RE: [Epic] (Off Topic) Quake 2

From: Miller, Chris <CMiller_at_...>
Date: Tue, 17 Mar 1998 14:56:00 -0600

> > I'm not saying I disagree with you, but it's clear that some
> companies
> > are a little bit more anal on this matter than others, and noone is
> more
> > anal than Games Workshop.
>
> In two words Horse Hockey. LOTS of companies are more anal about this
> than GW. Lets start with TSR, before WotC got them at the fire sale.
> NO USE OF TSR COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL ON ANY INTERNET SITE EXPECT THEIRS.
>
> Lets talk Fox and what they are doing to "Fan" pages of their shows.
>
> Lets talk Paramount and what they are doing with "Star Trek" fan
> pages.
>
---------> You are 100% correct - TSR was ripped constantly for this,
Fox is busy cutting their own throat knocking off Simpson's and X-Files
and used to hassle Tick sites as well. Paramount is again busily trying
to choke off trek sites.

Honestly these companies are stuck (to a point) trying to protect their
copyright (which they can lose if it's just all over the place) while
allowing fans to "fan" their stuff ,but some don't seem to care about
that last part.

> While I don't know if GW is planning on doing a WH40K shoot-em-up 1st
> person game, I have heard that they are or were working on it. This
> means that a Quake TC is not a "fan" thing, but a direct competitor.
> "Lets see, you want to use our copyrighted material and images,
> release
> a something that will be competing with our product and you don't want
> to pay license fee. Ah, no thank you so much for asking".
>
> Maybe I am a bit anal about this as I make my living off of
> intellectual
> properties also.
>
> As I understand GW's policy on fan work is that you can use terms that
> are copyrighted by them (like, say, Warhammer 40,000 or Eldar), and
> can
> use limited amounts of there rules/written stuff (like say, stats
> tables) but you can NOT use their images or large amounts of their
> fiction (i.e. you can post a couple of pages of THEIR fluff). The no
> image rule tends to rule out the Quake stuff with out a license
> agreement.
>
--------> I think the big problem is that if he releases it for free
they'd be hard pressed to show damages of any kind, as long as he
acknowledges their rights. He's not making money off of their property -
it's free. They might have some grounds on copyright issues, but again,
there are similar existing packages out there now - I';ve seen at least
one Space Wolves vs Tyranids conversion for Civillization II and I'm
sure there are others, and I don't believe anything was done over it.
Now if GW was planning to license a conversion to someone, they could
certainly jump in and do something, but has anyone heard of that
happening? Like to see it, but hasn't happend yet AFAIK. You'd think as
long as they can protect the copyright they'd be all for a quality job
done by fans on something they have no plans to do themselves, but you
never know.

Chris Miller
Received on Tue Mar 17 1998 - 20:56:00 UTC