"Problem??"

Yes, it is. Is it anything id will do anything about? Unlikely. Are they within their legal rights to do so if they choose to? Absolutely.

You can't pick and choose and rationalize. 'Oh, well they got paid for the game and it's not selling anymore and I didn't make any money off the map and blah blah blah". It's still illegal. 

I pretty much agree with Shambler. 

In principle, I do as well. However, I take issue when people try to rationalize away IP theft and copyright violations. Do what you like but don't try to sugar coat it. 

has had their salary, been for a fortnight in the Bahamas, bought a new car etc etc etc.

We can't take that away from them.

Christ, I think that after playing Distrans's level people will want to go and play the real Doom 3, and a few copies might be sold directly as the result of this level!

In my band we play three covers. The rest is original, but sounds a bit like the Rolling Stones or Oasis or something. 

Stop rationalizing. It's undignified. 

NO ITS NOT!!! 

...don't assume averyone else has added '-heapsize 128000' to their command line as a matter of course.

...fog 0.02 in the worldspawn may not appear thick enough on a lot of cards.

...people like to be challenged 

"Problem??"

Yes, it is. Is it anything id will do anything about? Unlikely. Are they within their legal rights to do so if they choose to? Absolutely.

You can't pick and choose and rationalize. 'Oh, well they got paid for the game and it's not selling anymore and I didn't make any money off the map and blah blah blah". It's still illegal.

You're perfectly right, of course. I don't think anybody here (with any sense, anyway) is going to disagree with you.

I don't know of even a single case or incident though, in the 10+ year history of Quake user maps, where an individual was asked to stop creating or distributing Quake maps with textures from other games. This is despite the obvious ploriferation of the practice.

Naturally the inaction of the related developers in no way implies that they're OK with the practice. It does imply that it's not enough of an issue for them to feel the need to take legal action or even send a "cease and desist" to the offending parties, though. (You could of course argue that they're simply not aware of it, and in many cases this may be true, but I'm sure at least some of the related companies know that their textures are being used in QuakeX levels.) 

...but I really don't understand why copyright issues about texes arise now and have never arisen before, like around 1996/97, when everybody was "stealing" original Q texes to majke their custom map, way before the code and stuff was made public...
How is it that no one as ever had a problem with that?

Btw, I agree with Shambler and even Willem, just wondering.... 

"How is it that no one as ever had a problem with that? "

It was a problem then as well. Just because nobody goes after anybody else legally doesn't mean it wasn't wrong to do. A tree falling in the forest and all that.

Howevr - id, realistically, will never go after anyone on this stuff because they WANT you to be modding their games and spreading their IP around. The only time they would bother would probably be if you tried to make money off of it.

Fribbles

Sure, and like I said above, realistically nobody is going to get sued unless they try to make money. Legally, id (or anyone else) is more than allowed to go after people using textures in other games but from a long term standpoint, it's not worth it. Bad PR, ill will with the community, etc. It's a PR bomb that you don't want to detonate.

Doesn't make it right however, and that's what I was arguing against. The idea that it doesn't matter or it's unimportant. That's the wrong way to think about things. 

Since you're one of the few here that can actually talk about this in a meaningful way, can you shed any more light on the issue?

There's a Q1 wad floating around somewhere that has the original UT textures in it. How do you feel about people using these textures in a Quake level?

We understand that it's illegal and/or against the game's EULA to do so. I'm not asking for Epic's legal stance on the matter. I want to know how you personally feel about the following:

1) the use of UT textures in a Quake level
2) the use of Quake textures in a UT level

I want to know your personal opinion on this. I guess I'd also like to know Epic's policy for dealing with these situations...

I understand if you don't want to discuss this, of course, but please elaborate if you feel like doing so. It would be helpful to see the other side of the coin. 

Fribbles

I can't speak for Epic and would never attempt to.

Personally, I don't have a problem with it. As a level designer, I love having more and more texture choices when making a level. But then, it's not my IP. :) 

I know it's illegal! I said that as my first line.

Yes it's IP theft and copyright violation. But that doesn't seem that BAD in these examples.

As a simple comparison: Pirating games. That is also illegal, but I'd argue in most cases, immoral: I.e. someone has done their job and deserves to get paid for it, and if a gamer is pirating a game instead of buying it, they are not paying that person their deserved earnings.

The pirate is actually negatively impacting on the game maker, but I don't see how the texture thief is actually negatively impacting on the texture artist.

Unless you're going to argue that people who play a Quake1 map with Doom3 textures will be so sated with Doom3-ness that they won't go and buy Doom3 itself...

(Incidentally I argued AGAINST pirating on here a while ago and got a fairly disinterested reaction...) 

"The pirate is actually negatively impacting on the game maker, but I don't see how the texture thief is actually negatively impacting on the texture artist. "

There are many arguments here but it's just going to add noise to another already noisy discussion and I'm sure we've annoyed distrans to high heaven with this hijack.

It's IP. The P stands for property and if you use it without the owners permission you are, legally, in the wrong. 

Further to what Fribbles said (I can't believe I'm getting drawn into a serious Func_debate but at least it's not about fucking guns or politics or operating systems...!), maybe what it boils down to is the following:

Imagine the Id texture artists come on and read this thread.

They see that some mappers have stolen their textures, that they created, from Doom3 and used them in some custom Quake maps.

They know that this is IP theft and a copyright violation, although it's unlikely to be pursued.

They also know that:

The mappers paid for Doom3 and thus paid them (the artists) for their work.

Going by the comments about Doom3, the players also paid for Doom3 and thus paid them.

The mappers have given them credit for their work.

The mappers have shown appreciation for their work by deeming it interesting enough to use in a custom map, and some of the players have shown appreciation of their work too.

...so what would the artists feel about the theft of their work in this case?? Can you lot - as "creators of stuff" - imagine that in THIS particular situation?? 

I KNOW IT'S ILLEGAL

Illegal != necessarily immoral

And if those "many arguments" aren't going to be stated, well, I for one aren't going to learn from them or heed them, am I? 

Thanks for the comments... enlightening as always.

I've used plenty of textures from "elsewhere" in my Quake maps. I always tried to give proper credit when I was aware of the source. I would hope that in the grand scheme of things nobody really cares too much about it... certainly I would remove them if requested by the rightful owners.

You could of course hit up the developers and ask their permission, but the main reason I don't do that is the fact that it is in the realm of IP law. I don't know the laws intimately of course, but I've got the idea that the owners are legally required to protect their IP if the infringements are brought to their attention (the key word being required, whether or not they care or actually want to deal with it).

Anyone know if that's correct, or am I getting IP law confused with patent law? Is it the same/similar?

Yours sincerely,

the legal ignoramus 

I'd imagine one big argument from the original artists would be "those textures look like ass in the Quake palette"... :)

p.s. if the thread derailment annoys distans, he can quickload to a previous save point and keep trying different things till he gets past this section... ;) 

ROFLMAO, that line makes it all worth it :D 

Shambler

I agree that they probably wouldn't care. I am also aware that you are aware that it's illegal.

So what are you arguing at this point? Do you want me to agree that they wouldn't care? Fine, yes, they probably wouldn't care.

I'm not going to argue illegal vs immoral because that's a cesspool with no possible resolutions within. 

I don't think that anyone here really meant to say that id has no IP on those textures or it is not a copyright violation to use them or anything alike.
Yes, it's their IP.
Yes, it's their copyrighted work.
No, they don't care.
So why don't we simply enjoy using such amazing work in our maps. 

from what I know about copyright/patent law, that requirement (chasing up infringements upon notice) is relevant only to patents not IP. 

some guy had made a UT map using quake3 textures and he (or his host) was asked to take it down by the ID software

Sock had made a texture set that used a bunch of ID`s q3 textures variations/alterations and he was asked to remove download link for that set by ID (either directly or via PQ host dunno) 

I didn't stole the textures: I paid the game... Also, if Id didn't want people to reuse their hi-res textures, they would have protected a little bit more than just putting it in .pk3 that can be open with WinZip...

As well, the comparison with the car is not good: I paid the car !!!!

Nevermind... 

... when you've paid your car, nobody can blame you if you are doing "tuning" on it... maybe people just laugh because it is ridiculous...

so, no problem for me: I don't want to sell my "tuned" car :P