[MMO] What license should the jamboree project use?

Why use Public Domain (PD)?

This is open to debate - it's far more important to have artists in the project, than that their work is PD. But here are my arguments.

The Cunning Artificer and pTerry keep their copyrights, as will the creators of any middleware we use.

But I feel we should release the rest of the Jamboree Project to the public domain, on Sourceforge, just as I've done with ThudGame.

I really don't want our work to be wasted. If we fail, through poverty or otherwise, it's not wasted if fans can re-use parts of the work.

2D artists have millennia of public domain art to build on, but 3D artists have none at all. The 3D community needs basic objects for use without worry of copyright infringement. We can give them some.

I suspect it'd please pTerry to know that he indirectly caused lots of good work to be gifted to the world.

Tracking, and worse, enforcing copyright across hundreds or thousands of pieces of art would be impossible anyway. Every "story" submitted would be copyright to the author, but usually also be a derivative work of other authors.

If we did have a team of volunteers going around inspecting everyone's work for copyright violations, and enforcing copyright, then 1) we would become legally responsible for it, and hence at risk of litigation (we'd be a content provider instead of a service provider) and 2) we'd change the tone of the game from "come and play, be creative, build on what's here and make it wonderful" to "if you make a toy that builds on someone else's toy, you could get it removed, or even get sued". That's a very different tone, and I don't want people to be scared to create.

A GPL-esque license wouldn't change that much, it would just change it to "...if you make a toy that builds on someone else's toy, and don't tell people how you did it, you could get it removed, or even get sued".

There are alternatives, but I don't like them. Making it so that all submitted work is property of the Project would leave a bad taste in my mouth, as do enforced GPL-style viral licenses.

I don't think we can replace the middleware with a PD version, but if we avoid viral licences, all our own code can be PD. If we don't get many 3D artists, we may also have to use non-PD 3D objects, but I hope these will be temporary, as modifications of them can't be Public Domain.

I want to be credited for my work!

That's only reasonable. Just as a painting in the public domain can still be signed by the artist, I hope we can find a way to have every texture, mesh and change to the game signed by the creator. This is what the "Books" or "stories" are about.

I think we should try to provide archive and editing tools that show the entire development tree, from the first creator of an item, to the last modifier.

If people using those tools didn't want to credit the people who's work they build on, they would need to make an effort NOT to: it would take more work than just crediting them appropriately. But some people would still try. To prevent that, people should also be given incentives for crediting the people who's work they build on.

Done right, we can also make it part of the society, so that it is seen as a socially better thing to build on other's work, than to create something from scratch (and this will most likely be true: if you can reuse some system resources, like a mesh, then there will be less load on the system).

I think people who placed their work in such a system will get more credit than in the standard copyright system, where people are punished for admitting they've built on someone else's work.

I don't want other people to use my work!

Then don't put any of your work on the Internet. Copyright or no, if people can see your work, and get it onto their machine, then they'll find a way to copy and use it.

See YouTube, Google Video, PirateBay, the million-and-one P2P clients, and tons and tons more. The net's FILLED with copyright infringement.

The only difference is that (as I understand it, but I'm no copyright lawyer), if you copyright your work, you can try to sue them. You'll almost certainly not succeed. If they're in the same country, and you officially registered your work with the correct authority before you released it to the public, and you have enough money for a good copyright lawyer, and you can prove that their use of your work was not "fair use", and you can prove that their use of your work caused you financial loss, then you stand a chance.

But the above won't be true for stuff you release in an online game. So you would have copyright, but it'd be completely unenforceable.

In that case, the only people that can't use your work are the nice people who care about copyright and giving credit... which are generally the people you'd be happy to reuse your stuff anyway.

I want to make money off my work.

That's reasonable too. I like making money and I don't see why artists shouldn't be able to as well.

It would be nice if we had a system where artists could "lock" their creation from other people editing and reusing it until they'd reached a certain level of payment: a variation of the Street performer protocol

What if we all don't agree with you?

Then I think we should at least have some kind of dead-man's clause. If the project dies a death, then all work done directly for the project (ie not user-created content) should be released to the public domain for others to try to re-do it.

This will then protect us against people (such as others wanting to make Discworld-related 3D games) trying to attack us in order to prevent the game being made: if they bankrupt us, the game would just come back better and stronger than before! Mwahahahaha!

You'd convinced me of the benefits of PD before I read this pasrticular post. And quite apart from the practical elements you outline, making your work free to take wings and fly just feels more right... Spread the lurve, my friends

Yes, OK, I should've been around in the late 60s...

Mr Scrub

Okay, I WAS around in the late 60's. That said, as a recording artist, I have strong feelings about copyright. When I was still touring (back in the golden olden days), I couldn't count the number of people who would come up to me and say, "I loved your album sooo much I taped it and gave it to all my friends!!!" (starry look in the eye). ("tape?" you say. "What's that?" Ah, never you mind, youngsters.) I should have said, "And how shall I pay my rent this week, then?" but I was always nice instead.

I think the author of any work at all should have whatever damn license he/she pleases, and no need to justify it to anybody. Do what you want, Dewi, it's YOURS. And if people don't want to follow your license model, whatever it is, they can just sit it out.

As he said, it may be more important to get lots of people involved than to have any particular license (even one that Dewi firmly believes to be the perfect one). Perhaps the key question is whether people are likely to be put off from contributing by a public domain license. Personally I wouldn't expect many would be, but I'm just one voice - I dont know what other people think
(That's right, keep quiet about the secret Mod powers to read people's thoughts...)

Mr Scrub

Yes, exactly: "it's YOURS" is only true until I get myself at least one helper

Instead, I want to be sure we "do what WE want, because it's OURS", where "we" is the general fandom, and specifically, everyone who put an effort into the project.

I really do want to hear from people who take Copyright seriously, especially artists, because artists are critical to the project.

I want to hear from the kind of people who'd be less likely to help out if they knew that everyone would own their work once they were done.

If you know people like that, do you know why they feel that way? If you are one, why?

What advantages does copyright over your work give you, and what kind of license would best maximise those advantages?

Personally, I really like public domain (it's what I use for the stuff I release on my own site as well).

I like the concept that we all own public domain stuff. For a community developed project, I think this is a really good thing, as it means things contributed can never really be taken back by its creator once it's been given (no claims of license agreements having been broken or similar issues). I'd hate it it someone had a falling out with the community and pulle all their stuff...

Also, I like the "generous" aspect of PD... you're actually giving stuff away for free with PD. Really sharing it with the world. A license like GPL means you're giving away nothing, but you pretend you are

You said it so much better than I did, with all my words

I agree. But I know that most artists feel very very strongly about copyright. And we're not really in a position to argue, since we need them. What's needed is a decent content management system that lets people see immediately what license and author each resource is released under, and incentives for people to use PD. Like, we give a bonus on all bounties paid for content, if it's PD.

I really like the idea of rewarding people for giving (rather than punishing those who don't).

I don't know, it just feels... nice

And once decided how things like that works, I think it will be quite straightforward to build a management system supporting it.