EA Halts Gun Brand Licensing

[Kargathia]

So, to sum this up: EA thinks they can now get away with not spending money on licensing fees.

They really might've upped the creativity of their explanatory bullshit though, this explanation is actually accurate. Can't have that, now can we?

Well not quite. It isn't that at all, if you look at how the licencing works they're right with this one; other media formats don't pay licences to guns because it's essentially advertising for the gun manufcaturer. Movies don't pay, books don't pay, etc, so why should games? It'll definately be interesting to see how this pans out, if it results in legal conflict with the manufacturers then I'd like to see how the defence of "why should we pay if you don't charge warner bros" holds up.

I'm not saying they don't have a case, I'm saying the reason for them doing this is that they figured they can get away with it. They'd happily ignore any comparison to movies/books if it was beneficial to their bottom line.

This being a large corporation, they generally prefer to mask their money-grubbing with a fancy explanation. Much like they're not hogging your contact info in order to force-feed you targeted advertising, it is to "deliver the best experience".

In this case, however, there is not a single underfed developer orphan twin in sight, merely the bare-faced admittance they'd much rather not fork over huge sums of money. Rather boring, really.

Fair enough, really this is rather a non-case and not newsworthy in my opinion. Since EA has every right to not pay the gun manufacturers for their licences for these since parallels can be drawn with other entertainment companies not paying (movie studios mostly but likely TV too), and since EA is a large corporation I doubt they'll be sued over it. If an indie dev or a less gigantic publisher did this there'd be lawyers though.

They are money grubbing about but they're quite justified in doing so, since it's basically fucking off the money grubbing of another giant evil corporation.

Well... several giant evil corporations.

On the whole it's one of these cases where I sincerely hope everyone sues, and proceedings drag on so much that everyone loses.

 

[Neverhoodian]

I'm reminded of an episode of Idea Channel from a few weeks back:
I know EA cited business rather than ethical reasons, but this would create less of a potential moral conundrum for some players.

 

[The White Hunter]

So, to sum this up: EA thinks they can now get away with not spending money on licensing fees.

They really might've upped the creativity of their explanatory bullshit though, this explanation is actually accurate. Can't have that, now can we?

Well not quite. It isn't that at all, if you look at how the licencing works they're right with this one; other media formats don't pay licences to guns because it's essentially advertising for the gun manufcaturer. Movies don't pay, books don't pay, etc, so why should games? It'll definately be interesting to see how this pans out, if it results in legal conflict with the manufacturers then I'd like to see how the defence of "why should we pay if you don't charge warner bros" holds up.

I'm not saying they don't have a case, I'm saying the reason for them doing this is that they figured they can get away with it. They'd happily ignore any comparison to movies/books if it was beneficial to their bottom line.

This being a large corporation, they generally prefer to mask their money-grubbing with a fancy explanation. Much like they're not hogging your contact info in order to force-feed you targeted advertising, it is to "deliver the best experience".

In this case, however, there is not a single underfed developer orphan twin in sight, merely the bare-faced admittance they'd much rather not fork over huge sums of money. Rather boring, really.

Fair enough, really this is rather a non-case and not newsworthy in my opinion. Since EA has every right to not pay the gun manufacturers for their licences for these since parallels can be drawn with other entertainment companies not paying (movie studios mostly but likely TV too), and since EA is a large corporation I doubt they'll be sued over it. If an indie dev or a less gigantic publisher did this there'd be lawyers though.

They are money grubbing about but they're quite justified in doing so, since it's basically fucking off the money grubbing of another giant evil corporation.

Well... several giant evil corporations.

On the whole it's one of these cases where I sincerely hope everyone sues, and proceedings drag on so much that everyone loses.

I don't because what happens then is that copyright and trademark lawyers get money and those arseholes really need to go away and stop fucking the world up. I hope it's a case where the gun companies go "oh well, it's free advertsising anyway" and EA just keeps it's mouth shut about the whole thing, that's the best we can really hope for out of it.

But it's EA. So we'll get an army of morons saying EA are stealing ideas and "loltheyrepiratesforguns" will be parotted over and over by the kind of drones that think that a zero punctuation or jimquisition episode they once watched is enough to form an educated and intelligent opinion with no reflection or reasonable thought on their part going into it, let alone the addition of extra sources.

Not accusing you of that btw, you seem reasonable, it's just that that's how these things tend to go and I find it a rather sad state of affairs that with so much information available from the internet, people use a 5 minute satire as their only source.

 

[CriticalMiss]

So EA want to not pay people for using their products, it's almost like piracy.

...this is nothing even close to piracy. I mean, what?

Well they are 'stealing' someones product (or rather the likeness of their product). They're even doing it to make money.

 

[Dryk]

It doesn't matter if they're right or not, they would happily go after someone that did this to them. You have to be right and convince me you're not being hypocritical before I give you props EA.

 

[Frostbite3789]

Well they are 'stealing' someones product (or rather the likeness of their product). They're even doing it to make money.

That's still nothing close to similar. At all.

 

[Samantha Burt]

Well they are 'stealing' someones product (or rather the likeness of their product). They're even doing it to make money.

That's still nothing close to similar. At all.

Care to explain your point, or are you gonna just keep shouting "It's not the same!"?

OT: Weighing up who I dislike more here: gun companies, or EA? Hmm...

 

[nyarlathotepsama]

But why would they have to pay to use a product in their game? Sarcasm by the way. I'm starting to think EA just does stupid things just to get a rise out of people and to keep up their status-quot, that being acting like complete assholes whenever and however possible then blaming the people that buy their games somehow

 

[flarty]

So EA want to not pay people for using their products, it's almost like piracy.

...this is nothing even close to piracy. I mean, what?

Its abuse of copyrights, something that the argument of piracy hinges upon?

 

[Scars Unseen]

So EA want to not pay people for using their products, it's almost like piracy.

...this is nothing even close to piracy. I mean, what?

Its abuse of copyrights, something that the argument of piracy hinges upon?

Actually, I'm pretty sure this would be a trademark issue, if anything. Completely different.

EDIT: And even then, probably not, as EA isn't trying to use the brand names to describe their own product, merely to properly label products(or in this case digital representations thereof) being used. Either way, mechanical devices are not covered by copyright law, and patent law doesn't apply here as far as I know.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

So, to sum this up: EA thinks they can now get away with not spending money on licensing fees.

They really might've upped the creativity of their explanatory bullshit though, this explanation is actually accurate. Can't have that, now can we?

Well not quite. It isn't that at all, if you look at how the licencing works they're right with this one; other media formats don't pay licences to guns because it's essentially advertising for the gun manufcaturer. Movies don't pay, books don't pay, etc, so why should games? It'll definately be interesting to see how this pans out, if it results in legal conflict with the manufacturers then I'd like to see how the defence of "why should we pay if you don't charge warner bros" holds up.

I would expect it to hold-up pretty well, since that's basically how copyright law works. If you catch someone using your copyright material, you basically HAVE to sue them, otherwise it's basically like saying "Nah, screw it, anyone can use it".

 

[Altorin]

leave it to EA to do the right thing for the most douchiest of reasons in the most douchiest of ways.

 

[Yup]

EA-style hypocrisy again it seems. EA handles the licenses for Porsche in the "area of entertainment software". And yes, they've quite recently sent out C&Ds for mods having Porsches in them (check the link).

http://www.virtualr.net/endurance-porsche-cup-series-released-called-off

They don't wanna pay for licenses but God forbid if anyone want to shirk paying for THEIR licenses.

 

[Scars Unseen]

So, to sum this up: EA thinks they can now get away with not spending money on licensing fees.

They really might've upped the creativity of their explanatory bullshit though, this explanation is actually accurate. Can't have that, now can we?

Well not quite. It isn't that at all, if you look at how the licencing works they're right with this one; other media formats don't pay licences to guns because it's essentially advertising for the gun manufcaturer. Movies don't pay, books don't pay, etc, so why should games? It'll definately be interesting to see how this pans out, if it results in legal conflict with the manufacturers then I'd like to see how the defence of "why should we pay if you don't charge warner bros" holds up.

I would expect it to hold-up pretty well, since that's basically how copyright law works. If you catch someone using your copyright material, you basically HAVE to sue them, otherwise it's basically like saying "Nah, screw it, anyone can use it".

Nope, that's trademark law again. And mechanical devices aren't copyrighted anyway. The technology behind them is patented. You're confusing 2 or possibly even three different forms of IP.

 

[SageRuffin]

Couldn't the artists just make their own shit up? Mix and match parts, a splash of color, alter the shape from a rectangle to a tetrahedron... it can't be that difficult, right?

Right??

 

[TephlonPrice]

LOL @ that.

I remember them talking about having La Rue Tactical (GREAT company) Trijicon (responsible for the ACOG family of gunsights), EOTech (COD's Holographic sight; commonly seen in other games), Magpul (full-weapons customization & specialized training) & other brands I could go on about in MOH:W, and when that game went belly up, I guess they decided to not pay excessive money for that.

Maybe instead of going for "authenticity" that wasn't even there, how about just give me Black 2 on Frostbite 3 with open-endedness, plenty of destruction & all that goodness & we'll be set?

 

[TrulyBritish]

NO! DAMN YOU EA AND YOUR STUPID SCHEMES TO RUIN VID.........!
*blinks*
Sorry, reflex action there. It's a bit of a bad habit, like smoking or 'selective genocide'...
*coughs* Anyhow, this actually seems to be making sense for once. Heck, if neither books nor movies have to pay as SkarKrow says. then why should games? Could get rid of some moral qualms for some players too that don't like the idea of indirectly supporting weapon manufacture.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Couldn't the artists just make their own shit up? Mix and match parts, a splash of color, alter the shape from a rectangle to a tetrahedron... it can't be that difficult, right?

Right??

But they shouldn't have to. If I write a murder mystery, I don't have to make up a name for the gun used in the murder. I can call a thing what it is. This isn't Voldemort we're talking about. If someone makes their own guns and tries to sell them as Colts, that's a trademark issue. If someone takes a new gun technology or manufacturing technology and uses it without license, that's a patent issue. If someone reprints another's poem about guns, that's a copyright issue. If I say the word Colt to describe an actual Colt branded gun, that's.... nothing. If I make a drawing of a Colt branded gun, that's new art(as the gun itself is not intellectual property).

Intellectual property law is meant to be limited. It says so right in our(United States) constitution. Lawyers -being lawyers- will try to make words mean things they were never meant to, and careless legislators and biased judges sometimes let them get away with it. But IP law was never meant to keep us from describing our actual physical world. That's insanity.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Eh, on the one hand, I like fair use and don't think you should have to pay to portray a gun in a game that is a particular variety in the same way you should be able to portray styles of buildings and home appliances. On the other hand, EA is so litigous with the licenses they have (Porsche for example) that I hope they get their pants sued right the f*** off.

 

[CpT_x_Killsteal]

My philosophy on this is "All's fair in love and war". If you make something for killing and someone else steals it, you can't really blame them. Even if they're only taking it's image.