Re: Bug#309257: libpano12: patent problems
Read more about the iPIX vs Dersch from FFII at http://swpat.ffii.org/pikta/xrani/ipix/ The second link (contains patent titles) suggests that there is clear prior art. Interactive Pictures appear to be a tn.us corporation - does anyone nearby know whether any regulations forbid so-called patent trolling in that locality? http://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?company=interactive+picturesCIK=filenum=State=SIC=owner=includeaction=getcompany -- MJR/slef My opinion only, see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#309257: libpano12: patent problems
Hello! [Mon, 16 May 2005] MJ Ray wrote: Read more about the iPIX vs Dersch from FFII at http://swpat.ffii.org/pikta/xrani/ipix/ The second link (contains patent titles) suggests that there is clear prior art. Thanks for the link! The prior art argument is pretty much irrelevant in our question as long as the legal status quo is different and the patent has not been challanged. For a user or for Debian we can't knowingly risk lawsuits even if we think they can be won. Interactive Pictures appear to be a tn.us corporation - does anyone nearby know whether any regulations forbid so-called patent trolling in that locality? http://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?company=interactive+picturesCIK=filenum=State=SIC=owner=includeaction=getcompany heise.de says that iPIX even threatened those that only linked to Dersch's graphics. http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/18317 Robert. -- Solutions are obvious if one only has the optical power to observe them over the horizon. -- K.A. Arsdall -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
Note that there is no question (IANAL, TINLA) that openttd infringes the copyright on Transport Tycoon in any jurisdiction that recognizes the doctrine of mise en scene, i. e., pretty much any jurisdiction that has a copyright law. See Micro Star v. FormGen. In general, Debian should not be distributing game clones, in main, in contrib, or anywhere else. The fact that copyright holders rarely bother to pursue legal action against half-assed clones of obsolete games does not mean that they are legitimate in the eyes of the law. Cheers, - Michael
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
On 5/16/05, Michael K. Edwards [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that there is no question (IANAL, TINLA) that openttd infringes the copyright on Transport Tycoon in any jurisdiction that recognizes the doctrine of mise en scene, i. e., pretty much any jurisdiction that has a copyright law. See Micro Star v. FormGen. There are always questions, of course. And, I do think you have a pretty strong point here, in the sense that this can be a very real issue. But, the scenes are not a part of openttd. They are the non-free component which forces openttd into contrib. In general, Debian should not be distributing game clones, in main, in contrib, or anywhere else. The fact that copyright holders rarely bother to pursue legal action against half-assed clones of obsolete games does not mean that they are legitimate in the eyes of the law. I agree with your second sentence. I'm just not sure that your general statement from your first sentence applies here. The question is: does openttd contain copyrighted material from Transport Tycoon? I don't have the answer to that question, and it sounds like the copyright holders are not currently interested in stating their opinion. That leaves us with due diligence -- whatever that means in this context. I don't think a blanket prohibition on clone software (or even game clone software) will serve us very well. Sometimes it's going to be a problem, sometimes it's not. The times it's going to be a problem is when the clone software copies a tangible expression of creative content from the original work. We have not yet identified any such elements which are relevant to openttd. -- Raul
Re: RES: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
On 5/16/05, Humberto Massa Guimarães [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
De: Michael K. Edwards [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Note that there is no question (IANAL, TINLA) that openttd
infringes the copyright on Transport Tycoon in any jurisdiction
that recognizes the doctrine of mise en scene, i. e., pretty
much any jurisdiction that has a copyright law. See Micro Star v.
FormGen.
I don't recall if 17USC117 makes any mention of it, but functional
cloning of any program is protected by Brazilian Computer Programs
Law in art.6, III (''It does not constitute infringement on the
computer program author's rights: [...] III - the occurrence of a
program similar to other, preexistent, when the similarity is by
force of the functional application characteristics _or_ of the
observance of technical or normative regulations _or_ limitation of
alternative form for its expression'' -- underlines and terrible
English translation are mine).
The issue isn't functional cloning. It's the fact that a video game
is a literary work in the sense of having characters, settings, plot
lines, etc., and therefore can be infringed in the non-literal sense
of Micro Star v. FormGen -- even by a new scenario written for the
existing game engine!
In general, Debian should not be distributing game clones, in
main, in contrib, or anywhere else. The fact that copyright
holders rarely bother to pursue legal action against half-assed
clones of obsolete games does not mean that they are legitimate in
the eyes of the law.
The mise en scene infringement would only be in the case of the
maps and scenery of the game, which, in casu, won't be distributed
by Debian. Anyway, you are quite right that game clones are not
completely legitimate in principle, exactly because they would
*normally* come with the infringing sprites, maps, sceneries, etc.
I think you'll find, on review, that even the deliberate intent of
evoking the original is enough to create an infringing derivative
work. When I get a moment, I'll find the litigation associated with
The Wind Done Gone.
Cheers,
- Michael
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
On 5/16/05, Raul Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 5/16/05, Michael K. Edwards [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that there is no question (IANAL, TINLA) that openttd infringes the copyright on Transport Tycoon in any jurisdiction that recognizes the doctrine of mise en scene, i. e., pretty much any jurisdiction that has a copyright law. See Micro Star v. FormGen. There are always questions, of course. And, I do think you have a pretty strong point here, in the sense that this can be a very real issue. But, the scenes are not a part of openttd. They are the non-free component which forces openttd into contrib. No, the artwork (if included) would be literally infringing. The mise en scene doctrine is not about literal copying, it's about the creation of sequels (parodies, clones, etc.) that plagiarize the original work and siphon off the commercial potential of it and/or of derivative works. In general, Debian should not be distributing game clones, in main, in contrib, or anywhere else. The fact that copyright holders rarely bother to pursue legal action against half-assed clones of obsolete games does not mean that they are legitimate in the eyes of the law. I agree with your second sentence. I'm just not sure that your general statement from your first sentence applies here. The question is: does openttd contain copyrighted material from Transport Tycoon? If you are talking about literal copying, you are asking the wrong question. The question is, does a clone of a specific game infringe its copyright? And the answer is Yes. A game clone -- as opposed to a new work in the same genre, with rules, tiles, etc. that are convincingly independently developed insofar as they are not scenes a faire -- always infringes the copyright on the original (assuming that the original is not old enough for its copyright to have expired, and was not published without copyright notice prior to 1976). I don't have the answer to that question, and it sounds like the copyright holders are not currently interested in stating their opinion. That leaves us with due diligence -- whatever that means in this context. It means reading the law and getting a clue. I refer you again to Micro Star v. FormGen. I don't think a blanket prohibition on clone software (or even game clone software) will serve us very well. Sometimes it's going to be a problem, sometimes it's not. The times it's going to be a problem is when the clone software copies a tangible expression of creative content from the original work. We have not yet identified any such elements which are relevant to openttd. If you understood the meaning of derivative work -- as you have conclusively demonstrated elsewhere that you do not -- you would have no difficulty identifying those elements. Cheers, - Michael
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
On 5/16/05, Michael K. Edwards [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: No, the artwork (if included) would be literally infringing. The mise en scene doctrine is not about literal copying, it's about the creation of sequels (parodies, clones, etc.) that plagiarize the original work and siphon off the commercial potential of it and/or of derivative works. But the only people who can own a copy of this sequel are people that own a legitimate copy of the game. So where is the plagarism? How does your siphon off the commercial potential work in this case? If you understood the meaning of derivative work -- as you have conclusively demonstrated elsewhere that you do not -- you would have no difficulty identifying those elements. This ad hominem approach of yours is getting annoying. You've presented cases which show that you do not believe in your own assertions about what derivative works mean. Specifically, you've claimed that derivative works are disjoint from collecitive works and anthologies, but you've also stated that the same work can be both a derivative work and an anthology. Until you can present a consistent view of your own beliefs, I cannot take seriously your critiques of my understanding. -- Raul
Re: Bug#309257: libpano12: patent problems
Le lundi 16 mai 2005 à 20:33 +0200, Josselin Mouette a écrit : So what? Are we going to remove any piece of software for which a jackass claims he has some prior art? I meant some patent, of course. -- .''`. Josselin Mouette/\./\ : :' : [EMAIL PROTECTED] `. `'[EMAIL PROTECTED] `- Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
De: Michael K. Edwards [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] The issue isn't functional cloning. It's the fact that a video game is a literary work in the sense of having characters, settings, plot lines, etc., and therefore can be infringed in the non-literal sense of Micro Star v. FormGen -- even by a new scenario written for the existing game engine! It seems (IMHO) that the issue here *is* functional cloning. The characters, the whole mise en scene of the game is in the *data* files. The game executable would function like a video player, presenting the data in the data files and interacting with the user. And *this* is exactly what is protected by art.6,III. I think you'll find, on review, that even the deliberate intent of evoking the original is enough to create an infringing derivative work. When I get a moment, I'll find the litigation associated with The Wind Done Gone. Just to reassert my point, with the data I have at the moment, I don't believe that the game executable does this more than mplayer evokes the content of copyrighted works. After all, if you want to play the game legally, you must have a legally-acquired copy of the original game to supply the artwork. Cheers, - Michael -- HTH, Massa -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#309257: libpano12: patent problems
On Mon, May 16, 2005 at 08:33:30PM +0200, Josselin Mouette wrote: Le lundi 16 mai 2005 à 12:12 +0200, Robert Jordens a écrit : For a user or for Debian we can't knowingly risk lawsuits even if we think they can be won. So what? Are we going to remove any piece of software for which a jackass claims he has some prior art? Especially since there is no non-trivial program that does not violate any number of patents somewhere... Diego -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
So where is the plagarism? How does your siphon off the commercial potential work in this case? On 5/16/05, Michael K. Edwards [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Would you like the very paragraph from Micro Star v. FormGen? ... radioactive slime. A copyright owner holds the right to create sequels, see Trust Co. Bank v. MGM/UA Entertainment Co., 772 F.2d 740 (11th Cir. 1985), and the stories told in the N/I MAP files are surely sequels, telling new (though somewhat repetitive) tales of Duke's fabulous adventures. A book about Duke Nukem would infringe for the same reason, even if it contained no pictures.*fn5 And this is every bit as true when the infringing work is a clone of the game engine as when it is a game scenario. In what way is this game engine clone a sequel to the original? It lets you play the original. In concept, it could let you play a sequel. Or, it could let you play an entirely different game. But no one has presented any reason to think that openttd represents a sequel. This is distinct from the FormGen case, which did represent a sequel. At performance time, the FormGen modified game presented original MicroStar content together with FormGen content. It was not faithful to the original, it was a derivative work. If you understood the meaning of derivative work -- as you have conclusively demonstrated elsewhere that you do not -- you would have no difficulty identifying those elements. This ad hominem approach of yours is getting annoying. It's a simple statement of fact. You do not understand the meaning of derivative work. You have conclusively demonstrated this in the course of the GPL debate. You mean when I countered your false claim that derivative works, collective works and anthologies form disjoint sets? I'm sorry, I'm still not convinced. You've presented cases which show that you do not believe in your own assertions about what derivative works mean. Specifically, you've claimed that derivative works are disjoint from collecitive works and anthologies, but you've also stated that the same work can be both a derivative work and an anthology. Until you can present a consistent view of your own beliefs, I cannot take seriously your critiques of my understanding. Bullshit yourself if you like, but I doubt that anyone else is buying. I have explained how a derivative work and a collection / collective work / anthology differ, exhibited an example which is an anthology _of_ two derivative works (not a derivative work and an anthology), and cited case law out the yin-yang. I have never claimed that they do not differ. I've disputed your assertion that they are disjoint. I've also disputed conclusions you've drawn which were based on this assertion that they are disjoint. The two participants in this discussion who do have legal qualifications (Humberto and Batist) have agreed that the two categories are disjoint in their respective jurisdictions -- meaning that a grant of license to create a derivative work of X does not grant license to anthologize it, and vice versa. Disjoint and Different are two very different concepts. Sets are different if there are elements in one set which are not in the other. Sets are disjoint if there are no elements in common between the sets. Your observation that derivative and collective works are different do not show that they are disjoint. Your latest example of a revised edition of an encyclopedia is just as easily disposed of. It's a collective work. That's because what's protected about it, as opposed to what's protected about the articles it contains, is the creative choices involved in the selection and arrangement of its contents. Note that there is a sense in which that bit of creative expression is itself derived from the selection-and-arrangement expression in the previous edition -- namely, that copyright in the 2005 edition doesn't extend the life of the copyright in the 2004 edition. Are you claiming now that copyright law does not grant derivative protections (for example, protection when the work is translated to another language) to the encyclopaedia because it is a collective work? If not, the above does in any way show that these concepts are disjoint. -- Raul
Re: RES: What makes software copyrightable anyway?
On 5/14/05, Raul Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 5/14/05, Michael K. Edwards [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You would be referring to your excerpt from Sun v. Microsoft, I suppose -- a case to which I had previously drawn your attention, and whose import your myopic quotation (go back and look; I believe that's a fair word to use) got completely backward. Specifically, you selected a fragment of the circuit court's summary of the district court's decision -- which the circuit court demonstrated to be incorrect, vacated, and remanded to the court of fact to try again. When I quoted the relevant two paragraphs of the appeals court's decision in reply, you copied the first sentence and said Exactly, completely ignoring the substance of the quoted paragraphs. From my point of view, I was dismissing them as tangential or irrelevant to the point I was making. You really think that it's tangential or irrelevant that the one time that you used a quotation from an appeals court to bolster your case, you were actually quoting the error that the district court had made, leading to the reversal of its decision? In that specific case, the appeals court was not claiming that the district court had drawn a conclusion which by its nature must be incorrect. The appeals court was asserting that the district court had not adequately described its reasoning. That's false. The appeals court asserted that the district court had failed to follow the prescribed procedure, which is to analyze the validity and scope of the claimed license, and unless it can be shown that the license did not apply (e. g., was terminated for material breach or authorized copying but not derivation), to deny all claims under copyright law. And therefore the district court's judgment was wrong. Period. I'm not really trying to slam you here, which would be rather inappropriate given that I am choking on crow just at the moment. Rather, I am pointing out a specific case where you seem to have failed to follow the legal argument. My assumption is that you are capable of so doing but have read highly selectively under fire. My impression here is that you're overgeneralizing. I'll try to be more specific about some of the generalizations I think you've made which I think are incorrect, but first I'm going to make a general statements myself. This needn't always true in all cases, but it's true enough that I think it's worth considering: The more text you need to quote from a court decision to make a point, the more specific the context is, to that case. That is by no means necessarily true; there is a very clear distinction in US law between points of fact and points of law, and points of law are by definition not specific to the circumstances of the case under review. And in any case, I don't believe I've needed to quote more than two paragraphs from any cited opinion in order to apply it to the present discussion. [snip] Likewise, a small body of existing case law grounded in the law of contracts (fair exchange) does not mean that the law of torts (fair morals) is irrelevant. Almost every case I have cited has involved both tort -- i. e., the statutory tort of copyright infringement -- and contract law. There is a giant body of case law, from which I am quite confident you will continue to be unable to extract any appellate decision from the last century (and precious few decisions at district court level) which does not follow the routine sequence of analysis I have described, and which you can watch being followed in each appellate case cited as evidence of where the boundary lies. In this case, the court itself had the opportunity to assert that the law of contracts must always apply in copyright cases. They didn't make that claim. Instead, they were careful to state that that claim needn't be true for the general case. They were careful to allow that it might even be true in this case. They limited themselves to asserting that the district court hadn't described their reasoning in this case. You just aren't reading that correctly. The appeals court spelled out how and why the contract analysis must be performed in order to decide whether the defendant's conduct fell within the scope of a valid license -- invariably a term in a contract, written or implied -- and vacated the district court's decision for failing to perform that analysis. All right, let me be more precise. Have you cited any case law in this entire discourse which I didn't cite to you first -- that is, have you added any case to the set of precedents under discussion? No, not in any of the threads this past week. And have you cited any case law which anyone other than yourself believes to actually support you on a point where we disagree? That's a red herring -- specifically it's an an attempt to use the bandwagon fallacy. Oh, it doesn't _prove_ anything -- but it might just be a
Re: Where to put Open Transport Tycoon (openttd)
On 5/16/05, Michael K. Edwards [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: It lets you play the original. In concept, it could let you play a sequel. Or, it could let you play an entirely different game. But no one has presented any reason to think that openttd represents a sequel. Have you read any of the OpenTTD web site? Here's a couple of snippets from the About page: quote An open source clone of the Microprose game Transport Tycoon Deluxe. OpenTTD is modeled after the original Transport Tycoon game by Chris Sawyer and enhances the game experience dramatically. Many features were inspired by TTDPatch while others are original. Significant enhancements = - autorail build tool - canals/shiplifts - larger stations - non-uniform stations ... /quote This is precisely the relationship that a game sequel bears to the original. I'm still dubious. Yes, you're right that this appears to satisfy the same requirements which were expressed about MicroStar. (And, you're right, I confused FormGen and MicroStar in my last post.) However, that is not the same thing as satisfying those requirements. In particular, you've still not identified the creative elements from the original game which openttd plagiarizes. Nor have you identified how. This might seem like verbal game playing, but if there are no limits on this kind of thing then everything infringes on everything, which clearly is not the case. It's a simple statement of fact. You do not understand the meaning of derivative work. You have conclusively demonstrated this in the course of the GPL debate. You mean when I countered your false claim that derivative works, collective works and anthologies form disjoint sets? I'm sorry, I'm still not convinced. You continue not to understand the meaning of derivative work, and you continue to exhibit that non-understanding with every message you write on the topic. You also continue to misrepresent my arguments -- where did you get a third disjoint set anthologies? -- and to vastly overstate the success of your countering anything. My apologies, I was combining some statements you made with statements made by someone else. So: are anthologies derivative works or collective works, or something else? Your latest example of a revised edition of an encyclopedia is just as easily disposed of. It's a collective work. That's because what's protected about it, as opposed to what's protected about the articles it contains, is the creative choices involved in the selection and arrangement of its contents. Note that there is a sense in which that bit of creative expression is itself derived from the selection-and-arrangement expression in the previous edition -- namely, that copyright in the 2005 edition doesn't extend the life of the copyright in the 2004 edition. Are you claiming now that copyright law does not grant derivative protections (for example, protection when the work is translated to another language) to the encyclopaedia because it is a collective work? Talk about false dilemmas. All copyright holders in the encyclopaedia and its constituent works have a cause of action for copyright infringement in the event of an unauthorized translation. If the copyrighted selection and arrangement of the original has been substantially copied into the translation, then the translation infringes the copyright in the collective work. Ok, I was trying to make some sense of your claims, and had been reduced to wild guessing. I think we agree that the protections which are attributed to derivative works and the protections which are attributed to collective works apply to any work which needs those protections, regardless of whether or not you admit that the work is a derivative or collective work. Thanks, -- Raul
