Licensing

[johnwhelan]

To my mind the DLS is a distribution mechanism not a licensing mechanism. So something like including the following license with a DLS upload should mean that in order to abide by the license would be payware route creators should delete the asset from their system. This means it would not be included in a payware route.

So assets with this type of license can continue to be uploaded to the DLS without having to consider the implications of payware routes.

License
-----------
IMPORTANT READ CAREFULLY: This License Agreement (AGREEMENT) is a legal agreement between you (either an individual or a single entity) and John Whelan (THE AUTHOR) for the installation and use of the content, which may include online or electronic documentation, associated media and printed materials (PRODUCT). By installing, copying, or otherwise using the PRODUCT, you agree to be bound by the terms of this AGREEMENT. If you do not agree to the terms of this agreement, do not install or use the PRODUCT.

All files contained within the PRODUCT remain the property of THE AUTHOR.

The AGREEMENT grants you permission to use the PRODUCT for your own personal private use, but NO permission is granted to modify, distribute, sell or re-sell the PRODUCT, in part or in full, unless written permission has been obtained from THE AUTHOR.

Disclaimer
--------------
This PRODUCT and any support from THE AUTHOR are provided "as is" and without warranty, express or implied. You use the PRODUCT at your own risk, THE AUTHOR and AURAN (the producers of Trainz) will not be liable for data loss, damages, loss of profits or any other kind of loss while using or misusing this PRODUCT.

If you do not agree with the terms of this license you must delete all files contained in this PRODUCT from your storage devices.

Copyright © 2011, THE AUTHOR
All Rights Reserved.

Cheerio John

 

[mrscsi]

To my mind the DLS is a distribution mechanism not a licensing mechanism. So something like including the following license with a DLS upload should mean that in order to abide by the license would be payware route creators should delete the asset from their system. This means it would not be included in a payware route.

So assets with this type of license can continue to be uploaded to the DLS without having to consider the implications of payware routes.

License
-----------
IMPORTANT READ CAREFULLY: This License Agreement (AGREEMENT) is a legal agreement between you (either an individual or a single entity) and John Whelan (THE AUTHOR) for the installation and use of the content, which may include online or electronic documentation, associated media and printed materials (PRODUCT). By installing, copying, or otherwise using the PRODUCT, you agree to be bound by the terms of this AGREEMENT. If you do not agree to the terms of this agreement, do not install or use the PRODUCT.

All files contained within the PRODUCT remain the property of THE AUTHOR.

The AGREEMENT grants you permission to use the PRODUCT for your own personal private use, but NO permission is granted to modify, distribute, sell or re-sell the PRODUCT, in part or in full, unless written permission has been obtained from THE AUTHOR.

Disclaimer
--------------
This PRODUCT and any support from THE AUTHOR are provided "as is" and without warranty, express or implied. You use the PRODUCT at your own risk, THE AUTHOR and AURAN (the producers of Trainz) will not be liable for data loss, damages, loss of profits or any other kind of loss while using or misusing this PRODUCT.

If you do not agree with the terms of this license you must delete all files contained in this PRODUCT from your storage devices.

Copyright © 2011, THE AUTHOR
All Rights Reserved.

Cheerio John

In your mind maybe, because the wording of that license does not prohibit its use in a payware route UNLESS (and this is very important) they are including the asset in the route CDP. Because if they did that would be distribute, sell and resell.

But merely accessing the kuid from the DLS does not violate that license in any way nor does that license prohibit a payware route that does access that asset from the DLS.

That's the exact same wording you used in the last thread, Zec told you that it didn't prohibit it, but I guess in your mind it somehow does.

 

[aardvark1]

I am preparing a very large batch of popcorn.

Will be distributed free to all.

No FCPT required. (First Class Popcorn Ticket)

Choices include...plain, or with butter, salt. Other enhancements available on request.

Please join me in enjoying this free snack.

Regards to all,

 

[mrscsi]

Actually I'm done with it

I'll just go do my own thing, and as long as that license is in place (if that's the one he wants to use) I'll abide by it to the absolute letter. And if I use every piece of content he has on the DLS with that license and reference every piece in a payware route, I'm not violating that license.

If he thinks I am I guess he's going to have to take legal action.

 

[paulhobbs]

To my mind the DLS is a distribution mechanism not a licensing mechanism.

The DLS is a distribution system that supplies licenced assets. End users are bound by the conditions in the licence included with the asset but Auran are not as the DLS upload agreement overrides it. I'd just point out that the upload agreement grants Auran a non-exclusive licence to distribute which means I can upload something to the DLS and sell the same thing as Payware if people are daft enough (or too tight to buy a FCT).

So something like including the following license with a DLS upload should mean that in order to abide by the license would be payware route creators should delete the asset from their system. This means it would not be included in a payware route.

Which is not what it says at all. The end user is free to use the asset in a Payware route as long as it is not distributed - I fail to see how anybody could come to a different conclusion bearing in mind we are no longer talking about ethics here.

License
-----------
IMPORTANT READ CAREFULLY: This License Agreement (AGREEMENT) is a legal agreement between you (either an individual or a single entity) and John Whelan (THE AUTHOR) for the installation and use of the content, which may include online or electronic documentation, associated media and printed materials (PRODUCT). By installing, copying, or otherwise using the PRODUCT, you agree to be bound by the terms of this AGREEMENT. If you do not agree to the terms of this agreement, do not install or use the PRODUCT.
[snip, no need to quote the whole thing again]

I would just point out that my modifying by copyright notice and posting it here John has voilated my copyright. Mind you as I stole it from Pikkabird in the first place I probably have no right to complain. I mention this merely to illustrate how absurd this whole debate has become.

There are no grey areas here, end users are bound by the included licence (if any) and Auran are allowed to include DLS content in versions of Trainz for whatever platform or in their Payware packages.

DLS content can also be referenced in Payware routes as long as the assets are not distributed. The was (many years ago) an exhibition at the Tate Gallery in London and one of the exhibits was a pile of bricks. Did the artist make his own bricks? I think not. The arrangement was what was important and made it art instead of a pile of bricks. Actually no different to a Payware route builder.

Paul

 

[magickmaker]

I actually bugged a friend of mine who is a lawyer about this, wanting to see what the legal standing on this type of situation would be here in the US. What he told me was VERY interesting.

Under US Copyright law, the original author can dictate how and where their works are used, even in the situation of a computer generated item (such as is found here on the DLS in some cases.) Furthermore, it's perfectly legal for them to state that their work may not be sold in any circumstances; so long as they are controlling the distribution of it. An example he gave being a book that is only sold by the author himself.

However, there are two points here that the Copyright law does not cover, and they are very important points. First, the Copyright holder can not prevent their work from being used in other works; so long as due credit is given and the bulk of the new work is original. Meaning that a person can use an excerpt from another book in theirs, so long as credit is given in footnotes and in the bibliography. In the case of computer generated programs, due credit must be given in the new user's work, which typically comes in the form of acknowledgement where the object came from; and the object not distributed by the second party. This does not preclude the NEW object from being sold; as long as the original copyright holder's object remains unchained. An example of this being a house included in a payware route. As long as the original copyright holder's object (the house) Is unchanged and the author credited in the notes and direction given where to find the original object, then it is perfectly legal for that second object to be sold.

Secondly, if the original copyright holder offers the object for download by third parties from a hosting site, then any license is waived in favor of the hosting site's own license. The exclusion to this being cases where the hosting site states all original licenses remain valid and enforced. This comes into play in situations where users take their own objects and upload them to a specific area to be downloaded. He informed me that there actually was a case some years back dealing with Flight Sim. At that time, a company had compiled the best aircraft that had been produced, onto a single DVD which made finding them much easier. This DVD was then sold for a few dollars, without permission from the original creators. One of those creators, claiming that their own copyright and use liscense had been violated, and were seeking damages from the DVD producer. In the end, the court stated that because the creator was not hosting the item themselves, but instead using a third party, that they had waived any and all licenses that they had on the objects, in favor of the license that the hosting site used. Furthermore, since the DVD producers were not claiming ownership of the items, and had credited the original authors of the aircraft, the court determined that the creators had no leg to stand on, and their claim was dismissed.

The point that you have to understand here, is that as a copyright and license holder you do have rights; however your rights can not impinge on the rights of another person. Meaning that if you are the one hosting an item, controlling who downloads it and where; then yes it is perfectly legal for you to state in your own "copyright" or "license" that the object may not be distributed by any other third party, or reused by someone claiming it to be their own. However under the same copyright laws and rights, you do not have the right to tell someone that they can not use something in a fair use type action (which is also protected under law), as long as that person abides by the set standards and law, or as the saying goes "Give credit where credit is due." As long as the third party credits the original author and does not claim ownership of the original work; there isn't a single thing legally that the original author can do.

 

[sniper297]

I'll take buttered and salted. :Y:

 

[Dermmy]

Just to add a little to all that John the points made by MagicMaker are exactly why I bear the hosting and distribution costs of my routes at checkrail.com rather than use the DLS, and exactly why I had my 'worth-while' content removed from the DLS some years ago.

If you want to retain control you must host the content yourself, or host it somewhere that respects your license. And (just for the trollers) I do NOT mean by that statement that N3V/Auran disrespect creators, their license is perfectly valid, is out there for everybody to see and it is up to each individual creator how they respond to it.

If you want your wishes 'ethically respected' by the community irrespective of the contents of the ultimate license, I suspect those days are long past...

Andy

 

[mcguirel]

I'll take buttered and salted. :Y:

And a Martini..............:hehe:

Derrmy, Key Phrase in thier DLS Item you check when uploading:

Auran is in no way responsible for the contents of your upload package and can in no way be considered liable for any of its contents.

If they take no responsibility to the asset, then individual licensing is valid because once distributed to a local computer that local computer operator is no longer attached to the DLS Policies and then the license of that asset is in effect on an individual basis.

Also, the Auran Content Creation and Distribution Policy has not been functioning for months.

I totally agree with Derrmys last sentence since this has become such a topic. What a shame.

 

[aardvark1]

And a Martini..............:hehe:

Shaken or stirred?

Have fun,

 

[mcguirel]

Shaken or stirred?

Have fun,

Either way, maybe it will just make this a blurry picture instead of Judge Judy Show.
Sadly this topic will hurt the DLS, but to what degree remains a variable of a N3V Complex Algebra Equation.

N3V needs to make this topic a closed deal, allow every content creator to sign off thru a forum notification system they agree / dissagree and allow for people to have items removed if the new policies which clarify this subject of Ethics/Respect for removal of said items they feel they can not just freely remove their own licensing values of their content.

 

[gawpo50]

Popcorn Please

I will have buttered and salted please......


With a shot of rum on the side thankyou....

 

[NSWGR_46Class]

I actually bugged a friend of mine who is a lawyer about this, wanting to see what the legal standing on this type of situation would be here in the US. What he told me was VERY interesting.

Under US Copyright law, the original author can dictate how and where their works are used, even in the situation of a computer generated item (such as is found here on the DLS in some cases.).

The DLS does not come under US laws.

As to not choosing to download the items off the DLS if you do not agree to the terms well thats pretty useless as IIRC you need to download the item on to your computer before you can read the liceance.

Bur why are we discussing this all again have we not just been through this before and did not N3V clearly state there point on this all.

 

[Gandalf0444]

The DLS does not come under US laws.

As to not choosing to download the items off the DLS if you do not agree to the terms well thats pretty useless as IIRC you need to download the item on to your computer before you can read the liceance.

Bur why are we discussing this all again have we not just been through this before and did not N3V clearly state there point on this all.

True enough, however all the content is supposedly on servers hosted here in the U.S. so there would be some disagreement on that, which throws another curve ball into the argument.

 

[ShadyCadence]

The DLS does not come under US laws.

I thought the DLS servers were here.

 

[Gandalf0444]

I thought the DLS servers were here.

They are supposedly..Unless that changed to benefit the sake of argument..

 

[Euphod]

The DLS does not come under US laws.

Great, now we can look forward to even more terse topics on the forums:
Law, International Law, Piracy, etc...

 

[sniper297]

Open a command prompt, type "tracert" then the www.whatevername.com, it usually shows you the route;

Tracing route to auran.com [174.121.103.202]

over a maximum of 30 hops:



1 1 ms 1 ms <1 ms home [*************]

2 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms adsl-108-85-211-254.dsl.applwi.sbcglobal.net [108.85.211.254]

3 13 ms 15 ms 13 ms dist2-vlan60.applwi.sbcglobal.net [67.38.56.243]

4 14 ms 13 ms 13 ms bb2-g7-0-2.applwi.sbcglobal.net [151.164.103.154]

5 19 ms 19 ms 19 ms 151.164.99.137

6 19 ms 19 ms 19 ms asn3549-glbx.eqchil.sbcglobal.net [151.164.248.18]

7 43 ms 41 ms 45 ms The-Planet-Dallas.TenGigabitEthernet6-2.ar5.DAL2.gblx.net [67.17.168.94]

8 43 ms 43 ms 43 ms te2-3.dsr02.dllstx3.networklayer.com [70.87.255.42]

9 * * * Request timed out.

10 302 ms 44 ms 43 ms e.ff.5746.static.theplanet.com [70.87.255.14]

11 117 ms 72 ms 198 ms ca.67.79ae.static.theplanet.com [174.121.103.202]



Trace complete.


According to http://whatismyipaddress.com/ip/174.121.103.202 the auran.com server is in Houston, Texas. Not really relevant tho, anytime you get into any kind of legal battle the only guaranteed winners are the lawyers.

 

[Euphod]

You are correct Sniper. We can hire a team of lawyers specializing in International Law, let's see....three teams of lawyers, one to represent Auran, one for Mr. Whelan and one for the servers in Houston. They can argue the case in front of a judge until all the parties are out of money. Then they can wink at the judge, who will then decide the case based on some other case that was decided by some other judge from long ago. Then everyone can go home and cry about having no money left and losing the DLS to boot!

Yeah, let's do that...:hehe:

 

[NSWGR_46Class]

...................."6.3 Governing law
This License is governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of Queensland, Australia and by using the Software you submit to the jurisdiction of the courts of Queensland, Australia and their courts of appeal.".......................