faefrost said:
Lil devils x said:
LaoJim said:
I know we're supposed to root for the little guy over the big guy, but I'm not seeing it myself. From the screen shots is does look as though TxK is a direct clone of Tempest 2000. This guy didn't work on the original Tempest so he has no particular moral claim to the creative rights. While I'm not a lawyer, my understanding is that you can't copyright game mechanics but you can copyright the overall art style of the game. I think a judge looking at this would decide that "an idiot in a hurry" would assume that this was another Tempest game and therefore officially sanctioned by Atari, something they have a right to complain about - irrespective of whether or not any lines of code or assets have actually been reused. If he'd changed the background, used a different design for the ship, changed some of the wording and made at least some modifications to the gameplay (which in fairness he might have done), I'd be all in favour of him taking the basic concept behind Tempest and creating something new with it, but it does just seem like a lazy copy at the moment, and I'm not sure why I should be on his side.
Put it this way, if Coca-Cola went after someone just for trying to sell their own brand of cola, I'd against that, but if someone puts their drink in a red and white bottle and calls it "Cocia-Cola" I've got no beef with the giant stamping on them.
I thought they said the guy
DID work on the original.
From the Article above:
" Minter was a developer for Tempest 2000 - as in, he literally wrote the code for both games."
Honestly though, I do not think any copy write should be able to go for more than 20 years, but then again I have major issues with copy write to begin with, as more than one person can think of an idea independent of one another, in addition you have people who have no intention of ever creating a work themselves copy writing everything imaginable just to claim royalties if someone else does. It is a terribly flawed and abused concept.
Tempest 2000 was not the original. It was a remake of the classic Arcade IP, and an attempt to bring the IP into the console generations. Tempest had remained one of Atari's few properties that had not been well adapted to modern home gaming systems. It's unusual control setup and extremely fast gameplay made it all but impossible for most contemporary consoles, and consoles evolved further and further away from its paddle type controls.
Atari could not ignore this one. It would literally be surrendering their IP, which is the only value remaining to the company. They do still have an obligation to protect that and carefully steward it for investors. And I am sorry, but as much as 20 IP seems like a great idea, it means creators have no reason to invest in new ideas. To create or invent new things. While some of the extremes of modern copyright are more than a bit abusive, the classic "creators lifespan or 75 years + x is a perfectly valid approach to insuring that creators get value for themselves and can pass some to their families.
I completely disagree on copywrite, as that hinders creativity rather than encourages it as well as allow for wealth to be funneled into fewer hands rather than the way it originally worked via apprenticeships. Apprenticeships allowed for wealth to be more evenly distributed among those who create it, allowing for those working under to eventually be able to be the ones who profit the most from their work. Copywrite destroyed this system, thus also causing wealth inequality to run rampant. The wealth accumulated from your work should be passed, as well as any knowledge or skills you chose to pass on to heirs, but " ideas" should not be considered property. I disagree that this system helps those who invented to profit from their work and the creators rarely are the ones who profit, instead it is others who copied their idea and copywrite it first or those who paid very little for the idea instead.
20 years is ample time for one to profit from their idea, honestly I think that is even too much, it isn't like copywrite prevents people from copying these things anyhow, those with the most money get the right sin the end and it only keeps people within those nations that support such things to do so, meanwhile in china they are mass producing them for cheap like mad. Most of the time these companies suing for " stolen ideas" stole the idea themselves. Copywrite isn't sustainable long term anyhow, the more people you have on a planet, the odds of multiple people legally owning the same idea increases. Even throughout history we have repeatedly had inventions reinvented and discoveries lost and rediscovered. We do not own these "ideas", they are just part of being a homo sapien that uses tools. That is what we do as a species, we invent and adapt. Trying to claim that to belong to one person is absurd.
Most of those who create are not all that concerned about profiting from their creations in the first place, it is great when they can, but they rarely are the ones who do. They are too busy inventing and creating things to concern themselves with marketing and sales. Those driven to actually create and invent do so because they don't know how to " not" do it. You wake up in the middle of the night and have to sketch things out, you miss meals and sleep because you cannot stop until your idea is out, they are not driven by money, but by natural ability, and are less likely to be the ones who profit from their work. Chances are this benefits people who prey on the inventors rather than the inventors themselves.
ATari is no longer the people who made the name what it is, they are just some
other guys who want to profit from others hard work instead. copywrite benefits those who did not do the work and prey on inventors more than it benefits those who do.
