7 ms·

In many countries you are obligated to "donate" one copy of any published and distributed work to the national library. That includes music, film, radio, tv, bo

by Thlom 9y ago

In many countries you are obligated to "donate" one copy of any published and distributed work to the national library. That includes music, film, radio, tv, books, papers, pamphlets, websites etc. Depending on how the law is written this might also include games in playable form, so online games would require a copy of the server application as well as the client. If not games should be included asap. Making these archives available for the general public might be difficult, but librarians are creative and many already have experience in making games available to the public. It's manageable.

taneq 9y ago
"Playable form" for an MMO would require donating a server team. These games don't run themselves.
- ajmurmann 9y ago
  Is that true? I keep seeing community run WoW servers for example.
  - taneq 9y ago
    A team of volunteers is still a team. Also, WoW private servers run on a reverse-engineered server infrastructure which seems to require much less babysitting than the actual live servers. I'd guess because they: * Don't have to deal with quite so many edge cases * Run on hardware an order of magnitude more powerful than was available to the original WoW server devs, meaning that much simpler solutions with far less sharding / IPC / configuration can still scale sufficiently well
    - merb 9y ago
      > * Run on hardware an order of magnitude more powerful than was available to the original WoW server devs, meaning that much simpler solutions with far less sharding / IPC / configuration can still scale sufficiently well well the hardware was never a problem, but the user base. you can basically run a 100 people reverse engineed wow server on basically a server with 2gb-4gb memory and a non virtualized cpu (a older gen one, dual core probably enough) and you would more run into networking limits than in actually performance issues. the problem with wow classic/burning crusade/wrath of the lich king, was mostly the overwhelming people, servers took way more than 100 people, and the biggest problem was logging them in, if there was a prime day, all sharded servers could login too many people which overloaded login servers quite regulary.
      - chrisdbaldwin 9y ago
        And they couldn’t just autoscale the login servers in the cloud. I remember the login servers were always an issue after down time.
    - EvilGrin 9y ago
      > Run on hardware an order of magnitude more powerful than was available to the original WoW server devs Back in 2012 Blizzard sold the original servers off for charity so we actually know what they used (HP p-class blades). https://www.geek.com/games/blizzard-is-selling-old-world-of-warcraft-servers-for-charity-on-ebay-1462617/ https://www.geek.com/games/blizzard-is-selling-old-world-of-...
    - ajmurmann 9y ago
      The other thing that's startling to me is that not that long ago pretty much all game servers were hosted by people other than the publisher of the game. I don't think there ever was a Valve hosted CS 1.6 server and it's still true that the vast majority of TF2 servers are community run. I think the same is still true for Minecraft. That worked really well.
azernik 9y ago
This is true in the US, though the process is tied to copyright - any copyrighted work (including software) distributed in the US needs to be deposited with the Library of Congress. I think the most difficult issue with distributing these to the general public would be classifying abandoned vs. maintained copyrighted works.
- whiddershins 9y ago
  Citation? I have never heard of this requirement, and if asked I would say it is completely false.
  - lsc 9y ago
    http://www.loc.gov/teachers/copyrightmystery/text/steps/ http://www.loc.gov/teachers/copyrightmystery/text/steps/ Note, this is just to register your copyright. My understanding is that you still own the copyright if you don't register, but it's weaker in many ways, so when people expect there to be money involved, they usually register the copyright. In practice, my understanding is that if it's distributed by a serious company, it's usually a registered copyright, and so the library of congress gets a copy.
    - azernik 9y ago
      Mandatory deposit applies regardless of registration; it's just that registration requires sending a copy, which satisfies the mandatory deposit rules. At the Copyright Office FAQ (https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/mandatory_deposit.html https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/mandatory_deposit.html) "Mandatory deposit (17 U.S.C. section 407) requires the owner of copyright or the exclusive right of distribution to deposit in the Copyright Office for the use of the Library of Congress two complete copies of the best edition within 3 months after a work is published. Section 408 of the copyright law, for a fee, provides the option to formally register the work with the U.S. Copyright Office. This registration process provides a legal record of copyright ownership as well as additional legal benefits in cases of infringement. Optional registration fulfills mandatory deposit requirements." Then later: "Yes. Under certain circumstances, special relief from deposit requirements may be granted. The grant of special relief is discretionary with the U.S. Copyright Office and will depend on a careful balance of the acquisition policies of the Library of Congress, the examining requirements of the Copyright Office (if registration is sought), and the hardship to the copyright owner." Note that "if registration is sought" - even if you're not registering, you still need to apply for an exemption.

by Thlom 9y ago

taneq 9y ago

"Playable form" for an MMO would require donating a server team. These games don't run themselves.

ajmurmann 9y ago
Is that true? I keep seeing community run WoW servers for example.
- taneq 9y ago
  A team of volunteers is still a team. Also, WoW private servers run on a reverse-engineered server infrastructure which seems to require much less babysitting than the actual live servers. I'd guess because they: * Don't have to deal with quite so many edge cases * Run on hardware an order of magnitude more powerful than was available to the original WoW server devs, meaning that much simpler solutions with far less sharding / IPC / configuration can still scale sufficiently well
  - merb 9y ago
    > * Run on hardware an order of magnitude more powerful than was available to the original WoW server devs, meaning that much simpler solutions with far less sharding / IPC / configuration can still scale sufficiently well well the hardware was never a problem, but the user base. you can basically run a 100 people reverse engineed wow server on basically a server with 2gb-4gb memory and a non virtualized cpu (a older gen one, dual core probably enough) and you would more run into networking limits than in actually performance issues. the problem with wow classic/burning crusade/wrath of the lich king, was mostly the overwhelming people, servers took way more than 100 people, and the biggest problem was logging them in, if there was a prime day, all sharded servers could login too many people which overloaded login servers quite regulary.
    - chrisdbaldwin 9y ago
      And they couldn’t just autoscale the login servers in the cloud. I remember the login servers were always an issue after down time.
  - EvilGrin 9y ago
    > Run on hardware an order of magnitude more powerful than was available to the original WoW server devs Back in 2012 Blizzard sold the original servers off for charity so we actually know what they used (HP p-class blades). https://www.geek.com/games/blizzard-is-selling-old-world-of-warcraft-servers-for-charity-on-ebay-1462617/ https://www.geek.com/games/blizzard-is-selling-old-world-of-...
  - ajmurmann 9y ago
    The other thing that's startling to me is that not that long ago pretty much all game servers were hosted by people other than the publisher of the game. I don't think there ever was a Valve hosted CS 1.6 server and it's still true that the vast majority of TF2 servers are community run. I think the same is still true for Minecraft. That worked really well.

azernik 9y ago

This is true in the US, though the process is tied to copyright - any copyrighted work (including software) distributed in the US needs to be deposited with the Library of Congress. I think the most difficult issue with distributing these to the general public would be classifying abandoned vs. maintained copyrighted works.

whiddershins 9y ago
Citation? I have never heard of this requirement, and if asked I would say it is completely false.
- lsc 9y ago
  http://www.loc.gov/teachers/copyrightmystery/text/steps/ http://www.loc.gov/teachers/copyrightmystery/text/steps/ Note, this is just to register your copyright. My understanding is that you still own the copyright if you don't register, but it's weaker in many ways, so when people expect there to be money involved, they usually register the copyright. In practice, my understanding is that if it's distributed by a serious company, it's usually a registered copyright, and so the library of congress gets a copy.
  - azernik 9y ago
    Mandatory deposit applies regardless of registration; it's just that registration requires sending a copy, which satisfies the mandatory deposit rules. At the Copyright Office FAQ (https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/mandatory_deposit.html https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/mandatory_deposit.html) "Mandatory deposit (17 U.S.C. section 407) requires the owner of copyright or the exclusive right of distribution to deposit in the Copyright Office for the use of the Library of Congress two complete copies of the best edition within 3 months after a work is published. Section 408 of the copyright law, for a fee, provides the option to formally register the work with the U.S. Copyright Office. This registration process provides a legal record of copyright ownership as well as additional legal benefits in cases of infringement. Optional registration fulfills mandatory deposit requirements." Then later: "Yes. Under certain circumstances, special relief from deposit requirements may be granted. The grant of special relief is discretionary with the U.S. Copyright Office and will depend on a careful balance of the acquisition policies of the Library of Congress, the examining requirements of the Copyright Office (if registration is sought), and the hardship to the copyright owner." Note that "if registration is sought" - even if you're not registering, you still need to apply for an exemption.