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jmac talks about copyright
Jul. 28th, 2009 01:21 pmA colleague just asked me about copyright for some reason. Well, I suppose because I've found myself in plenty of situations over the last few years where I've had to make some educated guesses about copyright law.
Just for amusement, here's my response. If I got anything hilariously wrong I'd love to hear about it.
What happens to the graphic and sound assets from old 8-bit or arcade games that have an expired copyright? Could an iPhone app developer make clones of old semi-popular games (assuming the popular ones have renewed copyrights). What about iPhone apps for board games that have expired copyrights?
Unless you're talking about arcade games produced before 1910 or so, your notion of "expired copyright" might need some revision. Copyright law is a real minefield, and it's very wide. You should probably assume that all the works you're interested in sampling or deriving from are still under copyright protection, unless you seek out works that are explicit about being in the public domain or in the Creative Commons (which I do with my own stuff, whenever possible).
IANAL, but practical experience suggests that you can confidently make all the game-clones you want so long as you don't literally copy any source code, art, text, or other assets from the original, and name it something different. If the game is _patented_, then all bets are off, so consider doing a patent search for the original.
If you do wish to lift assets out of another source (like music from an old video game) directly, here are your choices:
• Don't. Either create your own soundalikes, or find some at a resource like freesound.org.
• Ask for permission.
• Go ahead, and have a contingency plan in mind should the sample's copyright holder send you a cease-and-desist order.
Examples of contingency plans:
• The ability to argue that you're using the sample as part of a parody, a review, etc.
• The ability to re-release your work with the offending samples removed.
It's the responsibility of a work's owner to defend its copyright, so you won't get a cease-and-desist letter unless all the these are true:
(a) They still exist as a legal entity
(b) They notice your use of their material
(c) They give a shit about it
If you're confident that any one of these is likely to be untrue, you can risk using it anyway.
Just for amusement, here's my response. If I got anything hilariously wrong I'd love to hear about it.
What happens to the graphic and sound assets from old 8-bit or arcade games that have an expired copyright? Could an iPhone app developer make clones of old semi-popular games (assuming the popular ones have renewed copyrights). What about iPhone apps for board games that have expired copyrights?
Unless you're talking about arcade games produced before 1910 or so, your notion of "expired copyright" might need some revision. Copyright law is a real minefield, and it's very wide. You should probably assume that all the works you're interested in sampling or deriving from are still under copyright protection, unless you seek out works that are explicit about being in the public domain or in the Creative Commons (which I do with my own stuff, whenever possible).
IANAL, but practical experience suggests that you can confidently make all the game-clones you want so long as you don't literally copy any source code, art, text, or other assets from the original, and name it something different. If the game is _patented_, then all bets are off, so consider doing a patent search for the original.
If you do wish to lift assets out of another source (like music from an old video game) directly, here are your choices:
• Don't. Either create your own soundalikes, or find some at a resource like freesound.org.
• Ask for permission.
• Go ahead, and have a contingency plan in mind should the sample's copyright holder send you a cease-and-desist order.
Examples of contingency plans:
• The ability to argue that you're using the sample as part of a parody, a review, etc.
• The ability to re-release your work with the offending samples removed.
It's the responsibility of a work's owner to defend its copyright, so you won't get a cease-and-desist letter unless all the these are true:
(a) They still exist as a legal entity
(b) They notice your use of their material
(c) They give a shit about it
If you're confident that any one of these is likely to be untrue, you can risk using it anyway.