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Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection used modder's work without credit
(www.eurogamer.net)
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this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2024
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What do you think would happen if the mod authors filed a DMCA takedown against the game?
Their lawyers tie you up with a lot of legal fees trying to get you to defend it, if you don’t they take you to court for a frivolous suit.
Either way they win and you lose, even if you’re right.
I don’t see it playing out positive unfortunately.
Can the lawyers on the receiving end of a DMCA takedown take the other party to court for a frivolous suit? I thought one of the problems was that there is no recourse for those on the receiving end of a bad DMCA takedown?
What I think would happen is the modders send a DMCA takedown, and EA either does take it down, or they file a "we're not violating copyright, promise" form and then that's the end of the DMCA. If they file the "we're not violating copyright" form, then from there the modders can file a normal copyright violation suit if they choose.
Right, EA would file a counter-notice. Then the modder would have to get lawyers involved and file an actual legal complaint, and EA would respond with their lawyers.
But once they file the counter-notice, you could just stop there. They could sue you for filing in bad faith, but I've never heard of that happening.
Sounds like it, not a lawyer, but if you’re wasting peoples time and money, yeah there will most likely be a way for them to get back at you.
I'd fund that GoFundMe.
They'd have to change the content or pay the man prolly.
Ahahahaha I want to live in your world instead of the one we actually live in.
Nothing. Modders suddenly feeling they should be paid is really entitled and kind of crazy. Hey I made some fan art of a marvel character, should marvel pay me?
Modding isn't a job, and you can't make money off of someone else's game
You're conflating two different things.
There's modders who whine about working for free. And yes, modding is a choice.
Where in this incident is stolen work.
It's not work . I'm currently modding a game, it's a hobby. And I'd be entitled as hell to think I should be paid for it.
This "pay the modders" thing will just lead to more micro transactions. You want to download that created wrestler in the new game? It was made by so and so, you now owe. $9.99. fuck that
If you make something and give it away for free, that's fine.
If you make something and I sell it to the masses for a profit without your permission that's theft.
It’s not about pay the modders so much as if the developer of the game took your mod, put it in the game proper, claimed it was their work, and charged people for it.
Can you link your mod files so I can sell them without your knowledge or consent please? Seeing as you have no problem with it…
Yeah they're up on the games site for free
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/work
I found several definitions where this meets the definition of "work", but I'm interested to hear your argument about how "time and effort spent doing a task" is not work.
Nobody hired you to mod someone else's art. It's a hobby. I can't put brush to someone else's painting and demand payment
This is the wrong comparison. If you painted a modified version of an existing painting, the original painter can't take your work and sell it against your will.
Actually it's more like you modifying someone else's video game and then selling it as your own
No it's not. The modder didn't sell anything. Wanting to be compensated if somebody else makes a profit from your work that you put out for free is not the same thing as selling it.
Wanting money for your work isn't selling?
No, because they weren't even offering it for sale. But they also weren't offering it to be taken to be sold by somebody else for a profit. Which is what the studio did anyway. So now, after the fact, they can either pay a compensation and credit the modder, or they can remove their stuff from the game.
When they use that fan art in the next official marvel movie, yes absolutely they should.
But it's their character, you didn't ask permission to make the art out of a copyright, why should they pay you?
It’s their character, but it’s your work.
They cant just steal your work for their own monetary gain, just the same as you cant steal their character for your own monetary gain.
Both sides have contributed something here, but one side is profiting off the other through theft.
But the rub is, under fair use you can’t profit from it though, so as soon as you accept payment, now they can sue you. So in the end, they win and get it for free regardless.
If the rights holders enter into a contract and pay you for your work, I don't think they can turn around and sue you for making a profit off of it. I'm no lawyer, but I don't think the law is that far gone.
But how can they make a contract? Signing it would violate fair use exemption before that could be argued.
Corps are abusing a conflict within the laws, it’s not even a loophole, it’s just the unfortunate way the laws that protect each person/industry don’t agree.
There's nothing conflicting about this.
They have a right to the IP, you have a right to your works.
They can make a contract with you to use your works in their IP.
No, that violates the fair use act, and is the entire point, you can’t commercialize and profit from other people’s work. A contract would literally mean you’ve commercialized it, and have violated the fair use act…. It can’t happen, it’s literally why corps are doing this, and getting away with it.
It sucks, argue that it shouldn’t be that way, but it’s reality, sorry.
Negative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use
and
You can enter into a contract. There is no requirement that the original work is unpaid. Quite the opposite. If the original IP owner purchases it, since they own the IP there's no case of copyright infringement. And nothing stops the work creator from entering into contracts.
Edit: I'm not arguing this. This is literally the ONLY way to get paid for fair use materials. Period. You're wrong. Fair use is an anti-copyright lawsuit claim. There is no issue of copyright if you sell to the original copyright owners.
And even then... EVEN IF you were correct. Your claim that they cannot sell it to the original IP holders doesn't just allow them to steal the work. That's still theft.
Contracting someone to use an artwork they made of your character would implicitly grant a license for them to make commercial profit off of that transaction.
Profit is not explicitly one of the four factors of fair use.
They're still taking something they didn't make and selling it as though they did. I have every right to write and film a Batman movie, spend as much time I want making it professional, and then show it to people, as long as I don't charge them for it. That doesn't give Fox or whoever the right to take my movie and charge for it instead. Even if I did break the law by making people pay for it, the actual owners would only be entitled to that money, not to go make mroe money off of it themselves. It's still my work even if it uses concepts invented by someone else.
There's a reason every franchise under the sun has mountains of fanart and fanfic without the companies that own them trying to take control of it: it's blatantly illegal.
Their art, their copyright.
They don't expect to be paid, but they do expect that their copyright not be violated.
They might expect pay in exchange for granting a license to use their copyright art.
Well yeah, if Marvel released their next movie and it was literally the fan art.
That isn’t what a DMCA is for. Someone being compensated for the work they’ve done is unrelated to suing a company for using your art/code/work without permission or reference. Weirdly aggressive to modders though.
Edit: for your edit, you can’t monetise a mod for someone’s else’s game directly but you can absolutely make money modding. And even if their EULA enables them to do so, taking a modders code without at least a reference is pretty dogshit. Literally a million dollar studio ripping off people who did it out of passion knowing full well they wouldn’t get compensated. I’m surprised a EULA can protect them legally for doing it tbh.