam ect absolutely USE Daybreak copyrighted material and they are absolutely doing so for profit. THJ Does not actually use Daybreaks files, the game runs on EQEMU Open source stuff. The reason THJ tells people to DL the game off steam is because you need a legally obtained version of the a game to play on an EMU, P99, TAKP ect all do the same thing.

It's not lunacy it's reality sorry it doesn't fit the little narrative DBG is creating. THJ has it's own launcher. THJ has many of their own art assets, THJ uses EQEMU stuff to run the game. THJ does not even run the RoF2 cilent that they ask you to DL, they run the EQEMU created version of that client.
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Donations/profit is really a red herring. You still aren't allowed to use someone else's ip for your product without permission, even if it's free. Again, try stealing Disney ip as a non-profit and see what happens. Of course, doing so commercially increases the likeliness that they'll come after you and that they'll win.

Allahkazam and the like could be sued/dmca'd, but they would have a much stronger fair use claim. But I assume that the ip holders don't mind sites like that existing as much because they help players play the actual game. They're not a replacement for the product. No one has ever quit eq to play Allahkazam instead.
 
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Control

Control

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Cinge said:
not sure how copyright/IP is handled if the company owning it goes under. I dont think it goes public right away, probably still takes years. Though who is around at that point to enforce it.
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Nothing really changes legally. The ip still exists and is owned by someone. Whether or not that entity cares enough to enforce it (or even knows that they own it in some cases) is a different question. I've read about people trying to license obscure old game ips, and in some cases, it can be almost impossible to even find the owner since lots of them get rolled up en masse in acquisitions/bankruptcies over the years. Even if you find an owner, they might not even know anything about games or won't bother to even talk to you unless you're bringing crazy money to the table, regardless of how little the ip is worth. So in a lot of cases, you probably could get away with it, but all of your hard work and investment would be perpetually strapped under a sword of Damocles. And tbh, if you can get away with it, the ip probably isn't doing much for you anyway, so why not make your own instead?
 
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Mrniceguy

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Cinge said:
Trying to argue its "EQEMU" code and not everquest code. WHere do you think the EQEMU guys got all their code to start(all the base code is/was copyrighted)? It doesn't suddenly make it free to use when someone else used/manipulated the code first.
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EQEMU created the code. That's where it came from. It's entirely legal for them to do so. It's existed for 20+ years. It's entirely legal to make EMUs so long as you don't reverse engineer the code or use it to play pirated games. Strangely THJ instructs players to download legal copies of EQ produced by DBG and distributed by Steam and P99 has in the past instructed players to download pirated version of EQ Titanium.

Control said:
Donations/profit is really a red herring. You still aren't allowed to use someone else's ip for your product without permission, even if it's free. Again, try stealing Disney ip as a non-profit and see what happens. Of course, doing so commercially increases the likeliness that they'll come after you and that they'll win.

Allahkazam and the like could be sued/dmca'd, but they would have a much stronger fair use claim. But I assume that the ip holders don't mind sites like that existing as much because they help players play the actual game. They're not a replacement for the product. No one has ever quit eq to play Allahkazam instead.
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It's really not. It's an important aspect of both Fair Use and Implied Licensing(Permitted Use). If THJ is operating as a non-profit it's really hard to make a case against them having an Implied License, if they're are for profit it's really hard to make the case that do have one. It's probably what will determine the case TBH. Disney IPs won't be treat the same as Daybreaks IPs because they've exhibited very different past behavior(Implied Licensing). You can ABSOLUTELY use someones else's IP to make money, copyright law doesn't explicitly prevent USE. It prevents forms of Copying which can include USE, but Fair USE and Permitted USE both exist as ways to profit off someone else's IP. Permitted use doesn't have to be explicit it can be implict.

You're right on Fair USE grounds THJ likely wouldn't win and Allahkazam likely would win. But that's not the point, the point is to debunk the claim that you can't profit off someones IP without their permission. You absolutely can.
 
moonarchia

moonarchia

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Mrniceguy said:
EQEMU created the code. That's where it came from. It's entirely legal for them to do so. It's existed for 20+ years. It's entirely legal to make EMUs so long as you don't reverse engineer the code or use it to play pirated games. Strangely THJ instructs players to download legal copies of EQ produced by DBG and distributed by Steam and P99 has in the past instructed players to download pirated version of EQ Titanium.



It's really not. It's an important aspect of both Fair Use and Implied Licensing(Permitted Use). If THJ is operating as a non-profit it's really hard to make a case against them having an Implied License, if they're are for profit it's really hard to make the case that do have one. It's probably what will determine the case TBH. Disney IPs won't be treat the same as Daybreaks IPs because they've exhibited very different past behavior(Implied Licensing). You can ABSOLUTELY use someones else's IP to make money, copyright law doesn't explicitly prevent USE. It prevents forms of Copying which can include USE, but Fair USE and Permitted USE both exist as ways to profit off someone else's IP. Permitted use doesn't have to be explicit it can be implict.

You're right on Fair USE grounds THJ likely wouldn't win and Allahkazam likely would win. But that's not the point, the point is to debunk the claim that you can't profit off someones IP without their permission. You absolutely can.
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You can write a server code if you want to. What you can't do, is use that code to release EQ. That's where your argument falls off a cliff. If they were using it on a LAN somewhere for just themselves that would be just peachy keen. Using it to make an EQ server that is open to the public is where you give DPG the right to push your shit in if they want to.

To date, one, and only one, license to run an emu server has ever been issued, and that was to P99 after the folks who owned EQ back then sued them and that was part of the settlement, along with strict limits on what content they could release and that they make 0 profit off of it. Any other group running an emu server is living dangerously.

Fair use would be making references to event/zones/places, or making an aesthetically similar glam or two as an homage. Straight up using the art assets/zones/game in whole is absolutely not fair use. What it is, is a textbook case of copyright infringement.
 
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Mrniceguy

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dragonbr said:
Why does this matter at all?
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Ask the Yerm he is the one that brought it up. But it is something DBG falsely claimed in the court docs.

moonarchia said:
You can write a server code if you want to. What you can't do, is use that code to release EQ. That's where your argument falls off a cliff. If they were using it on a LAN somewhere for just themselves that would be just peachy keen. Using it to make an EQ server that is open to the public is where you give DPG the right to push your shit in if they want to.
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They didn't release EQ. They released a derivative product, that uses EQ IP. This is actually the part your argument falls apart if they end up being non-profit. DBG has given explicit consent for p99 to do so and has set decades of implied consent by allowing others to do so. So they need a real reason to differentiate between THJ from the 100s of servers they've allowed to exist. DBG even mentioned this in the court docs as to why they're going after THJ and not other EMUs, but they're just speculating on how much THJ is making, if they end up being wrong their lawsuit just kinda falls apart IMO.

moonarchia said:
To date, one, and only one, license to run an emu server has ever been issued, and that was to P99 after the folks who owned EQ back then sued them and that was part of the settlement, along with strict limits on what content they could release and that they make 0 profit off of it. Any other group running an emu server is living dangerously.
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P99 was never sued. Bunch of just made up head cannon in this part of your comment.

moonarchia said:
Fair use would be making references to event/zones/places, or making an aesthetically similar glam or two as an homage. Straight up using the art assets/zones/game in whole is absolutely not fair use. What it is, is a textbook case of copyright infringement.
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I agree THJ is not fair use. That doesn't mean it's not permitted use.
 
Ambiturner

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Mrniceguy said:
I agree THJ is not fair use. That doesn't mean it's not permitted use.
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Impressive how you've gone from 'fair use' to 'implied license' and now to 'permitted use' while having no understanding about what any of those things are.

You're like the Derrell Brooks of copyright
 
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Mrniceguy

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Ambiturner said:
Impressive how you've gone from 'fair use' to 'implied license' and now to 'permitted use' while having no understanding about what any of those things are.

You're like the Derrell Brooks of copyright
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I never said it was fair use. Implied License is a form of permitted use.
 
yerm

yerm

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Mrniceguy said:
Ask the Yerm he is the one that brought it up. But it is something DBG falsely claimed in the court docs.
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Man. You literally say ONE SENTENCE LATER who ACTUALLY brought it up. This is why you're insufferable. Even in past tlp threads where I think you've been correct (not here), you still argue disingenuously like this.
 
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