Locked: Sometimes it's tough to be a fan in Announcements

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ID:111344
 
Mar 29 2011, 10:12 pm (Edited on Mar 29 2011, 10:35 pm)
Keywords: website
Greetings, BYONDers,

I was hoping to make a development post today, as we've got some cool new things under the hood. Now that the site is reasonably speedy (is it? Let me know!) and we've almost got a stable software release, we've moved onto some long-requested feature creep. I can't make promises as we're in the evaluation stage but we may be able to sneak a thing or two into version 481 (hopefully without breaking a thing or three).

However, this was all disrupted this morning when I got an "abuse" alert from our ISP. In a nutshell, FUNimation-- owners of Dragon Ball Z, One Piece, Soul Eater, and a whole bunch of other stuff I've never heard of-- has decided that fan-based games using their intellectual property are not welcome here and has requested we remove them. All told, 24* games were listed in the complaint. I am not sure what their exact criteria is as some were excluded, and some were rather dubious (eg, AirMapster's "Draggin'Ballz4k"-- a parody of DBZ where players drag balls around a screen-- was considered infringing! What?) We have no choice at this time but to oblige with the request as our ISP is taking a heavy hand. However, we can contest speculative claims at a later date.

I outlined my opinion on fangames earlier. In a nutshell, I don't personally have a problem with them and in fact think they only help the original IP holders in promoting their brand. I DO have a problem with them dominating our site and turning it into a DBZ/Naruto hub, because that doesn't give us mainstream appeal. We addressed that in the earlier site update. I think that any kind of medium that inspires someone to learn how to design & develop something is a great thing, even if it isn't wholly original. That said...

I have known for some time that we were walking a fine line here, because, unfortunately, my opinion as to the harmlessness (or even benefit) of fangames does not hold up in a court of law. Essentially, whoever owns the IP makes the law, and if they say "no go", so be it. We have to suppress 24 games now, probably more down the line. Now suppressing a game doesn't kill it-- we have no control over that as games are not hosted here; it just removes it from our website. Those of you continuing to operate such games should keep in mind that you or your ISP may get contacted by the IP holders as we have, but that is out of our jurisdiction.

I'll do my best to work with these agents to see if they can understand where we're coming from here. It is a longshot, but perhaps they can grant exceptions on a case-by-case basis. Unfortunately, dealing with large companies can be futile because they understandably have to make blanket rules to deal with all of their traffic.

In the meantime, the best advice I can give is to produce original games. They are the only medium that is free of this legal nonsense and, as an added bonus, can be promoted on our new site. Fangames can always be converted to "original" games after the fact; although I acknowledge that they may lose some of their luster in doing so.

I apologize to the developers who invested countless hours following their dreams, only to hit this setback because someone else had the same dreams first.

*Infringing Games
AirMapster.DragginBallz4k
AtolSoldier.EternalPower
Azone.YuYuHakushoLife
Bishamon121.DragonBallPhoenix
DarkMoonProductions.OnePiecePiratesGalore
DBEO.DragonBallEpicOnline
DBOTeam.DragonballOnlineII
Dragonn.DBF
Emasym.DBLive3
Falacy.DBZHU2
Falacy.DragonBallZHeroesUnited
Falacy.DuelZ
ForgottenNinja0.DragonBallLostSaiyans
InfernoLFlames.DragonballTournamentFighters2
IVIannyV.AnimeArena
Kappa1234.SoulEaterDeathscytheoflegend
Pylar.DragonballGTMW
Quaddw.DragonballZOnslaught
SuperSaiyanGokuX.DBTC
SuperSaiyanX.DBRP
TeamRetro.DragonBallRetro
William_Hatake.DragonBallAFBrasil
Yash69.DragonballZSagasUnleashed
ZXandElliot.DragonballZUnstoppablePower
#1 Mar 29 2011, 10:17 pm
I really hope you didn't abide by taking down Draggin'Ballz4k. That is clearly non-infringing, and they are not legally allowed to ask you to take that down.
#2 Mar 29 2011, 10:19 pm
There's some kind of "trademark infringment" there (although I don't think it passes due to it being a parody). The guy I talked to didn't seem to think it was a big deal. I'm just going to remove everything requested for the time being and get back to stuff as needed.
#3 Mar 29 2011, 10:21 pm
I really, really doubt there is, as it's clearly a parodic title. They have full right to deliver a take-down notice, but they're overstepping their boundaries here.
#4 Mar 29 2011, 10:22 pm
Tom wrote:
I'm just going to remove everything requested for the time being and get back to stuff as needed.

Are you going to show the games that were listed? I'm a bit curious.
#5 Mar 29 2011, 10:26 pm
Yes, I will edit the original post with that information.
#6 Mar 29 2011, 10:28 pm
Ok, thanks. :)
#7 Mar 29 2011, 10:31 pm
Yeah you can really remove Byond games like that becuase of it being a parody, Must i state the Rights that the BYONDers have? or does the declaration of independance have no effect on the interwebs here?, Freedom of Speech, Religion, and Publicity. If FUNamation dosnt like it, they cant take it off, thats like taking a fan made website of jsut DBZ down becuase FUNimation saw some critizizment, According to our rights they cannot do anything unless they want to take it to court.
#8 Mar 29 2011, 10:33 pm
Drakera wrote:
Yeah you can really remove Byond games like that becuase of it being a parody, Must i state the Rights that the BYONDers have? or does the declaration of independance have no effect on the interwebs here?, Freedom of Speech, Religion, and Publicity. If FUNamation dosnt like it, they cant take it off, thats like taking a fan made website of jsut DBZ down becuase FUNimation saw some critizizment, According to our rights they cannot do anything unless they want to take it to court.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright
#9 Mar 29 2011, 10:40 pm
They are legally allowed to stop material of their licenses from being used unless in the following manner: commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching, library archiving, and scholarship which is allowed under Fair Use. Byond anime games don't fall under it.
#10 Mar 29 2011, 10:54 pm
Great, now I really want to play DragginBallz4k, and I can't!

I'm actually curious how they even found it. The title doesn't really match any expected search query, unless "Ball Z" matches "Ballz"
#11 Mar 29 2011, 10:59 pm
You know, there's just no way that game isn't valid, so I'm relisting it.
#12 Mar 29 2011, 11:05 pm
Though I have drawn my share of fan icons for Star Trek and Stargate theme games, my response remains the same. Good news. Original games are king and they will shine the brighter without all these ballz in my face. I have cleared out of all fan-games now and am concentrating on original games. As for "Draggin'Ballz4k" if your position is that you are not benefiting from the play on words then change your title.
#13 Mar 29 2011, 11:08 pm
Oh well had only relisted because people wanted to play it, so much for that.
#14 Mar 29 2011, 11:12 pm
They didn't get my game(Dragon Ball Z: The Dragon Within). I infringed them and whoever owns the rights to the game Snake.. It sucks not being noticed :/.. (P.S. Just letting you know so you can remove if need-be. Idk the rules. Kinda seems like it's a if they find it type of thing at this point).
#15 Mar 29 2011, 11:13 pm
I do like that idea...and god they can really do that damn
#16 Mar 29 2011, 11:16 pm
Asha_LaPoe wrote:
As for "Draggin'Ballz4k" if your position is that you are not benefiting from the play on words then change your title.

I'm not sure if you actually played the game or not, but the title just makes it all the more...epic, and there's really no reason that the title (as-is) should have been caught in this C&D. I do recommend you give it a try when you get a few minutes, I think you'll like it.
#17 Mar 29 2011, 11:20 pm
Ss4toby wrote:
They didn't get my game(Dragon Ball Z: The Dragon Within). I infringed them and whoever owns the rights to the game Snake.. It sucks not being noticed :/.. (P.S. Just letting you know so you can remove if need-be. Idk the rules. Kinda seems like it's a if they find it type of thing at this point).

All games based on their IPs should be removed to be safe :p
All or none imo
And yeah not sure how they picked them being my hub was blank, probably a list sent in by Silk of people he dislikes.
#18 Mar 29 2011, 11:46 pm
Lol I only hope that some of the most intense coded games IR mine XD Get a second consideration cause Whilst I kinda gave up on that game I did plan on creating a third game one day
#19 Mar 30 2011, 1:02 am (Edited on Mar 30 2011, 2:07 am)
Quaddw wrote:
And yeah not sure how they picked them being my hub was blank, probably a list sent in by Silk of people he dislikes.

I don't keep a list of people that I dislike and then plot secret revenge against them. If I feel the need to respond to someone's behavior, I do so directly.

While I'm sure that my recent blog post was the inspiration for whomever it was that decided to report Falacy, I personally had nothing to do with it. Not because I was worried about the fan game creators, but because I didn't want Tom/BYOND caught up in what could have been a much larger mess.

To be clear, I'm not saying that the person who reported this was wrong to do so - just that it wasn't me.
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