Usage of my drawing...

[Hemdian]

The original owner of this site did at one time claim that anything posted here was useable by his company. Not sure if FFE follow this practice, which is... questionable...

I don’t think that was anything nefarious, just some required legal boilerplate from the early days of the net. The law didn’t used to recognise the distinction between a regular printed publication and a website with user-contributed material. So, when posting to a forum you had to give the forum owner permission to ‘reproduce’ your post.

 

[DangerousThing]

But if someone paraphrases your words it's derivative work, even if you add something of your own. What I'm wondering about is if your words are themselves derivative of material that is copyright Marc Miller (i.e. Traveller-related). You'd presumably have copyright to the particular expression of the ideas you've posted, but do you have copyright to the derivative ideas you post in these forums? Or can others use your material as the basis of some further derivative work of their own (subject to the aforementioned prior copyright held by Marc Miller)?

Personally I think it ought to go without saying that if you work in someone else's universe, he and everybody else he permits should be allowed to use your ideas freely. But I know it doesn't always work that way.

(For the record, anything Traveller-related I post on these boards is freely available to use for inspiration by anyone doing legitimate Traveller work, amateur or professional.)


Hans

In the US a derivative work has to contain a substantial part of the original. I'm not sure of the exact legalities, but the judge must be able to recognize that the derivative work not only contains a look and feel of the original, but also includes names and places from the original.

For example, if I wrote Traveller fiction which included part of the Traveller canon such as the 3I and the Spinward Marches and such, I'm in danger of having created a derivative work. On the other hand, I might not have, depending on the precidents. Not that I'm going to write such things, because I hate writing fanfic.

On the other hand, if I wrote an SF game without using any of the canon and perhaps changing a few things such as calling a jump drive a hyper drive with a different set of rule for how that works, I might be safe. To be fully safe I'd use a set of rules that are available such as FATE and be careful to use different weapon names for those that are recognizably Traveller. And with enough changes, it wouldn't really be Traveller any more.

The major point is the difference between being inspired by and being a derivative work can be a thin line.

 

[Mithras]

This is the Internet and these things happen, did you hear of the Ken St Andre, Tunnels and Trolls copyright breach?

To mitigate it, I post only samples of written work ('expendable') if its from a project I'm working on. When I commission art work but want to show it to people on forums, I reduce the size/quality enough so that it still looks good, but cannot be used in a printed document very well. I'm sure my results aren't foolproof and my art can still be used in a PDF.

I have had a few people ask if they can use bits of my free games in their games, and at least one was for sale BASH StoneAge? But with a credit in there I'm satisfied it that.

I think it is important to discuss the legal ramifications, but think more realistically that legal channels are not an option unless someone has done the unimaginable and copied an entire game/book and is selling it on the Internet.

 

[aramis]

This is the Internet and these things happen, did you hear of the Ken St Andre, Tunnels and Trolls copyright breach?

Worst part of that is the offender is an IP attorney.

 

[Mithras]

I don’t think that was anything nefarious, just some required legal boilerplate from the early days of the net. The law didn’t used to recognise the distinction between a regular printed publication and a website with user-contributed material. So, when posting to a forum you had to give the forum owner permission to ‘reproduce’ your post.

Worst part of that is the offender is an IP attorney.

Nasty, I can't remember the details but it IIRC it was wholesale theft.

 

[aramis]

Nasty, I can't remember the details but it IIRC it was wholesale theft.

A certain fellow had a handshake license to produce some supplements for T&T. They were pretty good. He also did a fanzine, also decent. He also was the publisher for one of KSA's manuscripts, and a couple of KSA's T&T related boardgames. Then, he produced someone else's variant rulebook. KSA wasn't overly upset, but did note that it wasn't actually permitted by the agreement. He then produced a bunch of reprints of older editions without permission, and continued to produced the "Mythical 6th Edition" in violation of instructions from the author not to, failed to pay the authors of a couple more (and the author of the M6E, too), and got caught using art stolen from Deviant Art and a couple similar items on stuff he'd printed. He also had taken some people's internet freebies, bound and printed them, and sold them as his own works. It all came to a head about 3-4 years ago. He's refused to obey C&D orders, and has refused to sign for the registered mail, so he can't be served by mail. Oh, and had the audacity at one point to send a C&D to another author whose work he'd stolen...

Ken's gotten him to stop claiming permission, and in general stop stealing obviously, but he's still leaking illicit stuff out via eBay from time to time. The boycott has done more to stop him than anything, I suspect.

 

[rancke]

In the US a derivative work has to contain a substantial part of the original. I'm not sure of the exact legalities, but the judge must be able to recognize that the derivative work not only contains a look and feel of the original, but also includes names and places from the original.

For example, if I wrote Traveller fiction which included part of the Traveller canon such as the 3I and the Spinward Marches and such, I'm in danger of having created a derivative work. On the other hand, I might not have, depending on the precidents.

I'm surprised to hear that. I thought that if you left in the identifying markers, such as names, your work would definitely be recognized as derivative; if you filed off the serial numbers, it would still be derivative, but the IP holder might not be able to prove it.

Be that as it may, I'd still like to know the status of work that IS derivative of Traveller that is posted on these boards. Can Marc Miller use it unchanged (presumably not) or can he use it for inspiration? What about third parties?


Hans

 

[HG_B]

I'm surprised to hear that. I thought that if you left in the identifying markers, such as names, your work would definitely be
recognized as derivative

It would be. You are correct.

 

[Carlobrand]

... If you mean putting "Copyright 2013 by Rigel Stardin" on every drawing, that would be pain in the butt. Second Rigel is my forum name and I don't wish my real name known at present. ...

Have you considered using, "Rigel Stardin Enterprises"? Form your own little company and use that as the copyright holder, to retain anonymity. As far as I know, there's no rule about declaring a company. My wife runs an online book-selling business, has a name for the company, didn't need to jump through any hoops for that other than making sure she wasn't using some other company's name.

 

[aramis]

Many States require a business license. Which is typically about $50 per year plus some taxes on income. (it's quite possible to have no income and keep the business open.)

 

[SpaceBadger]

Have you considered using, "Rigel Stardin Enterprises"? Form your own little company and use that as the copyright holder, to retain anonymity. As far as I know, there's no rule about declaring a company. My wife runs an online book-selling business, has a name for the company, didn't need to jump through any hoops for that other than making sure she wasn't using some other company's name.

Depends on state law. Here in Missouri our Secretary of State has a nice section on her official website explaining the various requirements under Missouri law. For example, if he wanted to call his business "Rigel Stardin Enterprises" but his real name is not Rigel Stardin, he'd have to file a certificate of assumed name. He should probably check his own Secretary of State (or Corporation Commission, or whoever is is responsible for such matters in his state), or if really serious check with an attorney in his state.

 

[Dragoner]

It makes one wonder, of those that are caught plagiarizing others material to claim as their own, how much of their other work is plagiarism?

 

[Rigel Stardin]

(Forgive the spelling)

One problem with my deckplans is illistrated by the Marava Study, I did a while back. I designed 3 ships based off the original Empress Marava and resized the original in an attempt to bring it down to the size stated by the original designer. If I were to make a collect of deckplans and sell them at one of the RPG outlets on the web, the person holding the copyrights could come after me for using the name and using his design. The same goes for the Gazelle as well.

Not even I, can draw the difference between artist liesence, design changes and what would be the spirit of the original designer because several of these ships are based on Traveller designs as well as TV shows. The only thing I really own in these designs are the stamps I used to draw the deckplans...

 

[Timerover51]

It makes one wonder, of those that are caught plagiarizing others material to claim as their own, how much of their other work is plagiarism?

There was a case of plagiarism at my college when I was a student, in the history department. One of the professors was caught plagiarizing a student's paper, claiming it as his own in a history magazine publication. For those not in academia, there is this thing called "publish or perish". Running a check on his publications for the past several years led to strong suspicion's that he had been doing this for a while. He was allowed to resign quietly. I do not know where he ended up.

I assume that if you post something online, you are going to have it plagiarized. I had something posted on another website covering anti-aircraft fire effectiveness in World War 2 of the US and Japanese Navies. A guy contacted me asking for the sources of the information, with no request for any information about me at all. I assume that he was planning to claim it was his own work. I was not impressed.

 

[HG_B]

A guy contacted me asking for the sources of the information, with no request for any information about me at all. I assume that he was planning to claim it was his own work. I was not impressed.

More than likely the person wanted to know the primary sources you were relying on. (i.e. do you know what you're talking about) If he wanted to rip off what you wrote he wouldn't be asking for the source of the data.

 

[Dragoner]

There was a case of plagiarism at my college when I was a student, in the history department. One of the professors was caught plagiarizing a student's paper, claiming it as his own in a history magazine publication. For those not in academia, there is this thing called "publish or perish". Running a check on his publications for the past several years led to strong suspicion's that he had been doing this for a while. He was allowed to resign quietly. I do not know where he ended up.

I assume that if you post something online, you are going to have it plagiarized. I had something posted on another website covering anti-aircraft fire effectiveness in World War 2 of the US and Japanese Navies. A guy contacted me asking for the sources of the information, with no request for any information about me at all. I assume that he was planning to claim it was his own work. I was not impressed.

It pops up again and again, the real damage done is to someone's reputation. The legalities are murky, especially when dealing with a common law system like the US, civil law systems are some different, but there one doesn't have to face a trial by jury.

In relation to publishing work including Marava's, Gazelle's and Traveller Ship's, Marc would be the person to talk to about it.

 

[Timerover51]

More than likely the person wanted to know the primary sources you were relying on. (i.e. do you know what you're talking about) If he wanted to rip off what you wrote he wouldn't be asking for the source of the data.

Well, aside from having done the work about 1995, my primary sources were a lot of anti-aircraft reports and summaries, combined with After Action reports of ships that had engaged in extensive anti-air action, all of which came from the National Archives, or in some cases, the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson in Dayton, Ohio. The final report also included probable gun responsible for the kill, and took the attacking aircraft's flight profile into account as well. Primary source list would probably be about 100 or so documents, along with several weeks of working analyzing everything and then converting it into a table that could be used in a game or simulation. Essentially, it was an Operational Effectiveness study on World War 2 anti-aircraft fire by the US and Japanese Navies.