Re: olc

From: Gary (gwalicze@students.uiuc.edu)
Date: 09/09/95


On Sat, 9 Sep 1995, Paul Cole wrote:

> 
> 
> On Sat, 9 Sep 1995, FourSpace wrote:
> 
> > On Sat, 9 Sep 1995, Ole Gjerde wrote:
> > > This might be a problem.  TSR has copyright on that stuff, so if they 
> > > wanted they could sue you :)
> > > TSR was supposedly going to sue any muds with areas with mobs/objects 
> > > that they have copyright on.
> > > 
> > > Just warning you :P
> > > 
> > 
> > I don't think TSR would have a leg to stand on unless you are making 
> > money off of the mud (which none of us Circle muds would dream of :).
> > Suing a mud for using the monsters and objs as-is form thier manuals
> > would be equivalent to climbing through your bathroom window and 
> > arresting you and all your guests for playing an aD&d module.
> > 
> > Fireball
> 
> Actually. It depends entirely upon which portions they have registered 
> their copyrights.  If you use something that has not had its copyright 
> registered and then the offended party can attempt to do three things
> 
>  1) Seek injunctions to prevent you from possessing, reproducing <got you 
>     on that one>, translating, distributing <got you on that one too>,
>     the material < unless you have a license for one or more of the >
>                  < above either expressed or implied>.              >
>  2) Seek damages to the tune of any real value loss to their own work 
>      <lost sales or whatever> in past, present and future. 
>      <put it on an ftp site and future losses are quite large>
>  3) Seek any funds received as a result of use/possession of the material.
> 
> Point #2 is very dangerous since they can produce proof that profit was 
> lost based on your player count and seek damages based on price of 
> work * number of players.
> 
> If the copyright is --registered-- on the other hand, they can do all the 
> above PLUS 
> 
>  4) Seek damages to the tune of <some large figure I don't recall> just 
>     because they feel like it.  This is in addition to any or all of the 
>     above.
> 

The problem with this is, though, that you cannot find a mud that doesn't 
have ANY monsters out of the TSR books, and I think TSR would be hard 
pressed to sue EVERY mud. They would, more than likely, loose money in
the process.



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