I know

Joshex · January 14, 2014, 01:46:13 PM

I know people are tired of being let down and people think I'm a bit loopy. But I have been doing the hard research that everyone writes off as impossible for the very reasons I've encountered.

yeah, I was told marvel would not talk to me by several members here, and they in fact are ignoring me. maybe it's cause I'm too lazy/busy to write a physical letter to thier legal mailing address and settled for email.

So I know not many people here still have much support for my efforts, and I'm not really the best at rallying support for petitions (the last one I started got 0 signers.. other than me)

whee..

I am geek, as geek I have always known what it's like to not be important or noticed.

so what are you getting at joshex? and how does it relate to Coh?

I have come up with a presumption about the situation regarding the "videogame murder" that happened to CoH, some of you may have read it before it was deleted. I will not be repeating that here as it's irrelevant to the solution.

Every problem has a solution, even in this instituational aristocracy ruled burocracy.

the problem; CoH was shutdown for whatever reason legal or personal, and now NCSoft is sitting on the rights and all contact with NCSoft regarding this is either meeting stiff unacceptable demands or getting stonewalled.

Is there a tank or brute here? We heroes and villains have our methods for dealing with walls.

Eitherway, our problem with CoH is a legal problem, and in specific, an IP problem.

So lets cut the problem at it's root. What do we need? we need IP Law reform.

heck it's not just CoH that shows us the stifling and restricting articles of patent reform, Have you ever heard of the guy in canada who developed a new component for cars which boosts gas mileage to insane values like 60+ MPG and makes your engine burn cleaner in the process?

GM bought it, and sat on it. And are still sitting on it, and will continue to sit on it[period]

this is patent abuse, but it's allowed under current patent law.

I encourage you to do reasearch on the reason why IP laws were developed, by the queen of england. I'll make it blunt, if you create and sell a product/service it gives you monopolization rights to that product/service and makes competitors have to pay penalties for using your specific designs without permission or payment.

which has absolutely nothing to do with "patent sitting" because in a situation of patent sitting, you have no product on the market and don't intend to.

all they are doing is trying to prevent other people from using a patent that they find to be "scary" to thier current manner of business, which is not why patents and other IP's were invented. or maybe they want to discontinue a product so all we have as options is the new high priced stuff or to save money or some other selfish corporate reason.

so what do we do? leave it up to the governments? they seem pretty happy with how the patent laws are. things they deem too old can die and just stay dead while the totalitarian people-monitoring tools of the future can be the only thing on the market.

it's a game of Control. and the government is winning.

but we still have one tool left, Petitions. Voting.

the UN is currently in charge of international IP law and both the UN and most of it's biggest participants must take real petitions as a serious deal if there are enough signitures.

point of fact is the reform against IP sitting is in favor of the majority of the world because the majority of the world could actually get in business quicker with a great product if they could sell older more popular discontined products/services.

If we can make articles of patent reform and get a majority of the world to sign it, then then we can pry CoH all of it's data and development utilities from NCSoft's hands, or they will be forced to continue running it to avoid others buying it from an IP office under an article demanding that terminated products/services' IP's are publically available for purchase for nominal processing fees allong with all thier utilities and data.

we can make this happen if we have the 'round ones' to do it. problem is we need someone with more pressence than me "a geek" to start it.

this is what I wrote, feel free to look it over and make any legal wording changes you feel are needed.

Spoiler for Hidden:

Golden Girl · January 14, 2014, 07:33:41 PM

You're moving into self-parody territory with this :P

Floride · January 14, 2014, 08:44:00 PM

So.. all I have to do is start selling Windows98 and I can claim ownership of the IP? And no one has to buy it, I just have to make it "officially available"? Right on!
*Rubs hands together, licking his lips* yesssss.... I'm seeing the possibilities here. I will soon own the IP for the PSX! Muahahahaha!

Drauger9 · January 15, 2014, 12:19:24 AM

Hi Joshex, seen your post last night and was going to reply. Since it was late and I was exhausted I decided to wait until I had some sleep. LOL!

I'm glad to see that your atleast doing something, where as I just post on this board with my support but... I really really think IP law reform is a very very long shot.

It seems to me that when it comes to most laws (minus gun control, taxes, ect....) the Government in general are reluctant to consider it. In the case of IP laws where even if everyone here was to sign the petition. I seriously doubt they'd even consider it.

Also, as much as I would love to have City of Heroes back. The IP does belong to NCSoft and to go as far as. To ask the Government to change the IP laws so we can take it from them, is alittle much. I know you sighted other reasons for the IP law change but I'm just focusing on the main reason to want it for me. LOL!

QuoteEvery problem has a solution, even in this instituational aristocracy ruled burocracy

I agree with this, I always tell my nieces and nephews. "You can do anything you want. All you have to do is figure out how."

Hopefully you'll figure out how. Who knows, maybe you'll stumble upon something and be the one to bring City of Heroes back. I've seen enough in my short life, that I've learned not to write anyone or anything off. LOL!

Good luck to you.

JaguarX · January 15, 2014, 01:41:24 AM

Quote from: Joshex on January 14, 2014, 01:46:13 PM

Spoiler for Hidden:
intellectual properties (IPs)

Article 1: IP law should have a basic rule referred to as "no show means not owned" which states that a IP owner must provide proof of use of a patent with-in 10 years of ownership and significant progress towards using the IP with-in 2 years.
   1a: If neither of these is true at their given time then another party may legally use the concepts of the IP without penalty.
   1aa: However if after 10 years have past the IP was used by another party and the Registered owner of the IP does produce a product/service that fully utilizes the concepts of the IP, then the other party must pay penalty fees to the registered owner and is guilty of encroachment.
   1b: If however the registered owner makes no product or service that fully utilizes the IP after 10 years, then the other party currently using the concepts of the IP becomes the Official Registered owner.
   1ba: If the original registered owner attempts to create a product or service based on the IP after it has been assigned to another party then the original registered owner will be guilty of encroachment on the new registered owner.

Article 2: Under No show means not owned; a party that becomes the registered owner of an IP by creating a product/service loses ownership if the product/service is officially terminated in any capacity or if at any point for 2 years the product/service was not officially available. During this time another party may make a product service that utilizes the concepts of the IP without penalty.
   2a: however if after 10 years the former registered owner does reinstate the former product/service for at least an officially available period of 10 years or create a new product/service that remains officially available for at least 10 years that fully utilizes the concepts of the IP then the other party must pay a penalty to the registered owner.
   2b: If the former registered owner does not produce or reinstate a product/service which fully utilizes the IP with-in 10 years or if they do produce or reinstate a product/service with-in 10 years but the duration of the official availability of the product/service is less than 10 years they do not retain ownership of the IP and may have to pay a penalty for encroachment if during that time another party created a product/service that fully utilizes the IP and retained official availability for 10 years at which point this new party becomes the Official registered owner of the IP.

Registered Owner is to describe the party or person who currently has rights to an IP by any means but has not created or is not actively producing a product/service based on the full concept of the IP yet.

Official Registered Owner is to describe the party or person who has secured ownership of an IP by producing a product/service according to the terms of articles 1 and 2.

Official Availability is to describe the point when a product/service is directly available to all consumers weather regional or international through intention/distribution by the product/service owner.

Not Officially Available is defined as any point when the product/service is not intentionally available by the product/service owner weather regionally or internationally.

Officially Terminated is defined as any point when the Official Registered Owner has made a decision (corporate, personal or other) to make the product/service Not Officially Available.

Article 3: If an Official Registered Owner's IP currently has a product/service in any region(s) they hold exclusive rights to the IP in those regions, though other parties may operate outside of those regions they cannot claim Official Registered Owner status in those regions and must cease operations if the official registered owner extends the official availability of their product/service to that region. Failure to cease operation will make those parties guilty of encroachment.

Article 4: If an IP's Official Availability is Officially Terminated or if the registered owner loses Official ownership due to articles 1 and/or 2 then the former owner must release all product/services and Information/data/development utilities of any kind regarding that product to the new Officially Registered Owner. Failure to release all products/services and Information/data/development utilities will make the holder of the products/services and Information/data/development utilities guilty of encroachment, at which point the products/services and Information/data/development utilities may be forcefully removed from the holder's possession by patent and international authorities and turned over to the Officially Registered Owner.
   4A: if the IP and all it pertains to must be transferred to another owner and any loss/damage occurs, the parties responsible for the damages will be held accountable and will be investigated for cause of sabotage.

Article 5: If a product/service has been officially terminated for 2 years, any person(s) or organizations may go to any IP office to buy the IP rights without the former owner's approval. The former owner will be notified that everything they own that pertains to the IP must be handed over to the new party undamaged with-in 6 months at the former owner's expense.
   5A: Article 5 is not negotiable, able to be overturned, fought or repealed and is at the full discretion of the new owner.

Interesting stuff here.

Also consider how it would affect things, all IPs, beyond COH though and how it will effect personal property rights. Remember IP laws was designed to afford the protection of "creations" (umbrella term for software, inventions, products and etc.) for the creator that is somewhat like the personal property laws. Thus if someone could lose their property within two years because it is deemed the yare not using it at the time or not fully utilizing it, should a guy lose his car because he have not driven it in two years or rather can the neighbor enter the home grab the keys and drive off with the other guy's unused car without pentalty?

I think you are on the right track with that the laws may need a bit of changing or updating but remember games are not the only things covered by property laws. Everything from artwork, to computers, to logos, to written published and in some cases non-published works. I think your changes would hit writers the hardest because then if someone write something, after two years of non-utilization for what ever reason, any company can claim rights to the works. Like there are many books out there that haven't been in rotation for a while but if anyone did want to try and take their work and make money off of it without the author and creator of the work getting a cut, there may be lawsuit filed by the original author (unless of course the work has passed into the public domain time period and usually by then the author is stone cold dead.) With two years that would mean that any book or work of music for that matter that haven't been in rotation since, 2012 is open for any joe to pick it up, and claim all rights to the works. Compared to as it stands, I think the rights to the Beatles music go for a couple of dozen millions and that is music that was released in the 60s and still probably have great market value. Under the two year rule, anyone could have picked up the rights to that for free basically and make a killing. Which then go back to utilization and the meaning of fully utilize. The rights buyer may simply like Beatles music, but that doesn't make them an overnight expert at using it. And since they own exclusive rights to the work that means they could edit it, chop screw it, remix it, and calling it updating and modernizing classics and utilize it. And as long as they fully utilize their product, then they own the right to the Beatles stuff they acquired and that would really suck for people looking for true unadulterated Beatles stuff and have to wait until the guy stop releasing stuff and wait another two years before it changes ownership. Which in the end do not protect the work that the changes were meant to protect and do not nesseccarily give access to the IP by the fans of the original IP. The way it's worded, sounds like it would be a good idea to set up a corporation that specializing in acquiring IP stuff. Wont have to produce any product of my own, already have ready made markets, and basically the only money spent is on distribution and maybe changes the corporation sees fit in order to "improve" the product.

Or then, another loophole is price. A company can keep a price running but "abandon it officially" but to make it look like they are utilizing they simply raise the price. Say instead of $15 a month for VIP in COX, they don't want to lose COX IP but really don't want to bother run it, so they do the bare min. and raise the sub fee to $80 a month or so. While giving the reason they must do something like that is because the choice is to either use it or lose it and they are not ready to lose their creation yet or simply trying to increase profits that are inline with what their other products bring in on average. Or some other corporate excuse which the results probably will end up the same, keep raising prices until majority of the players that originally enjoyed the product simply cannot afford to pay to keep playing. Which if one cannot afford to play then whether the game is up or locked away in a virtual vault, the end result is the same. They cannot enjoy the product.

But again, I like your line of thinking and think you are on the right track. But besides all that I wrote above, the main thing is to remember that corporations and businesses have a lot of pull in what laws are passed or changed. The question is, in what way do this benefit businesses? It's a sad question to have to ask, but in US. it kind of how things work most of the time. Or else, corporate taxes would be paying out the nose in taxes while the people would be getting a break. AKA, businesses and the ones that run the business would not be paying a tax lower than the janitor they hired who is already barely get paid enough to take care of himself.

Shenku · January 15, 2014, 01:48:58 AM

Such a law would give rise to too many bad prescedents and horrific violations of the entire point of the laws in place now to protect such IP's, so I would have to say no to such an idea.

Think about it outside of just CoH. Take Disney for instance; every couple of years they pull an old Disney movie(An IP owned by Disney) out of their vaults and resell it in a new remastered and newly formatted version(I think they're onto Blueray now, but it was DVD before, and rereleased VHS before that), but only for a limited time.

Wouldn't you then be able to say that you can legally pirate such movies after their production has again ceased at the end of that limited time offer? Once they sell out from the stores, they're no longer available through official means after all, so Disney would once again just be sitting on it, wouldn't they? Why not then couldn't someone else start selling homemade copies under such a law?

Maybe not the best example, but you're basically asking for a law to legalize theft under those rather broad conditions, so how would you prevent people from just swooping in and saying, like Floride said, "I own Windows 98" or "No one was making copies of Mickey Mouse cartoons, so now Mickey Mouse is mine!"? No one wants some jack-hole movie pirate in China to suddenly become the legal owner of half of the movie industry, let alone any software under the sun that hasn't been made for a few years. You'd be opening the floodgates to a forced IP firesale for anything that isn't nailed down in secure current production by its present owners, and that would cause mass chaos across nearly every industry... Are you trying to encourage a law that would cause a financial collapse? Seriously? And people think I'm crazy...

JaguarX · January 15, 2014, 03:39:55 AM

Quote from: Shenku on January 15, 2014, 01:48:58 AM
Such a law would give rise to too many bad prescedents and horrific violations of the entire point of the laws in place now to protect such IP's, so I would have to say no to such an idea.

Think about it outside of just CoH. Take Disney for instance; every couple of years they pull an old Disney movie(An IP owned by Disney) out of their vaults and resell it in a new remastered and newly formatted version(I think they're onto Blueray now, but it was DVD before, and rereleased VHS before that), but only for a limited time.

Wouldn't you then be able to say that you can legally pirate such movies after their production has again ceased at the end of that limited time offer? Once they sell out from the stores, they're no longer available through official means after all, so Disney would once again just be sitting on it, wouldn't they? Why not then couldn't someone else start selling homemade copies under such a law?

Maybe not the best example, but you're basically asking for a law to legalize theft under those rather broad conditions, so how would you prevent people from just swooping in and saying, like Floride said, "I own Windows 98" or "No one was making copies of Mickey Mouse cartoons, so now Mickey Mouse is mine!"? No one wants some jack-hole movie pirate in China to suddenly become the legal owner of half of the movie industry, let alone any software under the sun that hasn't been made for a few years. You'd be opening the floodgates to a forced IP firesale for anything that isn't nailed down in secure current production by its present owners, and that would cause mass chaos across nearly every industry... Are you trying to encourage a law that would cause a financial collapse? Seriously? And people think I'm crazy...

Basically this above is what I was saying except I think Shenku put it in a more clearer shorter terms.

Kistulot · January 15, 2014, 04:57:38 AM

The discussion of changing IP law for CoH is outlandish at best, but one thing reading over this thread out of curiosity did stand out to me.

Quote from: Shenku on January 15, 2014, 01:48:58 AM
Maybe not the best example, but you're basically asking for a law to legalize theft under those rather broad conditions, so how would you prevent people from just swooping in and saying, like Floride said, "I own Windows 98" or "No one was making copies of Mickey Mouse cartoons, so now Mickey Mouse is mine!"?

In the example here of mickey mouse, it used to be that things like this went into something called the public domain. Thank companies like Disney for preventing that practice from ever including anything in our lifetimes.

Ohioknight · January 15, 2014, 05:16:13 AM

"we can make this happen if we have the 'round ones' to do it. "

No. "We" can't.

Honest to goodness -- you have greater chance of convincing the Chinese government to provide you with nuclear weapons for free with free shipping than you have of making any change whatsoever to IP laws -- even the most minor little change.

Joshex · January 15, 2014, 05:37:58 AM

Quote from: Floride on January 14, 2014, 08:44:00 PM
So.. all I have to do is start selling Windows98 and I can claim ownership of the IP? And no one has to buy it, I just have to make it "officially available"? Right on!
*Rubs hands together, licking his lips* yesssss.... I'm seeing the possibilities here. I will soon own the IP for the PSX! Muahahahaha!

though under the articles you could viably own the rights to the discontinued OS, you can't call it windows because that trademark is still in effect in newer versions. also certain file types, extensions and other stuff would need to undergo some changes in name and possibly code if for example the 98 '.exe' code is still fully utilized in the newest version of windows allong with new updates.

Quote from: JaguarX on January 15, 2014, 03:39:55 AM
Basically this above is what I was saying except I think Shenku put it in a more clearer shorter terms.

Official Availability, so long as the company intends for the former product to be available for sale to it's intended market, then no remakes are necessary to hold the IPs.

Spoiler for Hidden:

Quote from: JaguarX on January 15, 2014, 01:41:24 AM
Interesting stuff here.

Also consider how it would affect things, all IPs, beyond COH though and how it will effect personal property rights. Remember IP laws was designed to afford the protection of "creations" (umbrella term for software, inventions, products and etc.) for the creator that is somewhat like the personal property laws. Thus if someone could lose their property within two years because it is deemed the yare not using it at the time or not fully utilizing it, should a guy lose his car because he have not driven it in two years or rather can the neighbor enter the home grab the keys and drive off with the other guy's unused car without pentalty?

I think you are on the right track with that the laws may need a bit of changing or updating but remember games are not the only things covered by property laws. Everything from artwork, to computers, to logos, to written published and in some cases non-published works. I think your changes would hit writers the hardest because then if someone write something, after two years of non-utilization for what ever reason, any company can claim rights to the works. Like there are many books out there that haven't been in rotation for a while but if anyone did want to try and take their work and make money off of it without the author and creator of the work getting a cut, there may be lawsuit filed by the original author (unless of course the work has passed into the public domain time period and usually by then the author is stone cold dead.) With two years that would mean that any book or work of music for that matter that haven't been in rotation since, 2012 is open for any joe to pick it up, and claim all rights to the works. Compared to as it stands, I think the rights to the Beatles music go for a couple of dozen millions and that is music that was released in the 60s and still probably have great market value. Under the two year rule, anyone could have picked up the rights to that for free basically and make a killing. Which then go back to utilization and the meaning of fully utilize. The rights buyer may simply like Beatles music, but that doesn't make them an overnight expert at using it. And since they own exclusive rights to the work that means they could edit it, chop screw it, remix it, and calling it updating and modernizing classics and utilize it. And as long as they fully utilize their product, then they own the right to the Beatles stuff they acquired and that would really suck for people looking for true unadulterated Beatles stuff and have to wait until the guy stop releasing stuff and wait another two years before it changes ownership. Which in the end do not protect the work that the changes were meant to protect and do not nesseccarily give access to the IP by the fans of the original IP. The way it's worded, sounds like it would be a good idea to set up a corporation that specializing in acquiring IP stuff. Wont have to produce any product of my own, already have ready made markets, and basically the only money spent is on distribution and maybe changes the corporation sees fit in order to "improve" the product.

Or then, another loophole is price. A company can keep a price running but "abandon it officially" but to make it look like they are utilizing they simply raise the price. Say instead of $15 a month for VIP in COX, they don't want to lose COX IP but really don't want to bother run it, so they do the bare min. and raise the sub fee to $80 a month or so. While giving the reason they must do something like that is because the choice is to either use it or lose it and they are not ready to lose their creation yet or simply trying to increase profits that are inline with what their other products bring in on average. Or some other corporate excuse which the results probably will end up the same, keep raising prices until majority of the players that originally enjoyed the product simply cannot afford to pay to keep playing. Which if one cannot afford to play then whether the game is up or locked away in a virtual vault, the end result is the same. They cannot enjoy the product.

But again, I like your line of thinking and think you are on the right track. But besides all that I wrote above, the main thing is to remember that corporations and businesses have a lot of pull in what laws are passed or changed. The question is, in what way do this benefit businesses? It's a sad question to have to ask, but in US. it kind of how things work most of the time. Or else, corporate taxes would be paying out the nose in taxes while the people would be getting a break. AKA, businesses and the ones that run the business would not be paying a tax lower than the janitor they hired who is already barely get paid enough to take care of himself.

some interesting comments I had to adapt the definition of Official availability to avoid some of the concerns.

"Official Availability is to describe the point when a product/service is directly available to the market it was originally intended for weather regional or international through intention/distribution by the product/service owner."

you bought your car or house or rented it for personal availability to you and yours. and the seller sold it with intention of someone to live in it or drive it depending on the product. so thier definition is added to yours upon purchase.

Shenku · January 15, 2014, 06:16:33 AM

Quote from: Joshex on January 15, 2014, 05:37:58 AM
Official Availability, so long as the company intends for the former product to be available for sale to it's intended market, then no remakes are necessary to hold the IPs.

If no remakes are necessary, then what happens when official availability runs out after production was stopped? Again, using my Disney example, they only produce those remastered editions for a limited time, and after they're sold out, they're gone from the official market entirely until Disney decides to put it out again. Once that happens, there is no longer "official availability" any more, so again, what's to stop someone from suddenly claiming ownership of said discontinued product if that product isn't on the market anymore?

Companies like Disney would have to completely overhaul their production and marketing standards and procedures just to maintain control over all of their properties(because again, they currently don't have all of them available at present from official sources, because these things cost a lot of money to produce, let alone store until they sell), and not all companies can afford such drastic hits to their finances, many of which may simply cut their losses and fold up their companies, laying off hundreds, if not, thousands of employees(ending up in the multi-millions across all the different companies effected by this), and all because of one little law.

So no, I'm still not convinced that this is a good idea.

Joshex · January 15, 2014, 03:09:31 PM

Quote from: Shenku on January 15, 2014, 06:16:33 AM
If no remakes are necessary, then what happens when official availability runs out after production was stopped? Again, using my Disney example, they only produce those remastered editions for a limited time, and after they're sold out, they're gone from the official market entirely until Disney decides to put it out again. Once that happens, there is no longer "official availability" any more, so again, what's to stop someone from suddenly claiming ownership of said discontinued product if that product isn't on the market anymore?

Companies like Disney would have to completely overhaul their production and marketing standards and procedures just to maintain control over all of their properties(because again, they currently don't have all of them available at present from official sources, because these things cost a lot of money to produce, let alone store until they sell), and not all companies can afford such drastic hits to their finances, many of which may simply cut their losses and fold up their companies, laying off hundreds, if not, thousands of employees(ending up in the multi-millions across all the different companies effected by this), and all because of one little law.

So no, I'm still not convinced that this is a good idea.

Theres a thing called "enough stock in circulation" and a thing called Online ordering which can be done at shops or by one's self on a computer.

all the company needs to do is keep it listed as purchasable on thier website and in store's digital catalogs.

two examples of stuff in circulation right now one where the company keeps ownership and one where it doesn't;

Does keep ownership if; Though nintendo has made a claim that they have discontinued support for older systems such as the NES and SNES ETC, They still wish to have NES and SNES units in production if theres a call for it.

Does not keep ownership if; though nintendo still makes mario games, one could actively say that the nintendo motto is "throw out the old style and start new" which means that to be fair, nintendo has not produced a game that fully uses the original concept or at least some of it's sub concepts. Mario bros. was different in playstyle and other factors from super mario bros. and mario bros. 2 and 3 were completely different, world also very different, this coupled with the fact that certain of the titles are not intentionally for purchase any more IE you can't buy a physical copy unless it's used, nintendo would stand to loose some old gameplay concepts.

MWRuger · January 15, 2014, 05:41:22 PM

Honestly, I've been fighting for IP reform for about 20 years from a public policy standpoint and your solution is unrealistic and unworkable. It would destroy the protections that the law allows and do nothing to curtail abuse, just change how it is done.

Here's another mouse house example: In the early 90's there was a reprinting of early Mickey Mouse strips called "The Uncensored Mouse". Basically, strips that are politically incorrect and Disney didn't want them printed. Unfortunately, they were public domain and Disney had no legal grounds to stop the reprints. But Disney, unlawfully, kept the publisher in court with nonsense suits until he ran out of money. The worse part is that Disney just started reprinting them a few years ago.

Certainly reform needs to happen, but the easiest and saniest way would be to stop extending copyright indefinitely. Every time Steamboat Willie gets close, Disney rams through another extension. The US needs to adopt a EU style system that does allow older works to be preserved and made available for a reasonable cost.

What you are advocating is making copyright similar to trademark. Trademark requires defense and vigilance to keep protection under the law. Copyright does not and should not. Your solution would essentially make it impossible for individuals (as they would likely lack the means of defending infringement) to get protection for work under copyright and leave large IP holders with the only ones having protection.

Frankly, with amount of money that the RIAA and MPAA spend trying to overturn and destroy Fair Use and enforce DMCA even though it clearly violates Fair Use as described by the Supreme Court the best those of us actually working in this area can do is maintain what we can for Fair Use.

Sorry to be so blunt, but your plan would make things worse, not better for the public. I want COH back too, but not like this.

Angel Phoenix77 · January 16, 2014, 03:15:53 AM

interesting, does this mean tr, auto assault, and dungeon runners can now have a emulator or the real game?

Shenku · January 16, 2014, 06:53:21 AM

Here's the problem, Joshex, once they run out of official stock of a product, how are they suppose to keep track of what's still floating around in the third party markets to know that it is still available for people to buy? It's not in their inventory any longer, and they'd have already recieved their payments from the third party sellers(and thus couldn't track it further based on money coming in), so how do they know how much is still available to know that the property is safe from a hostile takeover by some other company?

No, I think too much extra regulation and information sharing would need to be involved to make that type of system work.

Now, I'm not saying that I'm against reform of some kind to allow legal access to things that are no longer being made or supported by their owners, but there's got to be a simpler way that won't screw companies out of properties they rightly own, yet allow us to have access to things that are no longer offered in any official/legal form.

As far as such reform in regards to NCSoft and CoH, it's highly doubtful that any potential reform that may get proposed and seriously considered will be able to wrest control of the game from them, and even more doubtful that any government official involved (or for that matter, public support) will be willing to reform such a system specifically for a video game, especially considering how easily video games and the game industry in its entirety are slandered in most forms of mainstream media.

thunderforce · January 16, 2014, 12:11:13 PM

Quote from: Joshex on January 14, 2014, 01:46:13 PMheck it's not just CoH that shows us the stifling and restricting articles of patent reform, Have you ever heard of the guy in canada who developed a new component for cars which boosts gas mileage to insane values like 60+ MPG and makes your engine burn cleaner in the process?

You probably have, yes, but I imagine you believe in all sorts of conspiracy theories. Patents are by definition public; if this existed (which it doesn't) and was being sat on by patent law, one could read the patent.

Furthermore, the situation CoX is in has nothing to do with patents.

(I don't feel that IP law should be usable to simply sit on a work, but I don't intend to wrestle with JagX's screenful of inanity on the subject.)

Joshex · January 17, 2014, 05:07:31 AM

Quote from: Shenku on January 16, 2014, 06:53:21 AM
Here's the problem, Joshex, once they run out of official stock of a product, how are they suppose to keep track of what's still floating around in the third party markets to know that it is still available for people to buy? It's not in their inventory any longer, and they'd have already recieved their payments from the third party sellers(and thus couldn't track it further based on money coming in), so how do they know how much is still available to know that the property is safe from a hostile takeover by some other company?

No, I think too much extra regulation and information sharing would need to be involved to make that type of system work.

Now, I'm not saying that I'm against reform of some kind to allow legal access to things that are no longer being made or supported by their owners, but there's got to be a simpler way that won't screw companies out of properties they rightly own, yet allow us to have access to things that are no longer offered in any official/legal form.

As far as such reform in regards to NCSoft and CoH, it's highly doubtful that any potential reform that may get proposed and seriously considered will be able to wrest control of the game from them, and even more doubtful that any government official involved (or for that matter, public support) will be willing to reform such a system specifically for a video game, especially considering how easily video games and the game industry in its entirety are slandered in most forms of mainstream media.

when supply runs out the first thing the stores do is ask the producers for more copies if there is still a request for it., even if there are no copies on the shelf for 2 years and someone comes up to the counter asking for it the response should be "we don't have it but we can order it."

this proves the company's intention to sell the product continuously to anyone who would want it.

Joshex · January 17, 2014, 05:12:39 AM

Quote from: TheDevilYouKnow on January 15, 2014, 05:41:22 PM
Honestly, I've been fighting for IP reform for about 20 years from a public policy standpoint and your solution is unrealistic and unworkable. It would destroy the protections that the law allows and do nothing to curtail abuse, just change how it is done.

Here's another mouse house example: In the early 90's there was a reprinting of early Mickey Mouse strips called "The Uncensored Mouse". Basically, strips that are politically incorrect and Disney didn't want them printed. Unfortunately, they were public domain and Disney had no legal grounds to stop the reprints. But Disney, unlawfully, kept the publisher in court with nonsense suits until he ran out of money. The worse part is that Disney just started reprinting them a few years ago.

Certainly reform needs to happen, but the easiest and saniest way would be to stop extending copyright indefinitely. Every time Steamboat Willie gets close, Disney rams through another extension. The US needs to adopt a EU style system that does allow older works to be preserved and made available for a reasonable cost.

What you are advocating is making copyright similar to trademark. Trademark requires defense and vigilance to keep protection under the law. Copyright does not and should not. Your solution would essentially make it impossible for individuals (as they would likely lack the means of defending infringement) to get protection for work under copyright and leave large IP holders with the only ones having protection.

Frankly, with amount of money that the RIAA and MPAA spend trying to overturn and destroy Fair Use and enforce DMCA even though it clearly violates Fair Use as described by the Supreme Court the best those of us actually working in this area can do is maintain what we can for Fair Use.

Sorry to be so blunt, but your plan would make things worse, not better for the public. I want COH back too, but not like this.

so you are saying there needs to be some anti abuse measure for stuff like "oh lets keep our rights to snow white and release a new 3D version or heck just release it again to keep from loosing the rights or heck lets just make a "the more you know" commercial featuring snow white to hold the rights"
technically the commercial theory would bomb because it doesn't make full use of the IP. the others, lets work on it.

Floride · January 17, 2014, 06:45:24 AM

Josh, I appreciate that you addressed my concern about how your ideas here could basically legalize IP theft. I've enjoyed reading the other responses too. It's obvious from the other responses that the biggest issue with your ideas is the role of "official availability". That's the first hurdle. While I'm doubting the UN will want anything to do with IP reform anytime soon, if you can tweak the issues with "official availablity" you may be on to something.

I'd like to add that there are a lot of IP in the world that are proprietary. They're that way for good reasons. Requiring those IPs to be officially available could do many small startups a LOT of harm, and protecting proprietary IPs would create an exploitable loophole where companies could hide the IPs they want to "sit on". You can't make laws forcing companies to act ethically, it's been tried before and generally backfires.

You can, however, create a set of ethical IP laws that companies can voluntarily adhere to - like Creative Commons copyrights, but for IP Rights. Getting businesses to embrace your new IP standards voluntarily will affect more change than the UN trying to force them all to act ethically with new laws.

Just something to think about.

Also, regardless of the issues in your new law ideas it's clear you put a TON of work into this and I, for one, APPLAUD YOUR EFFORTS. Don't get discouraged, you may be mere minutes from achieving something great. Tweak, tweak, tweak - and see what you end up with. Good Luck!

Segev · January 17, 2014, 02:00:20 PM

The thing to remember about IP, copyright, patent law, and the like is that, particularly in the domain of intangible "knowledge" and infinitely-duplicable "creative" works (such as anything that can be replicated digitally or whose material composition is irrelevant to its utility and content, such as books or movies)...they're designed to allow us to treat them as "property" in the same way we would physical property.

They're designed to protect "ownership."

The old-time gold prospectors of California and Alaska panned for gold for hours upon hours and days upon days for years on end. If, once they were done acquiring it, somebody else could just take a look at it and produce copies that were just as useful as the originals for a tenth the effort, these men would never have gone prospecting.

IP - intellectual property - is just that: it's property owned by somebody by virtue of the intellectual and creative work that they had to do to create it.

It takes effort to write a novel. Far more than it does to read and duplicate it. And nobody has a right to demand that, say, George R.R. Martin ever release another novel in his Song of Ice and Fire series. If, for some reason, he finished it this year, but decided that he never wanted the public to see it, there is no moral nor ethical way to say, "the conclusion of that story belongs to the public! He must release it!"

If Jed Clampett owns some back-woods land and discovers oil on it, and decides that he doesn't want to allow Exxon to come in and mine it out, no ethical nor moral way exists to demand that he give access to that oil. No matter how much we decide we need the oil, it's his until we offer him something that convinces him to sell us access. If Jed Clampett invested his own time and money into building his own oil wells, and then sat on the oil rather than selling it, we still wouldn't have any ethical nor moral right to demand that he give it away if he holds it for "too long" without "making it available." For whatever reason, the investment he put into it is not something he feels he's getting back. That means it's up to us to figure out how to convince him - how to pay him enough - to sell it, if we want it badly enough.

To try to force "sale" by deciding that not selling it means it's now something that can be taken for free, we effectively deny ownership to anybody. Without ownership, we cannot expect people to work to produce. (And yes, employees who don't own their work product still are paid what the employees feel is fair. If they don't feel it fair, they can choose to find other employment, or not work at all. If others will work for less than they feel they're worth, then they have objective evidence that it may be they who overvalue their production.) If Jed Clampett feels his oil is worth $10 billion per ounce, nobody will buy it from him for that amount. But he feels it's worth it, and thus would rather hold onto it than sell for less.

That's the other thing, addressing this proposed change to IP directly: it says it must be "officially available" or they give up their rights to the IP. It doesn't say how cheap that availability must be. Let's assume for a moment that the claim about GM sitting on a patent for an engine that would go for 60 miles to the gallon is true. To continue in this behavior of "refusing to sell," all they'd have to do is offer to sell engines - to be built on-demand - for $100 trillion. And raise the price as inflation goes up.

It's "officially available," but at a price nobody would ever pay.

And we can't say, "oh, well, that's not a fair price, so we'll establish a legal ceiling to how much something can sell for." At that point, you're just legalizing theft, again. Especially since "fair" may mean "free" to a lot of people who think that, say, a novel can be distributed electronically so cheaply that they shouldn't have to pay for their copy at all. Remember: a thing is worth what people will pay for it and what people will take to part with it. I mean, I would certainly pay $10 for a brand-new, fully functional Surface Pro 2, but I doubt I could find somebody to sell it to me for that. That means it's worth more than $10. But only I and the person from whom I'm buying can determine the value of the exact Surface Pro 2 I'm seeking to buy. Only Jed Clampett and his customers can determine the exact value of his oil. "The market" is really just an aggregate of all the individual purchases of the product in question. That's why "market values" fluctuate as things change in perceived value. When shortages occur, people who want it more desperately offer premium prices to get first dibs. This drives up prices overall as others strive to match or exceed them to get what they need. Attempting to say "it's only worth $X" from some sort of legal standpoint leads to true shortages. We had lines at gas stations in the late 70s precisely because of price controls.

Scarcity will be rationed. Whether by dollars or by "ration stamps" or by "first-come, first-serve," it will be rationed. At least with dollars, you know that somebody valued something the person offering them did enough to part with said dollars. (It's also why you wind up with a black market ANYWHERE you have anything short of a genuine open free market: it's the natural state of human industry. People will offer what they must to get what they feel they need, or even what they want badly enough. This drive will cause other people to offer those goods and services, eventually, because they want the price offered for them. Black markets are "expensive" only because the required threshold to get people to break the law tends to be higher than to trade openly. But they can be "cheap" too, if the reason for the black market is the premium of taxation/tariff/whatever put on a product by non-market forces.

You'll note that IP tends to fall into black markets - often FREE ones, such as torrenting files that you haven't paid for - because it's cheaper than paying the owner of the IP.

So our IP laws are definitely imperfect. If they modeled what they seek to properly, "black market" sales wouldn't be so prevalent. Then again, theft of property is always a thing with which one must be concerned...

...and I really am rambling, so I'll stop now.)