Because they'd like for people to donate, obviously.

Vic Rattlehead wrote:

I just find it funny that even though it's common freaking sense it's against the law, they'll do it anyway.

Donations are against the law? Interesting, somebody should alert the red cross.
At best its against BYOND policy, though as we've been over 1,000 times; since they seem completely incapable of actually laying out any type of rules; its difficult to run around preaching about them.
Simply using copyrighted material is illegal; if you want to get technical.

Vic Rattlehead wrote:

ITT: Falacy doesn't know how to read. Anyone who read a post in this topic would realize what I meant with "donations being against the law."

Taking true donations is no more illegal than making the fan-game to begin with.

And there's no "rules" against donations for fangames, because it's damn obvious you shouldn't take money for it.

There are indeed rules against putting a donate button on your hub. About as official as rules can get, though in recent times these old posts have been discredited by the staff:
Lummox Jr wrote:

Don't charge money or ask donations for fan foo.

Vic Rattlehead wrote:

There doesn't need to rules about it.

Yes, that's what rules are for, to preemptively stop people from doing things.

Does that mean in my game I should include a rule "Do not threaten to kill someone in real life"?

If you specifically don't want people threatening to kill each other in real life then I guess so? On the occasion(?) that that comment would come up, if there was no rule against it, why not say it? If anything it'd probably be less offensive than threatening to kill them in the game, unless they actually knew where you live o.O

Common sense kicks in even for morons.

lol you greatly overestimate the BYOND community, apparently. People in general will abuse anything and everything they possibly can unless forcibly stopped.

Why do you start threads that are simply going to turn into arguments?

This should have been reported to the BYOND staff, and left for them to handle.

It's a pretty loaded question, because you know the answer before you asked.

Vic Rattlehead wrote:

There doesn't need to rules about it. Does that mean in my game I should include a rule "Do not threaten to kill someone in real life"? Common sense kicks in even for morons.

Common sense isn't always so common or straightforward.

Common sense would say if Bob buys a BYOND membership specifically so they can get membership benefits in NarutoBall Z that BYOND is profiting off of copyrighted material. You don't see BYOND saying no to fan games offering benefits to BYOND members even though it's basically 3rd party money laundering. BYOND has basically operated under the idea that as long as it isn't directly related to the fan game it's fine (See I believe Strai Games which has donations for all their games, some of which are fan games).

That said, there is really not a whole lot of legal precedence for these sort of things, so there is nothing to base anything on but each persons interpretation of the law. Some take it as "Money + Fan game = No", others look at it as "Profit + fan game = No, So Donations<=Cost = Okay".

You also have to be realistic about the entire thing. While the owners of said material are well within their rights to protect their copyrights, they are generally not inclined to do so. Not only will they generally not have a hope of even recouping the court costs to pursue it, but they have the very real possibility of receiving a lot of negative press about it.

Now Fan fiction on the other hand, is considered to be legal in the United States as it falls under derivative works:

"A “derivative work” is a work based upon one or more pre-existing works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a “derivative work”."

So it's perfectly fine if I were to write a novel, but a game is magically off limits and copyright infringement? Fan games and Fan Fiction are the same thing utilizing two different mediums.

Private servers are more immoral than anything, really. I'll admit - I got carried away with that one!
Downloading music for free from Torrents and such are illegal, and there's SEVERAL bands that'd love to say the same thing.

Tko37 wrote:

There's nothing illegal in "recieving" money. A "donation" is a simple handing over of money, whatever the ulterior motive may be. Its all in the wording.

Donations made that are directly related to something that is teetering on the lines of 'fair use' (i.e: on the website) could very easily and quickly be ruled as illegal in a court of law.

A developer who has fangames that link to his personal website on which he has a donation option that in no way benefits you in the game should be fine.

A developer who has fangames that link to his personal website on which he has a donation option that in turn gives you benefits in said fangames again is back on the 'a judge is probably going to pwn you here' side of things.

What it comes down to is this:
1: Does the owner of the material care?
If Yes:
2: Does the owner of the material know you exist?
If Yes:
3: Has the owner of the material sent you a C&D order?
If Yes:

Once you are given a cease and desist order you have two choices. One is fight it in court. Very expensive, very foolish. Two is to bend over and submit to whatever it is they are ordering you quit doing.

Depends on what music you're downloading. Some people, in order to get publicity, release their music for free via torrents.