copyrighted chars and npcs in game

[MunkiLord]

22 minutes ago, subbacultchas said:

On it today Munkilord. Please stop, you don't need this much reputation do you?

Don't worry, day is still young and I have plenty of time to screw it up. 

[Abraxus]

14 minutes ago, MunkiLord said:

Don't worry, day is still young and I have plenty of time to screw it up. 

We take that chance every time we post! 🤣

[MunkiLord]

You get me!

[Frostbiter]

Quick question. If I recreate the co-pilot from the movie Airplane! (1980) does that count as infringement against the movie IP holders or against the LA Lakers?

[jubakumbi]

Just now, Frostbiter said:

Quick question. If I recreate the co-pilot from the movie Airplane! (1980) does that count as infringement against the movie IP holders or against the LA Lakers?

Both! 😉

Why go half way?

[Abraxus]

3 minutes ago, Frostbiter said:

Quick question. If I recreate the co-pilot from the movie Airplane! (1980) does that count as infringement against the movie IP holders or against the LA Lakers?

Go big, or go home my man! 😎😉

Edited September 12, 2019 by Abraxus

[MunkiLord]

3 minutes ago, Frostbiter said:

Quick question. If I recreate the co-pilot from the movie Airplane! (1980) does that count as infringement against the movie IP holders or against the LA Lakers?

Also gotta take into account California's publicity laws!

[LeapingLemur]

9 minutes ago, Frostbiter said:

Quick question. If I recreate the co-pilot from the movie Airplane! (1980) does that count as infringement against the movie IP holders or against the LA Lakers?

Marry me.

[Frostbiter]

2 minutes ago, LeapingLemur said:

Marry me.

Ah man, I just got through giving someone all my money from my last marriage.

 

[jubakumbi]

3 minutes ago, Frostbiter said:

Ah man, I just got through giving someone all my money from my last marriage.

 

Never too soon for a fresh start though!

Perhaps after the lawsuits over the IP infringment, you could live happily ever after?

[subbacultchas]

I didn't have time to reply before lunch, but man I really get this (in response to Munki's post about being non-creative, which I apparently did not quote). I've known people that wanted really badly to be (insert creative career here) in life, but did not really have that ability. I knew a guy who went all the way through graphic design in college, and passed through despite his inability because he'd never leave otherwise. To some extent I am this way too. I've wanted to be an author since I was a kid, because books have had such a large impact on me. And some things I can write and do well with, but it's not novels nor will it ever really be. I can come up with ideas, but the implementation of ideas to an actual creative medium escapes me.

I'm sure are people here who are kids, who don't have that creative flair and just really want to play a claws/regen scrapper named wolvvverine. Or people who don't have the flair overall and just want to play the game. While this forum doesn't really map well to what people say and do in the live game, it would bother me if either of those were given any grief. You just can't tell from looking at a character how hard they tried, or what they are working with. Not to shame anyone, just be careful when making judgments like this overall; there's always an outlier, and sometimes it's a pretty big population that got painted with that brush undeservedly.

Edited September 12, 2019 by subbacultchas

[Abraxus]

19 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

Never too soon for a fresh start though!

Perhaps after the lawsuits over the IP infringment, you could live happily ever after?

Perhaps your characters can share a cell in the Ziggerat in Brickstown for your IP transgressions! 🤣

[Ibarra]

1 minute ago, Abraxus said:

Perhaps your characters can share a cell in the Ziggerat in Brickstown for your IP transgressions! 🤣

They'd just break out since the guards are terrible.

[MunkiLord]

7 minutes ago, subbacultchas said:

I didn't have time to reply before lunch, but man I really get this (in response to Munki's post about being non-creative, which I apparently did not quote). I've known people that wanted really badly to be (insert creative career here) in life, but did not really have that ability. I knew a guy who went all the way through graphic design in college, and passed through despite his inability because he'd never leave otherwise. To some extent I am this way too. I've wanted to be an author since I was a kid, because books have had such a large impact on me. And some things I can write and do well with, but it's not novels nor will it ever really be. I can come up with ideas, but the implementation of ideas to an actual creative medium escapes me.

I'm sure are people here who are kids, who don't have that creative flair and just really want to play a claws/regen scrapper named wolvvverine. Or people who don't have the flair overall and just want to play the game. While this forum doesn't really map well to what people say and do in the live game, it would bother me if either of those were given any grief. You just can't tell from looking at a character how hard they tried, or what they are working with. Not to shame anyone, just be careful when making judgments like this overall; there's always an outlier, and sometimes it's a pretty big population that got painted with that brush undeservedly.

Exactly! It's very similar to wanting to be a pro athlete, but not everybody has the natural physical tools to do it. No matter how hard I work, I could never do the things a back up NBA player did, let alone someone like LeBron James. People like James work extremely hard, but that alone simply isn't enough. 

 

I bolded and underlined what I think is an absolutely phenomenal point. This is an incredibly tough problem to overcome. 

 

Great post.

[Marine X]

3 hours ago, PaxArcana said:

Which one is it, really?  Because it cannot be both - they are literally mutually exclusionary.

Well sure it can, and I think sometimes it is that being a little of both that makes it troubling.

 

A Child can very easily use the Character Creator here to make a Copy of their Favorite Character, if they were in school their Teacher would probably Praise them and give them a gold star if they did a good job, we should understand that it takes a different kind of skill to create a Good Copy than it does to start from scratch, but both can be notably well done.  Others here have made Copies, Homages and Parodies, if this is what they want to play as, let them do their thing. If the rules change I'm sure the GMs and Devs will let us know.

One of the Funnier things I have seen playing on Reunion, was Doctor Who references. I played on a team with Matt Smith and David Tennant, They kicked XXX! They both definitely moved up off the Sonic Screwdriver to something else, good likenesses too. Almost forgot about the all French team I joined for Paladin, that was a TRIP, loads of fun. Had seen a lot a clones on Virtue back in the Day, but they usually got NERFed no time flat, especially the Michael Jackson Clone in Atlas Park asking where all the children are ? ( creepy, but a good question ).

I wanted to draw Comic Books for a living when I was in High School and did a few then. So in COH I let those Creative Juices Flow, try to come up with something interesting, and always come up with a BIO to explain it. I've been told that Marine X is a play on Weapon X / Wolverine / Weapon XI from X-men Origins: Wolverine. Um, No...He looks like a bigger Version of me ( 6'4", 240lbs ), has no claws, no sword, no similar powers at all and he was Created on Virtue in 2004, the movie came out in 2009. People will say what they say.

 

 

Edited September 12, 2019 by Marine X

[subbacultchas]

Hey, I'm a firm believer that this is possible, you could have a character that predates whatever copyright by a company that may exist. One of my favorite characters back on live was a character for our Knights of the Redneck Republic SG, who I named Darth Tater. Never seen it anywhere else, and I decked him out in some camo and made a long story about him learning the ways of Sith agriculture. Just a joke character, but as an earth/kin controller I played him a lot from about issue 5 until it closed down.

Sometime right before it did close down, Darth Tater Mr. Potatohead dolls hit the shelves. Did they copy me? Probably not, they never even saw me or the character? Did I copy them? Unlikely since I'd never seen it, and still think I predated it by more than few years.

[Troo]

8 hours ago, jubakumbi said:

Objectionable to whom, exactly?

apologies, I was rushed and missed a conjunction in there somewhere.

 

'objectionable activities' was supposed to refer to the use of inappropriate words or crude language in character names. this mechanic is likely already in place and could be easily expanded.

[Skyhawke]

I look forward to this topic popping up again in October, followed closely by “Do you think they’ll shut Homecoming down?”.  😇

[Troo]

On 9/10/2019 at 9:48 PM, Rathulfr said:

The game cannot be shut down because of people using copyrighted chars.  It can be shut down for infringing on NCSoft's copyright of its intellectual property, which is being used without permission.  But that has nothing to do with players creating clones/parodies/homages.

NCSoft could easily be encouraged or forced to take action by other entities.

..this version as well as others could absolutely be 'shut down'. Cease and desist letters are not limited illegal behaviors. When ignored, letters lead to orders. Orders are temporary injunctions which freeze the offending action until a trial. Before any trial, the terms 'contributory infringement' and 'liable' get tossed around enough to pucker the sphincters of anyone even loosely associated with the offense that is not seriously lawyer-ed up.

 

Sinking dozens or hundreds of hours into a tenuous situation and then being flippant about the mention of a legitimate concern could be considered foolish.

 

Personally, I'm not stressed about it. This is all temporary.

[jubakumbi]

14 minutes ago, Troo said:

NCSoft could easily be encouraged or forced to take action by other entities.

Easily?

How exactly is NCSoft in any way vulnerable in this situation, to an outside force, to shut down rogue CoH servers?

Do tell!

[Troo]

It just takes a letter.

[MunkiLord]

But what would such a letter accomplish? Since every server is currently unauthorized, what law would make NCSoft liable for anything done on any of them?

[Abraxus]

26 minutes ago, Troo said:

NCSoft could easily be encouraged or forced to take action by other entities.

..this version as well as others could absolutely be 'shut down'. Cease and desist letters are not limited illegal behaviors. When ignored, letters lead to orders. Orders are temporary injunctions which freeze the offending action until a trial. Before any trial, the terms 'contributory infringement' and 'liable' get tossed around enough to pucker the sphincters of anyone even loosely associated with the offense that is not seriously lawyer-ed up.

 

Sinking dozens or hundreds of hours into a tenuous situation and then being flippant about the mention of a legitimate concern could be considered foolish.

 

Personally, I'm not stressed about it. This is all temporary.

Not much optimism there.  There are on-going efforts to make sure that will be the opposite of temporary.  So, you were either unaware, or don't give it much chance for success.  I can't tell.  In either case, rest assured that if they wanted to shut it down, they could have done so as soon as they became aware of their existence, and the opted not to, but instead to enter into discussions about legitimizing the whole thing.  We are all dreaming of what a "post deal" CoH will look like, and we kind of enjoy that line of thought.

[ShardWarrior]

11 minutes ago, MunkiLord said:

But what would such a letter accomplish? Since every server is currently unauthorized, what law would make NCSoft liable for anything done on any of them?

Be kind enough to allow them a few more minutes to obtain their Google search law degrees.  😉

[ShardWarrior]

49 minutes ago, Troo said:

NCSoft could easily be encouraged or forced to take action by other entities.

Or they could not.  I'll bet if we all try really hard we can conservatively come up with at least a thousand different "what ifs".  The game never got shut down before when a near bankrupt Marvel tried to sue the first time.  I personally don't see that changing now.

 

You've got far, far, far better odds NCSoft decides to close down the server due to it being a stolen version of their property than being concerned about a company/individual issuing a C&D because someone made a cosplay homage.

Edited September 13, 2019 by ShardWarrior