The Last Of Us Faces Another Rip-Off Accusation - UPDATED

Lieju

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FalloutJack said:
Hey, Hollywood! Quit stealing ideas directly from my brain that go into your movies! You don't even have the imagination to use them properly! GIMME MONEY!!

Hmmm...nope, doesn't work. Sorry.
Except that's not what this is.

It's taking someone else's work, not just ideas.

K84 said:
It's a hobby made rendition of a subway map.
More like some weird kind of fanart actually.
Is that intellectual property nowadays, really?
Whether he made it as a hobby or not doesn't matter.

And how is using copyrighted characters comparable to using the likeness of an actual place?

Taking other people's work to make money?
Not cool.
(But I'm sure Naughty Dog, or rather the publishers of the game would be fine if I took assets from the game to make money, right?)
 

Aardvaarkman

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Jul 14, 2011
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Legion said:
Now that they know it is his, I agree they should respond, but to be honest depending on how they discovered it I can't see it being difficult to not realise that it was made by a graphic designer...
Uh, how else would maps be made? They don't just magically spring into existence, someone has to design them.
 

Lieju

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Seracen said:
Granted, the likelihood of making a profit off of fanfiction is something reserved for tripe-mongers like Stephanie Myer, but still, the point stands.
I'd like to point out, that no matter what you think of Meyers' writing talent, it was E. L. James who made money off stuff based on Meyer's work.

IshimaruHayato said:
Everyone is in the mood to sue sue sue. Good god its like we cant just let people make money for being creative.
Um, you do realise that's what this is about, right?
Naughty Dog, instead of creating art-assets themselves, or paying for them, took someone else's work.
And the guy wants to be paid for his creation.
 

Aardvaarkman

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Jul 14, 2011
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Therumancer said:
At the end of the day you can't copyright an image of Boston's streets or whatever.
Why not?

It's certainly possible to do so. You could copyright a photograph, a satellite image, or a drawn map of Boston streets. What law are you referring to that prevents this?
 
Jul 13, 2010
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K84 said:
It's a hobby made rendition of a subway map.
More like some weird kind of fanart actually.
Is that intellectual property nowadays, really?
First of all, it's not a rendition, it was made specifically to demonstrate changes and additions that he believed would improve the subway. As such, yes it is intellectual property, the map was made to demonstrate ideas that are his and his alone.
 

Aardvaarkman

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Owyn_Merrilin said:
Too late, Apple already has a patent on rounded rectangles.

No, really.
No, not really.

That Verge article is highly biased and misleading. If you read the actual design patent, it is not a patent on rounded rectangles.
 

Xanex

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If he can demand compensation for use of his work. I see no problem with the city of Boston demanding compensation for theirs.
 

duchaked

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for a guy who owns the entire Boston transit system he's pretty upset
oh wait what nvm lol

I still think the whole Ellen Paige thing was pretty amusing tho
 

Dahemo

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It didn't surprise me to find the original was very, very similar to his "work".

Look, if MBTA had commissioned him to create this map (well they'd want their money back) but you could pretty much grease up the lawyers right now, it would be his and their property and Naughty Dog would be implicitly not paying a fee.

However, in this case, his screeches of "my IP" are complete nonsense. In a legal sense he drew a picture of a picture, made several intentional changes and called it an original work, he doesn't hold any IP rights in this case as his picture is of something and for the purpose of something he has no claim to. I believe that he did work hard and probably improved on the design, which is why this must be frustrating for him, but he has to understand his work was a dead end. It was not used to replace the current map, he was never going to make a penny from this. He knew that, yet after putting his redundant map online at a resource that makes it clear the maps are unofficial, he now suddenly believes he deserves money for this.

Someone in the Naughty Dog art department is probably getting told off for this, the only money he could claim is what the game artist would have been paid for his time if he hadn't used Google image search...
 

Aardvaarkman

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Dahemo said:
He knew that, yet after putting his redundant map online at a resource that makes it clear the maps are unofficial, he now suddenly believes he deserves money for this.
When did he say he deserves money for this?
 

lacktheknack

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Aardvaarkman said:
Dahemo said:
He knew that, yet after putting his redundant map online at a resource that makes it clear the maps are unofficial, he now suddenly believes he deserves money for this.
When did he say he deserves money for this?
Presumably at the part where he says he deserves money for this.

Andy Chalk said:
"To be clear: at no point have Naughty Dog contacted me about using my intellectual property (this visual representation of the Boston rapid transit network) in their product. To be even more clear: if you want to use my work commercially, payment before usage is required. If you're making money from your product, then you can pay me for my work as well."
That part.
 

Spartan448

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Andy Chalk said:
"Naughty Dog seems to have known that they couldn't use the official map without paying a hefty license fee.
It's shit like this I hate. Would Naughty Dog actually be REQUIRED to pay a hefty license fee, or is it just that you see this large company as prey, and a good opportunity to make some quick easy money off of your modified transit map that you probably made without permission in the first place?
 

OneTwoThreeBlast

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Spartan448 said:
Andy Chalk said:
"Naughty Dog seems to have known that they couldn't use the official map without paying a hefty license fee.
It's shit like this I hate. Would Naughty Dog actually be REQUIRED to pay a hefty license fee, or is it just that you see this large company as prey, and a good opportunity to make some quick easy money off of your modified transit map that you probably made without permission in the first place?
Riiiiight, poor ND is the one being preyed upon by the evil graphic designer from whom they stole!

I will repeat all these points again, since apparently nobody seems to be grasping them despite their incredible simplicity.

1. It doesn't care how any of you feel about the law, or what you think the law should be, etc. It matters what the law is.

2. If ND wanted a map of the system and the original was already licensed, they have TWO choices. ONE: PAY someone to do the work for them, or TWO: pay to use an already created work. Oh, but wait, there's a third: steal it from someone! Then they don't have to pay any licensing fees, they don't have to pay to employ someone to do the work, and they get it for free! Yay! Oh wait, except let's take this idea to its logical conclusion. If ND can steal this one small part its game, why not steal everything else? Lets make all the character models in the game in the game by stealing character models from previous games. I mean, sure, people worked hard on those models, they deserve to be paid for their work and not have it stolen and have someone else take credit for it, but whatever. Next, lets steal some dialogue from a movie. Wow, this game is reall coming together, and we haven't even spent a single cent yet!

3. Anyone here who thinks that just because his map is based on an original map means he either doesn't have a claim or is a thief himself has no concept of the law. Do you know what the copyright status of the original map is? No? ok then. Those who are claiming he didn't make enough changes to the original also have no concept of copyright law.

People deserve to be paid for their work, not have it stolen from others. Single graphic designers are not the enemy. Companies that steal from others, but then turn around anf yell piracy at every opportunity are the enemy.

EDIT: and the cruel irony is that these companies have been engaging in these practices for ages. How is a graphic designer supposed to make any money if you can just steal his ideas? These are people's LIVELIHOODS we're talking about. Their jobs. The way they put food on the table for their families and children. These are entire industries on which ND and others are preying. People are being left out, not getting paid for their work, all so ND can save a few dollars that wouldn't matter much in the scheme of things to them, but that is huge to a single graphic designer. Many people here also seem to have little concept of money, jobs, employment, and how people get by in the world by doing work and getting paid for it. J

And those who complain simply because they don't like the overall effect IP law is having on things? Why do you think those effects are happening? I'll tell you one thing after spending the entire last YEAR studying copyright law at Fordham Law School and applying it to this industry on my own time: it's because companies like ND and EA are using those laws improperly or maliciously, not some little designer in Massacussetts.

EDIT 2: and these "stifling creativity" arguments are even worse. This guys claim is not the kind of thing that stifles creativity. You know what does? Companies like ND. If you're, say, a designer, creating workes and hoping someone will pay you to use them, but knowing that your work will likely be stolen anyway and you won't be paid for it. Why bother doing your livelihood when people are just going to steal it instead of pay to use it or pay you to make a new one?
 

DrOswald

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ClockworkUniverse said:
RedEyesBlackGamer said:
Maybe it showed up in Google Images and they thought it was free source.
That would still be remarkably unprofessional. Ensuring that you have the rights to everything you use is a pretty basic legal requirement when making something like this.
But it can be impossible to determine if something is free source, especially something like this. For all we know someone posted this image saying "This is free to use even for commercial use" in a way that implied or even specifically stated that they had the right to say that. I think they should still reimburse the guy, but it is easily understandable if they did not realize that this map had a copy right claim to this man.

The second question I have is how much claim does this guy actually have on the map? Is it a retouched version of the city map? or did he create the entire map from scratch? If it is a retouch, did he obtain the right to do so?

There are too many questions for me to take either side, but this guys reaction is kind of excessive given the known facts. If he felt he had a legitimate grievance he should have contacted Naughty Dog before swearing all over twitter about how big of bastards they are. Your first point of contact when you have a legal grievance should not be swearing over twitter.
 

Owyn_Merrilin

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Aardvaarkman said:
Owyn_Merrilin said:
Too late, Apple already has a patent on rounded rectangles.

No, really.
No, not really.

That Verge article is highly biased and misleading. If you read the actual design patent, it is not a patent on rounded rectangles.
Source? That's the first I've heard of that one. Even the article on that page says they had other, earlier patents that were more narrow and didn't quite cover rounded rectangles with no other features, but this one did.

Besides, they own the friggin' page turn. I've seen the design patent for that one, and there's really nothing original or unique about it. Even if they couldn't actually enforce it, the fact that they bothered to file for it implies that they think they might eventually be able to use it as a weapon. I cannot support a branch of law that pretty much exclusively exists to allow for that sort of crap.
 

bug_of_war

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Owyn_Merrilin said:
Too late, Apple already has a patent on rounded rectangles.

No, really.

I'm just sick and tired of intellectual property law on the whole. It's getting to where I don't care whether it's a little guy or a big corporation, I have no sympathy for anyone trying to make a claim under that branch of the law. It's supposed to spur creativity[footnote]Yes, that is what it's about. It's not supposed to reimburse the creator, it's supposed to encourage people to create by allowing them to be reimbursed. What it's doing instead is preventing people from creating new things, because someone somewhere owns the rights to every idea past, present, and future. Or at least they do if you ask the lawyers.[/footnote], and instead it stifles it. I can't understand how anyone would support something like that.
People should have the right to their own creation, but when it's something like a map based off of a real thing, or the aforementioned shapes, people really need to just back the fuck off. I'm with you at this point, I don't care who's calling foul, it's just annoying now as people are doing it too often over things that have little evidence of actual content stealing (that whole case involving Ubisoft and that dude whom wrote a book that had only one similarity to Assassin's Creed and that was the genetic memory crap). It's a fine line, especially when it comes to ideas, but I'm so tired of this crap.
 

Anathrax

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Apparently they've reached a settlement, we can all calm down now.

...Unless one of you is willing to explore the possibility of Naughty Dog intimidating the graphic artist. Just saying, it's a company vs one guy. No? Good.

I'm curious about this though, if it was a "Hefty fee", would a sorry over the telephone negate that?
 

PhantomEcho

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bug_of_war said:
Owyn_Merrilin said:
Too late, Apple already has a patent on rounded rectangles.

No, really.

I'm just sick and tired of intellectual property law on the whole. It's getting to where I don't care whether it's a little guy or a big corporation, I have no sympathy for anyone trying to make a claim under that branch of the law. It's supposed to spur creativity[footnote]Yes, that is what it's about. It's not supposed to reimburse the creator, it's supposed to encourage people to create by allowing them to be reimbursed. What it's doing instead is preventing people from creating new things, because someone somewhere owns the rights to every idea past, present, and future. Or at least they do if you ask the lawyers.[/footnote], and instead it stifles it. I can't understand how anyone would support something like that.
People should have the right to their own creation, but when it's something like a map based off of a real thing, or the aforementioned shapes, people really need to just back the fuck off. I'm with you at this point, I don't care who's calling foul, it's just annoying now as people are doing it too often over things that have little evidence of actual content stealing (that whole case involving Ubisoft and that dude whom wrote a book that had only one similarity to Assassin's Creed and that was the genetic memory crap). It's a fine line, especially when it comes to ideas, but I'm so tired of this crap.

First off, I just want to point out that this isn't a case of "Oh, that thing in this one game looks kind of like a thing of mine! I'm going to sue you." This was a case of the guy going "Holy shit. That's -my- work in there!" As in -actually- the custom-designed map he'd made. Confirmed. No question about it.

Secondly, I'm glad to see this updated to show that Naughty Dog and this fellow have agreed on some sort of terms in recognition of this error. If it was a harmless accident by some new guy working there, or an underhanded tactic to try to save a few pennies in production costs, we may never know. And it doesn't matter.


Lastly, it's honestly disturbing to see how many people see this guy with a legitimate claim and immediately rush off to the company's defense. Really? Like developers have never screwed anyone over before, ever? You have to be -REALLY- damn desperate to claim that a map CONFIRMED to have been made by someone other than the makers of the OFFICIAL map is undeserving of rights. You people are acting like all he did was put some squiggly lines on a copy of the damn thing in photoshop.

He -DESIGNED- a new version of the map, with changes which he deemed worthy of being made to the public transit system for the betterment of everybody. If that somehow doesn't fall within the lines of what qualifies as Intellectual Property to you... thank whatever God you please that you're not responsible for making that call. I shudder to think what fresh hell a world governed by you would bring.


Glad to see everyone's coming away from this happy. I just wish I hadn't had to lose all remaining faith in the goodness of humanity in the process.

Cheers! I'll be back around when Fallout 4 gets announced.
 

Worr Monger

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From a completely unbiased standpoint.... I can honestly say that I never even heard of "Beyond Two Souls" until I read this article.

I remember seeing pictures of Ellen Page with all the digital tech on her face, assuming she would be put in either a game or animated flick.. but I never actually read what she was doing.

When "The Last of Us" came out... my logical conclusion was "Oh... that's what Ellen Page was doing, they did a good job with that tech, looks just like her"

Not until this story popped up on The Escapist, did I realize that it wasn't supposed to be her.

...just sayin.