Utter b0ll0x

po0k

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/02/10/tecmo_sues_xbox_game_hackers/

Protecting Ip is one thing, but ffs like :mad:

ambro25

Circulating 'Naked' skins/mods are akin to defamation.
Have to agree with TECMO on this one.

Chalk

jesus , its not like by doing it , there making the games thats sold any different.

seems like a bit of publicity for the fact that you can make the girls nekkid inn doa:bv

btw, wasnt that mod listed in EDGE in the issue with review of bv ?

ambro25

It was a topic of EDGE aeons ago, even made the cover (but not in naked form).

What I am saying is that, insofar as a principle of law is concerned, Tecmo is right and the modders are wrong. The morality of it is irrelevant: whether Tecmo are fair or not to sue those modders/hackers has nothing to do whatsoever with whether they can avail of IP protection law or not (EEF opinion notwithstanding). Simple.

But I'll concede that a lot of people don't understand, or find it hard to come to terms with the fact that, law and fairness are totally unrelated matters.

Goodshape

The harm isn't just to the wholesome values of Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball

Wholesome? Aye. Right. :rolleyes:

Utter bollox alright. And $1000 - $100,000 per skin. Flupin chancers.

Maximilian

ambro25 wrote:

Circulating 'Naked' skins/mods are akin to defamation.
Have to agree with TECMO on this one.

Arse.

ambro25

Mine or yours?

That's constructive... muppet

sound_wave

what a load of ol tripe

Otacon

I bet the reason so many think it's b0ll0x is cos ye have only found out now that you can actually get the characters 'nekkid'!!!

Peteee

Its stupid, twould be akin to Ford sueing someone for painting their cars themselves (I think)

Oh and otacon, get back to work ya moocher

Signed Your Boss!

petes

That is ****e. end of message

ambro25

Peteee wrote:

Its stupid, twould be akin to Ford sueing someone for painting their cars themselves (I think)

Ya think wrong, unfortunately - you can't protect a Ford (or anyother car) with copyright, that's why Ford couldn't sue you if you painted your Mondeo girlie pink with frog-green dots.

And here's me trying to have an educated debate with posters in the Game Forum but, by the look of things and their vocabulary, what's the point? :rolleyes:

petes

ambro25 wrote:

Circulating 'Naked' skins/mods are akin to defamation.
Have to agree with TECMO on this one.

Defamation of a computer game character. Really :rolleyes:

Goodshape

You're so great ambro25. Badge on the way.

Whatever about the strict legalities of modding someone elses 'intellectual property', it's a bloody stupid thing to start a lawsuit over. It's not as though they were sending these nude skins out to unsuspecting game players via some trojan file... you had to actually choose to download the content for a game you've already paid money for.

My guess is they're making an example of these guys so as to curtail any further fan-made mods which might encompass some ideas they could otherwise charge good money for. Just another reason to stick with PC gaming tbh.

stevenmu

ambro25 wrote:

Ya think wrong, unfortunately - you can't protect a Ford (or anyother car) with copyright, that's why Ford couldn't sue you if you painted your Mondeo girlie pink with frog-green dots.

And here's me trying to have an educated debate with posters in the Game Forum but, by the look of things and their vocabulary, what's the point? :rolleyes:

Actually I think cars is a very good example. Ford do have copywrite (well patents to be technically correct) on Mondeos. Imagine what would happen if VW made an exact copy of a modeo and tried selling it. Yet Ford are perfectly happy to let people not only paint there cars, they also let people take apart the mechanics to figure out how they work (reverse-engineer the car) and add after market modifications. They also let people sell these mods on to others, they're basically happy to let people use the car as they see fit.

Similarly with creating skins for Tecmo games, people are just customising the games they paid for to suit themselves. They're also alowing others to take use these customisations which in no way damages Tecmo's IP or results in loss to them.

ambro25 wrote:

But I'll concede that a lot of people don't understand, or find it hard to come to terms with the fact that, law and fairness are totally unrelated matters.

It is both illegal and IMHO morally right. Unfortunatly many people seem to have forgottten that the law is supposed to be about fairness. Fairness is the whole reason for having law in the first place.

ambro25

petes wrote:

Defamation of a computer game character. Really :rolleyes:

No. It is important to understand that copyright issues can be:

economic in nature: e.g. right to obtain commercial benefit, which is the argument advanced by most posters disagreeing by Tecmo, but they do so without proof)

or moral (from the developer's point of view): e.g. the rights to
_claim authorship
_require the author's name be indicated by others using the work
_to retain control over how a work is used
_to oppose the defamation of work (is what we're really talking about here).

Goodshape wrote:

Whatever about the strict legalities of modding someone elses 'intellectual property', it's a bloody stupid thing to start a lawsuit over.

But "strict legalities of modding someone elses 'intellectual property'" is precisely what this is all about. Whether you agree with it or not is irrelevant. Really. And I'm not saying that to p1ss you off.

Goodshape wrote:

My guess is they're making an example of these guys so as to curtail any further fan-made mods which might encompass some ideas they could otherwise charge good money for.

Possibly, possibly not -you don't know that, and neither do I nor anybody here. So how can you condemn a supposed course of action? See my comment above about 'no proof'.

stevenmu wrote:

Actually I think cars is a very good example. Ford do have copywrite (well patents to be technically correct) on Mondeos.

No, you cannot protect cars (or any other object, unless it's a statue or a building) by copyright, trust me on that. But copyright is what you use to protect games.

stevenmu wrote:

Similarly with creating skins for Tecmo games, people are just customising the games they paid for to suit themselves.

For their own private use - fair enough. In the States, it's called fair use.

stevenmu wrote:

They're also allowing others to take use these customisations which in no way damages Tecmo's IP or results in loss to them.

Nope, that's where it all goes wrong. $$$ damages has nothing to do with it: if the modders hadn't publicized it, Tecmo would never even have batted an eyelid.

Blub2k4

going with the car mod idea, a few years back Rolls Royce sued someone for putting the grille and silver Lady on a VW bug.
They won.

ambro25

I think that was trademark infringement, though, not copyright. You got source?

Dont be at yourself

In fairness, if knowledge that mods like these could be easily obtained for TECMO games were to become common, then they'd do huge damage to the brand (outside the lonely pervy nerd community). No parent is going to let their kid play a game that can be turned into a playboy photo-shoot in mere minutes.

They're perfectly right to protect their product.

I wonder, would there be as much an issue with their actions if it was a mod turning the likes of Mario or Jak & Daxter into pornos? Because it's exactly the same.

Blub2k4

ambro25 wrote:

I think that was trademark infringement, though, not copyright. You got source?

I remember seeing the car parked outside my school way back.

<edit> it was pre-internet but I remember reading about it in the papers and I was quite interested as I had seen the car a few weeks before the story.
Google has nothing at a cursory glance.

monument

ambro25 wrote:

or moral

Remind me who said "The morality of it is irrelevant", will you, thanks.

And while you're at it, stop calling people muppets, and then saying you cant have a "educated debate" in the game forum.

NekkidBibleMan wrote:

I wonder, would there be as much an issue with their actions if it was a mod turning the likes of Mario or Jak & Daxter into pornos? Because it's exactly the same.

No, not really there is a difference between Jak & Daxter and the border line porn that is games like Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball - any judge in his or her right mind would see this.

Maximilian

ambro25 wrote:

Mine or yours?

That's constructive... muppet

Yours. Its where you talk from. At least try knowing a little about what you're talking about before you let your half-baked ideas vomit forth from your brain and onto the keyboard. Defamation ffs!! Jesus, at the very least get a dictionary.

Also, in terms of copyright infringement, its seems to me to be "fair dealing".

NekkidBibleMan wrote:

In fairness, if knowledge that mods like these could be easily obtained for TECMO games were to become common, then they'd do huge damage to the brand (outside the lonely pervy nerd community). No parent is going to let their kid play a game that can be turned into a playboy photo-shoot in mere minutes.

That's like saying that making a minuture paper mache cock, attaching it to Barbies "front bottom" and displaying it for the world to see is copyright infirngement etc. Sheesh. It would be different if you were to pass these mods off as TEMCO products. For that matter it might also be different if these guys were trying to sell their modifications as a product.

Guys, there's nothing wrong with what these guys are doing, not under Irish/EU law nor I suspect U.S. Law (unless its expressly forbidden under the EULA).Temco are just being bullies.

ambro25

monument wrote:

Remind me who said "The morality of it is irrelevant", will you, thanks.

The morality of the lawsuit is irrelevant. The lawsuit is based upon the morality of the modders' use of the copyrighted work. I thought my posts to be sufficiently clear. Evidently not.

monument wrote:

And while you're at it, stop calling people muppets, and then saying you cant have a "educated debate" in the game forum.

If I can't have an educated debate (because posts are limited to: 'Arse', 'this is ***e', etc. when I post my disagreement with the first thread), I'm obviously dealing with muppets - sounds logical enough, no? (although since posting that/trolling therewith, we seem to be getting there )

monument wrote:

No, not really there is a difference between Jak & Daxter and the border line porn that is games like Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball - any judge in his or her right mind would see this.

The judge applies the Law. Not what is right or wrong (in your mind or anybody else's).

Dont be at yourself

While titillation is undoubtedly a selling point of DOAXBV, it's unfair to class it as border line porn. It's important to realise that it is a volleyball game, a genre that doesn't really lend itself to games featuring anything other than scantily-clad women.

It's also important to realise that Tecmo placed much emphasis on parts of the game not strictly relating to girls jumping up and down in bikinis, and that the game could have been a lot cruder if Tecmo had wished.

But regardless, the argument isn't whether the game was asking for a nude patch, it's about whether third-parties can make modifications to a company's products, damaging the reputation of the brand and undoubtedly sales in the process.

po0k

NekkidBibleMan wrote:

In fairness, if knowledge that mods like these could be easily obtained for TECMO games were to become common, then they'd do huge damage to the brand (outside the lonely pervy nerd community). No parent is going to let their kid play a game that can be turned into a playboy photo-shoot in mere minutes.

And without such modifications (which require a degree of technical knowledge to implement) these parents would buy a game with "bouncing breast physics" as a selling point?

The DoA series has been a soft-core porn game since it started, it's Lula or Leisure Suit Larry packaged as a beat 'em up.

Also, you're forgetting the "Fair use" laws in many countries.
When you buy a product (like a car) you can tinker with it as much as you like for your own educational or entertainment purposes.
If I modded my Shredder2000FX blender and then posted a website with instructions on how to perform this mod for others to learn from, I'd be within my rights.

IP law and the DMCA are again being stretched and this is another example of what a bad piece of legislation the DMCA is for consumers.

monument

ambro25 wrote:

The morality of the lawsuit is irrelevant. The lawsuit is based upon the morality of the modders' use of the copyrighted work. I thought my posts to be sufficiently clear. Evidently not.

I know what you were trying to say, but in a case taking on moral grounds morality is not irrelevant. In any case US law respects freedom of speech more the IP claim on moral grounds where the game is on thin moral ice to start with.

ambro25 wrote:

If I can't have an educated debate (because posts are limited to: 'Arse', 'this is ***e', etc. when I post my disagreement with the first thread), I'm obviously dealing with muppets - sounds logical enough, no? (although since posting that/trolling therewith, we seem to be getting there )

They posted such about their comments, you posted 'muppet' about them... see the charter.

ambro25 wrote:

The judge applies the Law. Not what is right or wrong (in your mind or anybody else's).

Judges actually apply their perception of the law – ie what they think is wrong or right to the law.

Not every case is the same whether it is a killing or an IP case. The law is not black and white.

ambro25

Maximilian wrote:

Yours. Its where you talk from. At least try knowing a little about what you're talking about before you let your half-baked ideas vomit forth from your brain and onto the keyboard. Defamation ffs!! Jesus, at the very least get a dictionary.

I'll rephrase: 'Subject to certain exceptions and qualifications, the author of a work has the right to object to any distortion, mutilation or other modification of, or other derogatory action in relation to the work which would prejudice his or her reputation. This right is known as the integrity right.'

Maximilian wrote:

Also, in terms of copyright infringement, its seems to me to be "fair dealing".

It's only fair so long as the copyright owner does not object to it (copyright is not a right to do something, it's a right to stop others doing something). Insofar as the integrity right is concerned, that's a pretty elastic notion, but one which Tecmo is entitle to try to stretch as the authors and owners of the copyright.

Maximilian wrote:

Guys, there's nothing wrong with what these guys are doing, not under Irish/EU law nor I suspect U.S. Law (unless its expressly forbidden under the EULA).

In your qualified opinion? See above.

Dont be at yourself

And without such modifications (which require a degree of technical knowledge to implement) these parents would buy a game with "bouncing breast physics" as a selling point?

Soft-porn games tend to go under the Dail Mail Ban-This-Sick-Filth radar though, and so parents are oblivious to their 13 year old son buying them. It's mods like this that end up getting splashed across their pages, and I wouldn't count on them reporting that it requires a degree of technical knowledge to implement. Hence, worked-up, ill-informed parents. Hence, a decline in sales.

It's probably that last part Tecmo have issue with. This kind of publicity is going to damage the brand and affect sales - there is no getting away from that fact, and no defence against it, in my mind. As such, Tecmo are perfectly right to do what they did.

On your other point: there's a slight difference between having a website detailing how you modded your blender and a website that actually distibutes the mod. And that's before the consideration of making money from the website enters the equation.

ambro25

monument wrote:

I know what you were trying to say, but in a case taking on moral grounds morality is not irrelevant. In any case US law respects freedom of speech more the IP claim on moral grounds where the game is on thin moral ice to start with.

I don't follow that comment.

Taken in isolation, "but in a case taking on moral grounds morality is not irrelevant". That would agree with what I'm saying here: morality is relevant in a case where the issue is 'I object to the amoral use of my work made by these modders/hackers'.

The issue of moral grounds however, is not in relation to the nudity patch or such like, but in relation to the moral right that the developer owns to have his work (the game) preserved from what he deems wrongful/detrimental use

monument wrote:

They posted such about their comments, you posted 'muppet' about them... see the charter.

Did they now? 'cause having a look at -say (I'm not picking)- Maximilian's post, I'd swear that 'Arse' was thrown at me rather than at Maximilian's comments. Anyhow, if I have been breaking the Charter, I am quite sure that NekkidBibleMan here would tap on my shoulder.

monument wrote:

Judges actually apply their perception of the law – ie what they think is wrong or right to the law. Not every case is the same whether it is a killing or an IP case. The law is not black and white.

Cases (and the application of the law in relation to them) turn on facts, that's not in doubt. But it looks rather clear cut here.

Maximilian

ambro25 wrote:

(etc) In your qualified opinion? (etc)

Actually it is my "qualified" opinion, as a solicitor, which I am.

This might be of interest, its just one section. Like I said, what these guys are doing is not illegal.

Copyright & Related Rights Act, 2000

82.—(1) It is not an infringement of the copyright in a computer program for a lawful user of a copy of the computer program to make a permanent or temporary copy of the whole or a part of the program by any means and in any form or to translate, adapt or arrange or in any other way alter the computer program where such actions are necessary for the use of the program by the lawful user in accordance with its intended purpose, including error correction.

(2) It is not an infringement of the copyright in a computer program for a lawful user of a copy of the computer program to observe, study or test the functioning of the program in order to determine the ideas and principles which underlie any element of the program, where he or she does so while performing any of the acts of loading, displaying, running, transmitting or storing the program which he or she is authorised to do.

(I wouldn't get hung-up on the use if the word "necessary")

po0k

NekkidBibleMan wrote:

Soft-porn games tend to go under the Dail Mail Ban-This-Sick-Filth radar though, and so parents are oblivious to their 13 year old son buying them. It's mods like this that end up getting splashed across their pages, and I wouldn't count on them reporting that it requires a degree of technical knowledge to implement. Hence, worked-up, ill-informed parents. Hence, a decline in sales.

It's probably that last part Tecmo have issue with. This kind of publicity is going to damage the brand and affect sales - there is no getting away from that fact, and no defence against it, in my mind. As such, Tecmo are perfectly right to do what they did.

On your other point: there's a slight difference between having a website detailing how you modded your blender and a website that actually distibutes the mod. And that's before the consideration of making money from the website enters the equation.

There was tabloid hysteria about the fabled nude-cheat in the Tomb Raider series too. It didn't hurt sales as much as the declining quality of the gameplay did for the later instalments.

I also believe that the game is rated for Mature Audience (17 and up), so why Tecmo should be worried about the game damaging sales to a demographic who shouldn't be playing the game in the first place raises a question about their own moral integrity.