CriticKitten said:
SacremPyrobolum said:
Well, there is a difference between being fired and being fired and then stolen from.
The person in question presumably had a library full of games that he paid for taken away. Now, in this case you could justify it slightly by saying that the money he lost was the equivalent of what he earned with the weapon and with some other fines put in but that depends on the value of his library.
I'm somewhat doubting that the total value of his Steam library is anywhere near the costs to Valve and Aion for the legal costs incurred during the process. The item has made somewhere around $60k on the market. And that's without getting into the mess caused by having to replace the art at the last second and all the dissatisfied players.
In the case of the forum you mentioned that is completely out of hand. From what I gather if I was to refer to a games existing art and say that something like this would go well in your game, I could be banned and have the game which I payed for taken away. Not for actually doing something, mind you, but for posting a suggestions which the company might and might not (probably not) use. Art is usually inspired by similar art and sometimes people mix things up and do not realize that that awesome sword you saw on deviant art actually belongs to an obscure South Korean MMO. For example, the Beatles tasked Ringo to create a song. He comes back and shows him his idea only to find out that it is actually a real song by another musician. I should not be held accountable for the company not checking on whether my ideas are original or not.
Let me get this straight:
You want to be able to suggest ideas that open a company up for potentially massive lawsuits and reap the monetary rewards for stealing, but when caught in the act, you want to blame
the company for not having the time to perform extensive searches through the thousands of other games on the internet? And you don't believe you should be punished at all, beyond returning the money?
I was not aware of how much money the Mace had garnered and yes, i believe in that case the Steam games are compensation enough, even though the games, which are software, do not really have any real life value. To this end, they should have just charge him money.
If I am suggesting something on a company forum chances are I am not a draft artist or anything of the like, and therefore cannot provide my own concepts and ideas in a visual for other than that already represented in existing art. For example, if I was to say that I want a piece of clothing in the game that reflects something from a popular TV show or movie, like ruby or crystal slippers, then I would probably provide a picture of the shoe and say that something like this would compliment your game well. I am not saying that they should put the ruby slippers in the game whole-stop.
It should also be remembered that sometimes artist just happen to be influence by other art and end up making something that looks very similar to or exactly the same as the original, like the Ringo story I alluded to or, more relevantly, the whole C&C Generals controversy with some of the tanks looking a lot like the Warhammer 40K Baneblades. Many people thought that EA did it on purpose, inclueding me, because they are EA, but upon reflection it is much more likely that such and icon from nerd culture could have unawaridly influenced the artist and therefore prompt him making the tank.
CriticKitten said:
And you believe this is a reasonable point of view, do you?
First of all, no need to be rude, and yes, I do. I, a random forum dweller, do not influence the internal decisions by the company to not do further research into a random forum dweller's suggestion that they are implementing into a game, which they know can come from anywhere, which might have copy written content, and therefore should not have any legal responsibility thrusted on me should the company get into hot water. I do not see how that cannot be seen as reasonable.
