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CCP claiming intellectual property rights of alliance names and logos

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JustSharkbait
Methodical Destruction
#61 - 2014-02-13 13:13:58 UTC
Interesting thread. I have a question though. Since gaming for many people is about their identity, would this policy suggest that we can't use our character names, corp names, alliance names, and logos in other games? I have used many of my character names for years and it is who i am online for the most part.

This kind of logic can get ridiculous so I think it is best if we save the drama until CCP releases their official blog about it. THEN we can cause all the drama we want about it should there be issues. However, this is EVE online, so i guess Pre-drama is needed.

Hoo Ha Ha!!
Tyrant Scorn
#62 - 2014-02-13 13:25:22 UTC  |  Edited by: Tyrant Scorn
CCP Falcon wrote:
It's a shame to see that rather than wait for a civil resolution to the situation, people have chosen to jump the gun and try to create drama from it.


Maybe you should have responded sooner and throw the concerned party a bone or two instead of waiting for a negative themed post to crop up on the forums and then respond but this is true CCP fashion and you do this countless times where you just ignore the whole thing, thereby giving the impression that you don't care... What do you expect ? The other party can't mind read, they have no idea what you're doing in the meantime... So if they get inpatient, I mean... what did you expect ?

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Major 'Revolver' Ocelot
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#63 - 2014-02-13 13:37:27 UTC
CCP Falcon wrote:

I'm very much of the opinion that Alliance identity is extremely important to our community, and after explaining this to our legal department they were extremely receptive with regards to coming to an amicable agreement that benefits everyone.


Even though you banned me for 90 days I still think you're a pretty cool gai.

Also people, don't be getting mad at the waiter if the food isn't cooked properly. I imagine many devs to feel the same way as above.

Legal business can be tricky, have patience in the meantime.
Arline Kley
PIE Inc.
Khimi Harar
#64 - 2014-02-13 13:48:16 UTC
CCP Falcon wrote:
...and after explaining this to our legal department they were extremely receptive with regards to coming to an amicable agreement that benefits everyone.



Why do I get the mental image of Falcon orbiting the legal team in his ship.. Shocked

"For it was said they had become like those peculiar demons, which dwell in matter but in whom no light may be found." - Father Grigori, Ravens 3:57
Davon Mandra'thin
Das Collective
#65 - 2014-02-13 13:53:19 UTC  |  Edited by: Davon Mandra'thin
The EULA is an end user license agreement. Tell their lawyer that if they don't want that vendor printing their logos that they can end the vendor's license agreement. I am presuming your vendor doesn't play Eve, and it shouldn't therefore be a problem.

CCP Falcon wrote:

It's a shame to see that rather than wait for a civil resolution to the situation, people have chosen to jump the gun and try to create drama from it.


It is indeed a shame, that your legal team tried to create a drama from it.
Altrue
Exploration Frontier inc
Tactical-Retreat
#66 - 2014-02-13 13:55:06 UTC
CCP Falcon wrote:

In the end, we've listened to the concerns of the involved parties and come to a solution that allows us to both protect our IP, and let players use their alliance logos freely.

I'd hardly call that bad press, personally.

There'll be more info in the next couple of days regarding stuff!

Smile


Oh sure if you clarify the situation and put some nice rules in place to help the playerbase, ultimately it will be very good press. Big smile I was just referring about the initial post that could have been understood as bad press.

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Uma D
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#67 - 2014-02-13 14:12:37 UTC
Davon Mandra'thin wrote:


CCP Falcon wrote:

It's a shame to see that rather than wait for a civil resolution to the situation, people have chosen to jump the gun and try to create drama from it.


It is indeed a shame, that your legal team tried to create a drama from it.


This is exaclty what i was thinking when i was reading that.

The whole thing could have been handled by far better from ccp´s side right from the start. If you simply would have asked TVC or cafepress to remove any reference to eve online, i bet everyone would have been happy.

And the the whole thing would have been solved in a few hours.
MailDeadDrop
Archon Industries
#68 - 2014-02-13 14:30:27 UTC
CCP Falcon wrote:
We've been working on this situation since December, when the original issue surfaced.

In my opinion, you should be ashamed that it is taking this long.

CCP Falcon wrote:
It's a shame to see that rather than wait for a civil resolution to the situation, people have chosen to jump the gun and try to create drama from it.

No, what's a shame is that anyone at CCP thinks 2 months is an acceptable amount of time to wait for a resolution. From the evidence presented, and undisputed by either party, was that the OP *DID* wait for a civil resolution to the situation. When one wasn't reached in a reasonable timeframe, they made it public (to CCP's shame).

MDD
Ruskarn Andedare
Lion Investments
#69 - 2014-02-13 14:42:54 UTC
MailDeadDrop wrote:
CCP Falcon wrote:
We've been working on this situation since December, when the original issue surfaced.

In my opinion, you should be ashamed that it is taking this long.

CCP Falcon wrote:
It's a shame to see that rather than wait for a civil resolution to the situation, people have chosen to jump the gun and try to create drama from it.

No, what's a shame is that anyone at CCP thinks 2 months is an acceptable amount of time to wait for a resolution. From the evidence presented, and undisputed by either party, was that the OP *DID* wait for a civil resolution to the situation. When one wasn't reached in a reasonable timeframe, they made it public (to CCP's shame).

MDD


What do you consider a 'reasonable timeframe' when lawyers are involved?

From prior experience I consider anything under 6 months pretty amazing
Debora Tsung
Perkone
Caldari State
#70 - 2014-02-13 14:56:01 UTC
Batelle wrote:
I'd love to see what rule is cited if/when this gets a lock. At the very least, putting this thread here brings the issue up amongst other devs at CCP.


Discussing forum moderation? Straight

Stupidity should be a bannable offense.

Fighting back is more fun than not.

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Kaarous Aldurald
Black Hydra Consortium.
#71 - 2014-02-13 14:57:03 UTC  |  Edited by: Kaarous Aldurald
Ruskarn Andedare wrote:
MailDeadDrop wrote:
CCP Falcon wrote:
We've been working on this situation since December, when the original issue surfaced.

In my opinion, you should be ashamed that it is taking this long.

CCP Falcon wrote:
It's a shame to see that rather than wait for a civil resolution to the situation, people have chosen to jump the gun and try to create drama from it.

No, what's a shame is that anyone at CCP thinks 2 months is an acceptable amount of time to wait for a resolution. From the evidence presented, and undisputed by either party, was that the OP *DID* wait for a civil resolution to the situation. When one wasn't reached in a reasonable timeframe, they made it public (to CCP's shame).

MDD


What do you consider a 'reasonable timeframe' when lawyers are involved?

From prior experience I consider anything under 6 months pretty amazing


I know I've only trolled so far on this thread, but I'd like to make a serious response here.

It's basically this. They waited 2 months, in today's world where taking care of a traffic ticket can take 8 months, for a dispute involving international, cross country copyright law? For crying out loud it takes 8 weeks just to register an info query with the United States Patent Office, let alone an actual freaking patent or copyright. (source: I hold 2 patents and a copyright myself.)

They jumped the gun, plain and simple. And it was for no reason than to try and create drama. It's reprehensible, akin to airing your dirty laundry.

CCP is 100% in the right on this.

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Your Dad Naked
Doomheim
#72 - 2014-02-13 15:00:06 UTC  |  Edited by: Your Dad Naked
CCP Falcon I don't think anyone is over reacting, nor do I think the drama is unwarranted.

Fact is CCP's legal department saw someone trying to sell a t-shirt using their own custom made logo. CCP decided that since they submitted this logo to the game as well, that they have the right to control the sale.

There's no denying that happened. Sure, maybe after a couple months of deliberation CCP will make the right decision. That doesn't change the base mentality CCP has towards its customers, which is spelled out quite clearly by how they initially reacted.

Perhaps if they contacted the seller himself they wouldn't look so bad. Instead they contacted the larger company that he was selling through. It's obvious why they did that, which further establishes my point.

While some members of CCP's staff are pretty awesome (Falcon is one of them :buttkiss:), it seems most have become extremely removed from the perspective of their customer base. Hence all this constant drama every X months.
MatrixSkye Mk2
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#73 - 2014-02-13 15:10:49 UTC
JustSharkbait wrote:
Interesting thread. I have a question though. Since gaming for many people is about their identity, would this policy suggest that we can't use our character names, corp names, alliance names, and logos in other games? I have used many of my character names for years and it is who i am online for the most part.

These are good questions I'd like to know the answer to as well.

Successfully doinitwrong™ since 2006.
Liam Inkuras
Furnace
Thermodynamics
#74 - 2014-02-13 15:17:25 UTC
I really want a Phobia. Cardigan

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TigerXtrm
KarmaFleet
Goonswarm Federation
#75 - 2014-02-13 15:18:44 UTC
Your Dad Naked wrote:
That doesn't change the base mentality CCP's legal team has towards customers, which is spelled out quite clearly by how they initially reacted.


Fixed it for you. Stop assuming things.

In just about any company the legal team is a completely separate entity from the team that we know as the 'CCP developers'. The legal team did something which by itself is just. They included a term in the EULA to cover alliance logo's so they don't get in trouble when they are used in promotional stuff. Then they happen to see such logo's made for profit which goes against the term they created earlier. Nothing illegal about it so far and if this company was EA you would have gotten a big fat middle finger telling you to **** off at this point.

Luckily we are blessed with an awesome developer like CCP who wants to support player initiatives like this. So they called off their legal team and explained to them that they should leave alliance logo's alone, despite it being covered in the EULA.

All's well that ends well.

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JC Anderson
RED ROSE THORN
#76 - 2014-02-13 15:21:39 UTC
To be honest, I am a bit baffled by this whole situation. :P
Lady Zarrina
New Eden Browncoats
#77 - 2014-02-13 15:55:45 UTC
Good to see CCP working towards the proper solution.

It is too bad a negatively slanted post seemed to perculate the issue to the top of the legal teams todo list. But then again, anytime a lawyer is envolved, they figure out as way to make sure it takes as much time and money possible to solve the issue.

EVE: All about Flying Frisky and Making Iskie
MailDeadDrop
Archon Industries
#78 - 2014-02-13 15:57:27 UTC
Kaarous Aldurald wrote:
It's basically this. They waited 2 months, in today's world where taking care of a traffic ticket can take 8 months, for a dispute involving international, cross country copyright law? For crying out loud it takes 8 weeks just to register an info query with the United States Patent Office, let alone an actual freaking patent or copyright. (source: I hold 2 patents and a copyright myself.)

They jumped the gun, plain and simple. And it was for no reason than to try and create drama. It's reprehensible, akin to airing your dirty laundry.

CCP is 100% in the right on this.

Yeah, and it takes 9 months to make a baby (if you're lucky). That timeline is just as apropos a comparison.

Last I checked, Iceland is a signatory to the "Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works", "Universal Copyright Convention" (Geneva), and "Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights". Just like the USA. There's no "dispute". A cursory examination would reveal that CCP is attempting to unilaterally assert copyright to works created (and copyrighted) by another. My brother's an IP lawyer, and I've got the Patent Examiner's handbook at home. Yes, I have patent, too.

CCP lawyers should never have sent the original letter. Having sent it, it should only have taken a couple hours labor for CCP's legal department to determine that they were in error. This whole mess should've been straightened out in a week. That CCP's legal team has taken 2 months, AND THEY'RE STILL NOT DONE, indicates that they are either completely unmotivated (shame on CCP Management), or totally incompetent (again, shame on CCP Management).

MDD
CCP Falcon
#79 - 2014-02-13 16:23:15 UTC
Dev blog is out, license is in place, new procedure for alliance logo submission is in place.

This is what we've been working on, and why it took a while to get a response.

This thread is locked, feel free to continue the discussion here.

CCP Falcon || EVE Universe Community Manager || @CCP_Falcon

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