lord9 - again

[rumour3]

The whole SpeedTree thing is very interesting. Presumably N3V's license doesn't cover third party SpeedTree creations and so doesn't cover Pofig's excellent work. However, if a SpeedTree clone of Pofig's models created without the proper license ends up in a route on the DLS or forming part of TANE, who would IDV pursue? Pofig, who has made a number of attempts to get his content removed, the cloner, or N3V? Watch this space...

R3

 

[Vern]

@Lataxe... You really don't get it. At the risk of repeating myself, freeware does not equal free for all. There is still intellectual property involved in creating a piece of original work - even if it's not for payment. No different to taking a photograph and uploading it to Flickr or similar. Free to share and people can download it to do as they wish on their own computer, but it is still protected by copyright if they try to re-upload it and pass it off as their own work, they will be descended on from a great height.

As a freeware route builder, I don't crave or expect any recognition for what I've achieved but I do expect not to have some witless oaf without an artistic bone in his body, then come along and try to pass the work off as their own.

A person downloading the cloned version is not going to receive any updates or improvements to the original work by the author either, unless of course the cloners steal that too.

We have seen the N3V stance repeated ad nauseum but I sincerely hope behind the scenes with TANE, amongst all the gloss they are also working on steps to reduce the possibility of this happening. It could be as simple as some sort of watermark built into the asset or route which, if a cloner tries to upload under a different KUID will send a warning email. Or maybe some means of password protecting assets so they can't be cloned (as I believe N3V have implemented with DLC) other than by the original author.

 

[Lataxe]

@Lataxe... You really don't get it. At the risk of repeating myself, freeware does not equal free for all. There is still intellectual property involved ........

As a freeware route builder, I don't crave or expect any recognition for what I've achieved but I do expect not to have some witless oaf without an artistic bone in his body, then come along and try to pass the work off as their own.

Vern,

You're right - I just don't get it. If you want it to free, make it free - free to be distributed, used and amended. If you don't want paying for it and you "don't crave any recognition" why do you care what "witless oafs" do with the entity you have created and let loose in the world? Do you care if someone repeats your sentences as their own because they like the ideas they express?

Why not just let it go? In truth, you "have-it....no-don't-have-it" lads are hurting only yourselves with all this need-to-own-&-control angst about FREEware.

Lataxe

 

[PerRock]

Why not just let it go? In truth, you "have-it....no-don't-have-it" lads are hurting only yourselves with all this need-to-own-&-control angst about FREEware.

Because in the dictionary definition & legal definition of the term Freeware ONLY refers to the cost of the item. It makes no statement as to the restrictions placed upon the person purchasing the item for $0 (yes you are still buying it, just for 0 cost). Buy downloading & installing something that is freeware from the DLS (and most Trainz content websites) you agree to follow the terms in the license and the law; which states that regardless of cost to you, the copyright of the item still belongs to the original creator unless specifically excluded in the user agreement.

Your idea that: Freeware = "I can do what I want with it." Is 100% completely false.

If you download something of mine and then redistribute it without my permission I have the full extent of the law to sue you for doing that, and I would most likely win.

Now as to why I personally put restrictions on content I've made (with the exception to Sketchup Imports from the 3D warehouse, which already has a license governing what I can & can't do with them) I worked hard to make my content. I make stuff the I want to for my own projects, I'm not going to charge someone for that. However I also don't want someone to take, say my Bombardier BiLevels, and while still using my textures plaster over them in MS Paint the name of their train line. The reason, as it makes my work look bad. That is not to say I don't allow reskins, but I want to see it first to make sure it meets the same standards I hold myself to.

Does that make any sense?
peter

 

[PerRock]

I'm going to expand upon my post a little more. Here are 2 straight-from-the-dictionary definitions of Freeware. Tell me where does it say that I can do what I want.

free·ware

noun\ˈfrē-ˌwer\
Full Definition of FREEWARE

: software that is available for use at no cost or for a nominal usually voluntary fee

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/freeware

free·ware

[free-wair] Show IPAnoun

computersoftwaredistributedwithoutcharge.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/freeware

peter

 

[Pofig]

Good Morning Pofig
As we stated many times to you, if you are not willing to contact us via the means we provide (it is very easy to miss threads on the forums, it happens quite a lot surprisingly!), then there is not much we can do. It's pretty simple to do, and ensures that everything is done fairly. Including ensuring that authors aren't trying to hurt other members by withdrawing permission previously given (this does happen, and somewhat more regularly than might be realised!), as it ensures we investigate and track the report.

We require YOU as the author of your assets to contact us to tell us that they have been uploaded without permission. Anyone else contacting us is guessing they were uploaded without permission. We don't act on guesses... As doing so also means that people can have content removed simply by claiming a legitimate asset was stolen... It's happened quite a bit recently, with several groups/creators claiming other creators stole their artwork.

It should also be noted, as we stated to you, there ARE some assets that have been created by other members as deliberate, direct, replacements for your non DLS content. They look almost identical, with the same naming convention, but are not your assets. We need to also ensure that we are not removing these assets by accident (right now, I don't have a list of these assets unfortunately)...

Again, this is where we need to ensure we are able to investigate, not just remove everything someone things may be uploaded without permission... Which is what a lot seem to be requesting. I mean hey, lets just delete all of the content by, say, Pencil42 because I think it may be uploaded without permission. (Sorry Curtis, just an example, I don't actually think that ). No investigation permitted, no thinking, just remove because someone claims it... Or, would it be better to ensure that it actually was uploaded without permission I'm pretty sure it'd be hard for the 'original creator' of most of that content to do so, considering it IS the uploader...

Regards

This procedural model. Such a model can provide only the author. What's stopping you ask for a model if you are in doubt about the authorship?
A man who wants to do something, finds means. A man who does not want to do anything, finds reason.

And this. No comments.

 

[Lataxe]

I'm going to expand upon my post a little more. Here are 2 straight-from-the-dictionary definitions of Freeware. Tell me where does it say that I can do what I want.


http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/freeware


http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/freeware

peter

Mr Rock,

Thanks for your considered replies.

I do understand that the definitions of freeware contain the somewhat contradictory limitations you mention. Personally I would call it "restrictedware" since the only free part seems to be that it doesn't cost the user any money.

But what I'm questioning is this very definition and the motives that drive it. I'm trying to suggest that there might be advantages (for everyone) in making such freeware wholly and truly free, without any of the restrictions commonly found in the licenses.

The history and nature of human civilisation is copying of good practice & design between peers within the various human groups - tribes & societies, large & small, physical and (now) virtual. The notion of private property is actually quite a new one in human society. Consider the attitude of Native Americans to the land they roamed; and the normal arrangement of commonland before the British Enclosure Acts saw the aristocracy steal everything for themselves.

Similarly with copyright; it's a very modern invention in human history, expressly designed to emulate and exagerate the notion of property into the metaphysical domain (design, technology and so forth) to create monopolies.

Now, you can make an argument, as copyrightists do, that having this notion of monopolistic intellectual ownership of an idea, design or process is necessary to support the profit-making motive that (it is claimed) is the only thing that drives creators. Today we can add "fame" to the recognised motives for creating things. Personally I think (indeed I know) that fame & fortune are far from the only drivers of the human urge to create. However, our current culture, with its hegemony of business-is-the-only-way, tends to belittle these other creative motivations.

In your example of a Trainz coach you've created, you say that you basically want to keep control of that design. But if you allowed others to (without the need to seek permission) further develop your asset, a number of enhanced designs of it would perhaps emerge. As you say, some would be awful; but some might be better.

In all events, none of them will negate, destroy or devalue your own original, which you still have and which does not change.

When would the enhancements or changes to your coach be sufficient to change it from "plagiarised" to "something new"? Did you yourself not "plagiarise" the design by using the real-world item as your template? In truth, this is how all design evolves and it seems short-sighted, not to say arrogant, that designers who have employed so much previous design in "their" new iteration want to claim it as entirely theirs. As they used the designs of countless others to seed their own, why not allow the process to continue in the minds of others?

I realise I may be asking the blind to see here, of course.

Lataxe

 

[Vern]

I highly doubt the freeware creators who have expressed their opinion in this thread are the blind ones here...

I do agree that the word "freeware" as it has evolved was maybe not the best definition the software world could have come up with (non-commercial would have been better but more clumsy) but the facts are we are stuck with it.

The fact remains, ripping off someone else's work and representing it as your own is at best unethical and at worst illegal. N3V need to get systems in place to stop it where it starts, as they have done for their own DLC.

 

[xcrossi]

Lataxe
OH...Russia..never mind.

 

[Lataxe]

I highly doubt the freeware creators who have expressed their opinion in this thread are the blind ones here...

I do agree that the word "freeware" as it has evolved was maybe not the best definition the software world could have come up with (non-commercial would have been better but more clumsy) but the facts are we are stuck with it.

The fact remains, ripping off someone else's work and representing it as your own is at best unethical and at worst illegal. N3V need to get systems in place to stop it where it starts, as they have done for their own DLC.

Vern,

If someone truly did take your unaltered asset and tried to not only represent himself as the author but to himself lay copyright on it - perhaps try also to sell it - I would agree that this is "ripping off". However, Lord9 has not done anything like that. He has uploaded a copy of unaltered freeware (not payware) assets that were not on the DLS but freely-available elsewhere. He has to upload such copies under his own username, if he wants to upload them at all, since he can't upload using any other name; but he doesn't seem to have tried to hide the identity of the original author in any way.

As someone in a post above mentioned, perhaps his motive for doing this is merely to enable some Trainz route/session to run in multiplayer, not some cunning plot to steal anything. What has he ripped-off? He is getting nothing but stick around here.

Here is an extract from the config file of a tree asset that was originally created by Pofig and downloaded by Lord9

description "speedTree, made by Pofig, repaint by Urman_Diesel. Visit http://429786.ucoz.ru"
trainz-build 3.2
category-class "FT"
license "http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/"

Now, is he doing something illegal here or merely annoying Pofig's sense of ownership? I don't know how the Urman Diesel repaint came about or whether the creative commons license quoted is legal.

In all events, Pofig still owns his trees and has them. The only change seems to be that Urman Diesel has somehow created enhanced versions of them and Lord9 has made those freely available via the DLS, whilst Pofig continues to make his originals freely available via a different route.

I find it hard to see, in this situation, how anyone has been "ripped off", even if Pofig's nose has been put out of joint. Pofig has not lost money or status as the original creator. What has he lost or had "ripped" from him then?

****

If you, say, as someone understanding the software involved, were to take an existing Trainz asset created by person-A and alter it to improve it, at what point does it cease to be primarily the design of person-A and become your design? There are no clear boundaries in the evolution of designed things and this is the reason I find it difficult to accept claims to total ownership - copyright - of such things.

But accept them I do, since they are legal constructs we're all bound to via participation and membership of a society, so from this point of view you are correct. This doesn't mean that the law and it's definitions makes sense. Personally I think they're against natural justice and would like to see them changed to reflect the less avaricious aspects of human nature.

Incidentally, I hope you and others can accept these posts of mine in the spirit they're intended - discussions attempting to express different points of view, supported by reasoning. We may or may not end up agreeing but I hope it's of some value to air the alternative perspectives.

Lataxe

 

[pware]

N3V need to get systems in place to stop it where it starts, as they have done for their own DLC.

I presume, by that, you mean some sort of copy protection? I would have concerns about how extreme that could become. For example, would it become impossible for you to modify, for your own purposes, an asset uploaded to the DLS? I can think of many downloaded assets where I have edited config.txt files and resized .tga files to remove errors and update them to work on the latest Trainz 12. I have also reskinned assets for my own use. More recently I have started altering files (edits and reskins) with the intention of eventually uploading them to the DLS as new assets BUT in every case I have sought and obtained permission from the original creators first. Would this still be possible if DLC style protection was implemented?

Unfortunately, the history of copy protection systems is littered with disasters. Some critics of copy protection have always claimed that if you make music, video and software downloads cheap enough for the honest users then it will not be worth the time and effort of the pirates to steal them - I guess that lord9 and his ilk disprove that hypothesis.

Just don't sacrifice "fair use" by the majority of honest users for the sake of stopping a few idiots.

Peter

 

[rickf77]

I think most freeware creators don't want some sleazebag making money off of what they offered the community for free, I realize in this case this is not the problem (I hope). Also, I'm sure most would like people to have enough respect to at least ask if the creator would mind if they re-skinned, etc., their work. How hard can that be?

Maybe I'm way off base, but I think they loose a lot of control (maybe all), when the upload stuff to the site. Yet, bless them, great creations, from the good creators keeps on coming.

If I could do great work like them, I would be very proud of myself and would like everyone to know it's my work. I would not want some person to attach their name to it. There is no good reason for a decent person not to ask the creator if he minds you doing ANYTHING with his work.

Of course those of us who can, should be allowed to do whatever we want to their work, as long as it's for our own use and not uploaded anywhere.

Show these guys the respect they deserve or we may end up losing them.

I think what this lordwhatever fella did was wrong and he knows it.

Cheers...Rick

 

[RRSignal]

Just don't sacrifice "fair use" by the majority of honest users for the sake of stopping a few idiots.

Unfortunately, that's clearly the direction Trainz seems to be going.

 

[RRSignal]

I think most freeware creators don't want some sleazebag making money off of what they offered the community for free, I realize in this case this is not the problem (I hope). Also, I'm sure most would like people to have enough respect to at least ask if the creator would mind if they re-skinned, etc., their work. How hard can that be?

Perhaps, but some of us don't care or don't think that's really the case. Truth is, technically, the DLS Upload Agreement allows N3V to do that. I don't share that attitude: I don't think N3V really makes money (certainly not hand-over-fist) off the back of any single freeware creator, or really even makes much by freeware or the DLS as a whole. Sure, they charge for FCTs, but that's for a better quality-of-service; one can access the DLS for free if they're willing to put up with slower downloads. Similarly, unless maybe one has contributed a route, or possibly a good loco set, I don't see N3V making a lot of money if they were, say, to include a particular freeware creator's content with a new version of Trainz. The majority of non-route/loco content is a small part of the whole.

Of course, I realize that others do not share my beliefs and that's fine. They don't have to upload to the DLS if they don't want to.

 

[chickenlover]

I feel sorry for Pofig. He put time and effort into those those trees and then some sleazy swindler comes upon these trees and uploads them to the DLS! I mean seriously! Can't we just have a rule that if anybody's models/textures that in the author's EULA state that they can't be included in any payware asset, the person responsible of uploading smebody's unmodified content get a PERMENENT BAN from uploading content and downloading content from the DLS and may have a slight chance of getting their account status prevoked if the re-uploaded models get into a payware asset?

 

[smash]

Normally I stay out of these threads, But I want to directly address Lataxe.
I do understand your idea's behind you argument. But here is the thing that is (maybe) getting lost.
Firstly I have never created any content. I have reskinned some items and, with permission, released them.
Having done that I can assure you that I understand why alot(most?) content creator do release stuff with licences agreements.
I hope you don't take this wrong.
Have you made any content? If not then most would ask (as most content creators would) for you to get a copy of blender and try to make somthing.
It is not as easy an it seems. Trust me I tried I could not even make a box.

My point being :
Once you have taken the time to learn the software to make something, skin it, export it,get it into trainz and find you need to make corrections, You could have anywhere from a few hours to 10's of hours creating something.
After you have gone through all that and release something to have some upload it without you permission, Let see how you would feel. I would be pissed as well.

There can also be another reason that pofig does not want his trees on the DLS.
The licence agreement with the the company Speedtree. Another user had a problem with there trees being on the dls a while back.

I hope you can understand is that most people are willing to share the content they make, But with all the work into it some just want retain control over it.
Kenny

 

[Lataxe]

Normally I stay out of these threads, But I want to directly address Lataxe.
I do understand your idea's behind you argument. But here is the thing that is (maybe) getting lost.
Firstly I have never created any content. I have reskinned some items and, with permission, released them.
Having done that I can assure you that I understand why alot(most?) content creator do release stuff with licences agreements.
I hope you don't take this wrong.
Have you made any content? If not then most would ask (as most content creators would) for you to get a copy of blender and try to make somthing.
It is not as easy an it seems. Trust me I tried I could not even make a box.

My point being :
Once you have taken the time to learn the software to make something, skin it, export it,get it into trainz and find you need to make corrections, You could have anywhere from a few hours to 10's of hours creating something.
After you have gone through all that and release something to have some upload it without you permission, Let see how you would feel. I would be pissed as well.

There can also be another reason that pofig does not want his trees on the DLS.
The licence agreement with the the company Speedtree. Another user had a problem with there trees being on the dls a while back.

I hope you can understand is that most people are willing to share the content they make, But with all the work into it some just want retain control over it.
Kenny

Smash,

In truth I do recognise the feelings of ownership that many creators of Trainz content have; and I respect those feelings in that I myself will never go against the limits they include in their license, no matter how much I believe these limitations are a pointless dampener on the wider creative opportunities for Trainz creators as a whole.

I don't have the skills or knowledge (yet) to make low-level items like locomotives or speedtrees but I have developed the skill to make good-looking and performing routes & sessions. I'm also busy making various kinds of groupings of already extant DLS items such as additional speedtree groups, herds of cows, proto-typical consists and so forth.

Since there are all sorts of assets & license-types in these constructs, including non-DLS ones, I will never upload them and they will remain in gaol on my computer. I have no desire to suffer the spiteful accusations of plagiarism & theft often bandied about here in the forums.

The skills I have that are highly developed are more physical. In particular I make high-quality cabinets and other furniture. This involves not just a lot of hard-won skill & knowledge but also a lot of very expensive tools. So I do understand the efforts needed to be creative.

Here's where I begin to disagree with, it seems, most other creators. I don't think of my efforts to make furniture (or the efforts of learning to do so) as work. It's play. I don't do it for profit and I don't do it for fame. I do it because I enjoy it. I also like to give the furniture away and expect no reward for that - certainly no ongoing say in how it can and can't be used; or copied; or even sold. My "reward" was learning how to make it then doing so.

I suspect that many Trainz asset creators feel the same, somewhere down in their true souls. I think they're allowing themselves to be seduced, though, by the notion that what they do is only worth something if it attracts praise and if they can continue to own it in some fashion. Personally I can't wait for the cabinets to leave my shed as then I can make the next one. The recipients can do exactly what they wish with it, once it becomes theirs. And I don't even retain a copy of it, unlike Trainz asset creators!

As to Pofig and his issues with the Speedtree software license - I confess insufficient understanding and if I have unjustly accused him (or anyone else) of merely being awkward about asset use for the sake of it, I apologise.

Lataxe

 

[PerRock]

Something that should be mentioned; when you purchase software (for $0 or for thousands) you aren't actually buying the software, your's buying the right to use the software. It's difficult to compare software to more physical products, as with electronic distribution you're always making copies. Every time something is downloaded another copy of the item is made.

Maybe this analogy would work. Say you make a piece of furniture, give it to someone & they instead of using it like intended take it apart and stat making replicas & selling (again it could be for $0) of it without your permission. How would you feel about that?

Now what if their replicas were of a somewhat crappy version? would you want those going out in the world? Inevitably someone will see or use the crappy version thinking it's actually one you made & start telling people not to get your products as their crap. This is why I put restrictions on things I make.

peter

 

[Lataxe]

Something that should be mentioned; when you purchase software (for $0 or for thousands) you aren't actually buying the software, your's buying the right to use the software. It's difficult to compare software to more physical products, as with electronic distribution you're always making copies. Every time something is downloaded another copy of the item is made.

Maybe this analogy would work. Say you make a piece of furniture, give it to someone & they instead of using it like intended take it apart and stat making replicas & selling (again it could be for $0) of it without your permission. How would you feel about that?

Now what if their replicas were of a somewhat crappy version? would you want those going out in the world? Inevitably someone will see or use the crappy version thinking it's actually one you made & start telling people not to get your products as their crap. This is why I put restrictions on things I make.

peter

Mr Rock,

Although analogies are always fraught with the capacity to mislead, I believe I can offer you a real-world example of how several pieces of furniture that I designed did have their design disseminated and copied-enhanced by various other woodworkers as truly free ware. This occurred, by the way, via the Fine Woodworking magazine forum, some years ago. It was not a dissimilar process to making and uploading a designed-thing to the Trainz DLS.

I made a number of items after getting bits of advice about the design & techniques involved from the aforementioned forum, museum pieces, books and so forth. Eventually I made a number of pieces in traditional styles not well-known in the US. Many expressed an interest in these styles (mostly English & Scottish Arts & Crafts) which resulted in me publishing plan-drawings of the designs in the forum, including full-size templates for some pieces.

Many took up these designs and elaborated them into their own pieces, none of which were identical to mine but many of which were very similar. I'm sure there were instances of poor enhancement or execution as well as very good ones. I understand that some were made by commercial woodworkers who subsequently sold them, as well as those made by amateurs for themselves, family and friends.

The point is that these designs were only mine in the sense that I was one tiny elaborator in a whole history of elaborators, pre and post-dating my own iterations. I felt it would be completely silly of me to claim that these designs were somehow wholly mine, since I used a whole history of A&C traditions and advice from many other woodworkers about the construction & design techniques involved.

Why would I want to copyright any of this or prevent other woodworkers from elaborating "my" designs? What would I gain, other than a reputation as a self-important and self-centred little eejit? And why would I want to prevent others from copying and elaborating on those designs, as I had done myself in evolving them?

******

If I was a commercial woodworker I might feel differently, But in fact, I would still have used designs that were 99% developed already by many other woodworkers of the past, so copyrighting a slight elaboration to them would surely have been a lie - theft of a common inheritance for my selfish ends.

I know there is a meme about (the Ayn Randian Hero meme) that encourages people who make things to believe they invented the whole kit & caboodle from their god-like minds. In fact, they are (like me with the furniture) merely adding a tiny addition to a design that has been evolving via various minds for some time, often centuries. Yet they want to say it's all theirs. It isn't.

Lataxe

 

[rickf77]

Mornin' All;

Hi there Lataxe! I guess this could go on forever. Boy, I wish I had your woodworking skills! If I did, and made something for my friends, I would really expect them to keep it and take care of it. I would hope every time they looked at it they would love it and remember who made it for them. I would feel pretty rotten if they sold it or gave it to someone else. Your time, skill, and great care went into it. Maybe it's just me, but if they did not understand that, maybe they should give it back and a better home can be found for the item.

Surely we can respect the creators' wishes. Give them the credit they deserve, ask them if they mind before you alter their work. I think most don't want to see their work that they offered us turning up as payware, or in a route that is payware. If they agree to it, fine and dandy. Most of them seem to say it's OK to re-skin or make some other changes. Even with this permission, I would think the right thing would be to show the creator what you have done before you upload it anywhere. Always give the person credit for the great item you altered.

All this Russian had to do was ask. If he got a "no" answer, find something else and ask that creator. If all that fails, maybe he will have to learn to make his own items. I'm sure most guys would only be too happy to see their work being put to good use.

I'm sure not too many would bother with this sim if it were not for the great freeware artists' work. I read somewhere here in the last week that we AND N3V (whatever ya call them) should thank these guys once a month. I also think they should never have to pay for anything.... including every item in the shop, every new version that comes out, life time FCT, etc.

Anyway...thanks guys for everything you have done to make Trainz what it is. There very well might be no Trainz at all if not for the work you have done in every department.

Cheers...thanks a million....Rick