Lots of trademark abuse lately

[GM_GooglyMoogly]

The amount of time it takes between receiving an IP violation complaint and acting on it can vary based on numerous factors:

 

1.  How many GMs are available at the time the complaint comes in?

2.  How cooperative our tools are being?  Sometimes we can look up a player costume and it populates instantly, other times it takes minutes, sometimes it glitches and never populates.  

3.  How obvious is the violation?  Making a blue and red character in tights with a red cape and an S on their chest, named SUPERMAN is easy.  Sometimes the IP being violated is more obscure.  Sometimes it has become public domain.  Sometimes it's a judgment call as to whether its parody or copy.  We sometimes research the IP to look at images or to see if there is any registered trademark, etc.  

4.  If the GM has any doubts or questions they will seek the opinion of other GMs and Lead GMs before acting.

 

All that generally happens in less than a day.  But if it's timed just right it can happen in a few minutes.

Edited May 31 by GM_GooglyMoogly

[battlewraith]

This thread reads like a bunch of retirees having a debate at their condo association meeting.

 

1. Someone let their dog poop on my lawn, it's clearly against the bylaws!

2. What do you want us to do about it?

3. PUT A SIGN THERE SO THAT THEY KNOW IT'S WRONG!

 

 

[Maelwys]

2 minutes ago, battlewraith said:

This thread reads like a bunch of retirees having a debate at their condo association meeting.

 

1. Someone let their dog poop on my lawn, it's clearly against the bylaws!

2. What do you want us to do about it?

3. PUT A SIGN THERE SO THAT THEY KNOW IT'S WRONG!

To be fair, the elder gods themselves live in fear of what can happen if one of those same retirees actually decides to get off their lawnchair and do something about it...


 

[Oklahoman]

1 hour ago, battlewraith said:

This thread reads like a bunch of retirees having a debate at their condo association meeting.

 

1. Someone let their dog poop on my lawn, it's clearly against the bylaws!

2. What do you want us to do about it?

3. PUT A SIGN THERE SO THAT THEY KNOW IT'S WRONG!

 

 

[Haijinx]

4 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

 

Who said it was set in the Marvel Universe?

 

I was replying to "Seems weird to have them in a comic book universe." in reference to Jedi and Sith.

They have been in comic books and not just those produced by Marvel.

 

 

When I was a kid, I thought they were great fun.

That was a long time ago and comics have changed drastically since then.

I agree the the art was often subpar, but there were some decent artist in there from time-to-time - they mostly did one-shot appearances as I recall. I really liked the Bill Mantlo issue even though it was far and beyond one of the issues way out of the norms for a Star Wars "Universe" story.

 

Ok I'll be more specific.  Seems weird to have them in a superhero comic book. 

 

And as those goalposts may also be moved.  I mean a Universe based on the real world with Super powers and so on.

 

Laser Sword guy? Sure. Jedi? No.

[shortguy on indom]

 

Something needs to be done... the Giant Monsters need your help.

 

City Officials:  Hire 100's more PPD and restore the influence levels to where they were previously.
Citizens:  Form 'Neighborhood Watch' programs throughout all of Paragon.  Put your differences aside, unite! No more walking aimlessly.
Store Owners: ID individuals and stop allowing random factions access to your wares. No bare feet!
Pets:  Stop loitering at doorways.  Carry small plastic bags.
Heroes:  Use your Super-powers for the 'Good of Paragon.'  Band together, the pursuit of influence and rewards is not important.
Vigilantes:  Form possees to trackdown the violators and punish them.  It worked 150 years ago and it can still work today.
Rougues:  Infiltrate the violator's bases to gain their confidence and use what you know against them for gain of infamy.
Villians:  Continue to stay out of Paragon.  We know that you bankroll and are the brains behind all these 'ICON' costume shops. 

[PeregrineFalcon]

28 minutes ago, shortguy on indom said:

Something needs to be done... the Giant Monsters need your help.

 

City Officials:  Hire 100's more PPD and restore the influence levels to where they were previously.
Citizens:  Form 'Neighborhood Watch' programs throughout all of Paragon.  Put your differences aside, unite! No more walking aimlessly.
Store Owners: ID individuals and stop allowing random factions access to your wares. No bare feet!
Pets:  Stop loitering at doorways.  Carry small plastic bags.
Heroes:  Use your Super-powers for the 'Good of Paragon.'  Band together, the pursuit of influence and rewards is not important.
Vigilantes:  Form possees to trackdown the violators and punish them.  It worked 150 years ago and it can still work today.
Rougues:  Infiltrate the violator's bases to gain their confidence and use what you know against them for gain of infamy.
Villians:  Continue to stay out of Paragon.  We know that you bankroll and are the brains behind all these 'ICON' costume shops. 

Are you sure that you've posted in the correct thread?

 

Also, WTF is it with you and banjos?

 

[Oubliette_Red]

12 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Are you sure that you've posted in the correct thread?

 

Also, WTF is it with you and banjos?

 

<snip>

 

Not sure if they posted in correct thread or not, too pancaking small to read. And I have my webview set to default at 120% because I'm an old fart..  <.<

 

[GM_GooglyMoogly]

1 hour ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Also, WTF is it with you and banjos?

 

Sometimes it's Finland!

[Seed22]

2 hours ago, shortguy on indom said:

 

Something needs to be done... the Giant Monsters need your help.

 

City Officials:  Hire 100's more PPD and restore the influence levels to where they were previously.
Citizens:  Form 'Neighborhood Watch' programs throughout all of Paragon.  Put your differences aside, unite! No more walking aimlessly.
Store Owners: ID individuals and stop allowing random factions access to your wares. No bare feet!
Pets:  Stop loitering at doorways.  Carry small plastic bags.
Heroes:  Use your Super-powers for the 'Good of Paragon.'  Band together, the pursuit of influence and rewards is not important.
Vigilantes:  Form possees to trackdown the violators and punish them.  It worked 150 years ago and it can still work today.
Rougues:  Infiltrate the violator's bases to gain their confidence and use what you know against them for gain of infamy.
Villians:  Continue to stay out of Paragon.  We know that you bankroll and are the brains behind all these 'ICON' costume shops. 

Im 27. This post made me feel like I was 62 because I couldn’t see a damn thing. 

[Unearthly Herald]

2 hours ago, shortguy on indom said:

 

Something needs to be done... the Giant Monsters need your help.

 

City Officials:  Hire 100's more PPD and restore the influence levels to where they were previously.
Citizens:  Form 'Neighborhood Watch' programs throughout all of Paragon.  Put your differences aside, unite! No more walking aimlessly.
Store Owners: ID individuals and stop allowing random factions access to your wares. No bare feet!
Pets:  Stop loitering at doorways.  Carry small plastic bags.
Heroes:  Use your Super-powers for the 'Good of Paragon.'  Band together, the pursuit of influence and rewards is not important.
Vigilantes:  Form possees to trackdown the violators and punish them.  It worked 150 years ago and it can still work today.
Rougues:  Infiltrate the violator's bases to gain their confidence and use what you know against them for gain of infamy.
Villians:  Continue to stay out of Paragon.  We know that you bankroll and are the brains behind all these 'ICON' costume shops. 

 

[Glacier Peak]

How this thread made it to 6 pages...

 

 

...also any shortguy posts or reactions

Edited May 31 by Glacier Peak

[Unearthly Herald]

3 hours ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Are you sure that you've posted in the correct thread?

 

Also, WTF is it with you and banjos?

 

Perhaps he must have been at the medicine cabinet when he posted that. Maybe his mind is all over the place. 🤷‍♂️

[Glacier Peak]

1 hour ago, Unearthly Herald said:

Perhaps he must have been at the medicine cabinet when he posted that. Maybe his mind is all over the place. 🤷‍♂️

1,981 places???

 

[lemming]

5 hours ago, GM_GooglyMoogly said:

Sometimes it's Finland!

Any metal bands use banjos?

[Bionic_Flea]

18 minutes ago, lemming said:

Any metal bands use banjos?

 

[ZacKing]

14 hours ago, biostem said:

So you genuinely believe that if you asked people, (at least those who fall outside of the "don't care" category), why they created an exact copy of [character X], they'd honestly answer that since they were able to play [character X] on some other Marvel or DC game, that it's ok in 3rd party titles?

 

There are plenty of other games out there where there are free skins for Marvel, DC, Star Wars, Star Trek, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Scooby Doo, you name all readily available for free.  Of course there's going to be those who expect it to not be a problem here.  I know this because I've let people know about the rules in a PM and they've thanked me and said they weren't aware of it.

[Nerio72]

I think any of the ideas people have mentioned would be ok. There are a lot of good ideas to be seen amongst the arguing!

Another idea which may be even more unpopular, you click on "Create new" and you get a pop-up "Please refrain from creating copyrighted characters (name, costume, etc.) see TOS page whatever, section whatever."

Agree ✅ Disagree❌

[lemming]

Well, while there's plenty of ways to present, maybe putting something visible at these two points of login & char creation would help.

Something in the verbage near the top, possibly in Red before clicking Accept

 

and something to the left on the character creation screen.

[battlewraith]

I just hope something is done...um...immediately. After 20 years of absolute ruthless negligence it really feels like the hammer could fall any second now. 

And this fragile dreamworld-- this poetic house of cards if you will -- could all come tumbling down.

 

And for what?

 

The lack of a sign.

[Oubliette_Red]

2 hours ago, lemming said:

Well, while there's plenty of ways to present, maybe putting something visible at these two points of login & char creation would help.

Something in the verbage near the top, possibly in Red before clicking Accept

 

and something to the left on the character creation screen.

 

This assumes that people will read it when it's front and center, the majority wont. There's a link to the CoC in your 2nd screenshot, it would be interesting to know what percentage of  players have actually clicked on it, I'll bet on it being in the single digit range.

 

You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it think.

 

 

For me, I report, provide screenshots, global and local names then move on.

 

Edited June 1 by Oubliette_Red

[Excraft]

36 minutes ago, Oubliette_Red said:

This assumes that people will read it when it's front and center, the majority wont. There's a link to the CoC in your 2nd screenshot, it would be interesting to know what percentage of  players have actually clicked on it, I'll bet on it being in the single digit range.

 

I think there's a big difference between a link buried in paragraphs of text and a tooltip/message front and center on the character creator.

[lemming]

1 hour ago, Oubliette_Red said:

This assumes that people will read it when it's front and center, the majority wont. There's a link to the CoC in your 2nd screenshot, it would be interesting to know what percentage of  players have actually clicked on it, I'll bet on it being in the single digit range.

 

You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it think.

 

 

For me, I report, provide screenshots, global and local names then move on.

 

I'm under no illusion that this will do more than cut a few, but when someone complains about freedom of speech, etc... it's easy to reference.  It wouldn't take up any real space.

 

It's just a suggestion, and along with the tips occasionally popping it up is just to keep it in mind.

 

One of the points someone said up thread was some games have licensed skins of IP characters.   Maybe something that points out we don't pay fees to license any of that would help?

 

This discussion has probably run it's course and may have some discussed points for the council in it to work on.  If something happens, fine, if not, fine.

[Krimson]

29 minutes ago, lemming said:

...when someone complains about freedom of speech, etc...

Only one sort of person does that and they come here with an agenda. I like to remind them that not a single nation on this planet gives people a right to an audience unless you happen to be in a courtroom.

[GM_GooglyMoogly]

29 minutes ago, lemming said:

This discussion has probably run it's course

 

Indeed it has.  This is the second time I've had to trim posts (and those that quoted trimmed posts).   Thread locked. 

 

BETEO