5 ms·

no they don't need approval from Nintendo They need Valve to not block them for Nintendo without legal case based on some excuses (which Valve as store owner i

no they don't need approval from Nintendo They need Valve to not block them for Nintendo without legal case based on some excuses (which Valve as store owner is somewhat allowed to do). And the one thing Nintendo does not want is a legal case, because they know they are most likely going to lose it and then it's likely not just dolphin which would take advantage of the additional legal clarity created by the case. In the EU I'm not sure there even would be a case because the law being _that_ clear cut in favor of Dolphin.

rowanG077 3y ago
Are you serious here? You think the Dolphin team can meaningfully affect Valve here? That's delusional.
- dathinab 3y ago
  no they can't, and I didn't say so but it's Valve which is blocking them not Nintendo and sure Valve might do so on behest of Nintendo but it's still Valves doing so the idea that Dolphine (or Valve) have to asks Nintendo for anything is just completly absurd and beyond any legal basis which is why Nintendo doesn't use the proper legal methods here IMHO, because then you can dispute it and they can (probably will) lose but as long as Valve plays along there is nothing much Dolphin can do, so again it's Valve who first needs to be convinced before then either Nintendo gives up or you have a proper legal dispute with them anyway like you correctly pointed out there is no way for Dolphin to affect Valve so the is no way for Dolphi on steam
  - rowanG077 3y ago
    Legality is not the issue here. Not everything that is legal can be published on Steam. The people who make it a legal argument after this article are missing the point.
    - shagie 3y ago
      (furthering this point) consider the recent Developer claims Steam is rejecting games with AI-generated artwork -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36522665 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36522665 / https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36520701 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36520701 AI art isn't illegal, but Steam still has taken a position of not wanting to be the middleman for distribution of such content.
      - wtallis 3y ago
        > AI art isn't illegal All indications are that the dubious legality of ML-generated art is exactly why Valve is not approving those games. Valve isn't taking a moral stance against ML-generated art, they're playing it safe legally by avoiding distributing such games when they cannot ensure the ML models were not trained on unlicensed content and will not spew copyright infringements.
        shagie 3y ago
        Consider then the statement: Valve isn't taking a moral stance against emulators, they're playing it safe legally by avoiding distributing such games when they cannot ensure that unlicensed software won't be run on them and will not invite copyright takedowns. --- Valve doesn't want to carry software that they may be sued over as a distributor. Until they are on very firm standing that it is ok, they pull the software. https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-steam-pc-dmca-takedown-communism-1850125125 https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-steam-pc-dmca-takedown-... https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-soviet-republic-pc-dmca-city-builder-1850190837 https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-soviet-republic-pc-dmca... As a distributor of software, Steam has no appetite for distributing any software that may lead it to legal entanglements. Spurious DMCA requests, AI art, or credible threats from Nintendo - that game cannot be distributed.
      - dathinab 3y ago
        Different situation. Valve limited there store to "in general not contain products of a certain type (here AI art containing)". But in case of Dolphin this isn't the case but a explicit ban of dolphine without it braking Valve TOS. If Valve would but in their TOS that "emulators are generally not allowed" then rejecting Dolphine would be okay and no one would have wirten any blogs or news articles about it, or even tried to put it on steam.
ohgodplsno 3y ago
Go to your local supermarket and start selling things, let's see how long until you get kicked out by security. If Valve says no, Dolphin doesn't come out on Steam. If Valve says "ask Nintendo", and Nintendo says no, Dolphin doesn't come out on Steam. Dolphin doesn't get a pass to be published everywhere because what they're doing is legal.
red-iron-pine 3y ago
> And the one thing Nintendo does not want is a legal case, because they know they are most likely going to lose it and then it's likely not just dolphin which would take advantage of the additional legal clarity created by the case. Bollocks. Nintendo has a reputation for suing the hell out of anyone, often repeatedly, even if they would likely lose. They're rabid about protecting their IP, to the point where they're infamous for it. Family friendly front-end, but ruthless corporation behind it. They'd absolutely get lawyers and charge in aggressively. Valve has nothing to gain by putting their money at risk for someone else's emulator; "no dog in this fight".
- dathinab 3y ago
  But in this case if they lose in court they will lose far more then "just" dolphin being on steam. And with how it's currently they for sure guaranteed won't see dolphin or similar on steam, a sure fire way which might even be cheaper then suing. Also AFIK in most cases where they sue they either have a good chance of winning or losing will just lose that case and not set a precedence which can cost them dearly.
  - mcpackieh 3y ago
    > But in this case if they lose in court they will lose far more then "just" dolphin being on steam. The only thing they'd really lose is the money they already spent on lawyers, and they're more than happy to accept that loss. Nintendo will sue in futile situations just to make the other party miserable.
    - dathinab 3y ago
      No they set legal precedence that Nintendo device emulators are legally okay (as long as they don't do anything additional etc.). And publicity, too. If you considers how many people in this chat alone just blindly assumed it's illegal, and that's given a "more tech affine audience of HN, then that is a huge deal.
      - 3y ago
johnnyanmac 3y ago
>they don't need approval from Nintendo Valve just said they did. >They need Valve to not block them for Nintendo without legal case based on some excuses Or what, they sue Valve? It's still their store. Valve can reject any title for any reason (well, almost any reason. But proving discimination here would be difficult). I've come across this issue with Valve's vague rulings for dozens of titles, so I'm not exactly surprised the outcome here once again favors Valve. But people are still in blind devotion for Valve instead of realizing that they have been leveraging their pseudo-monopoly on the Pc platform for years now.

rowanG077 3y ago

Are you serious here? You think the Dolphin team can meaningfully affect Valve here? That's delusional.

dathinab 3y ago
no they can't, and I didn't say so but it's Valve which is blocking them not Nintendo and sure Valve might do so on behest of Nintendo but it's still Valves doing so the idea that Dolphine (or Valve) have to asks Nintendo for anything is just completly absurd and beyond any legal basis which is why Nintendo doesn't use the proper legal methods here IMHO, because then you can dispute it and they can (probably will) lose but as long as Valve plays along there is nothing much Dolphin can do, so again it's Valve who first needs to be convinced before then either Nintendo gives up or you have a proper legal dispute with them anyway like you correctly pointed out there is no way for Dolphin to affect Valve so the is no way for Dolphi on steam
- rowanG077 3y ago
  Legality is not the issue here. Not everything that is legal can be published on Steam. The people who make it a legal argument after this article are missing the point.
  - shagie 3y ago
    (furthering this point) consider the recent Developer claims Steam is rejecting games with AI-generated artwork -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36522665 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36522665 / https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36520701 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36520701 AI art isn't illegal, but Steam still has taken a position of not wanting to be the middleman for distribution of such content.
    - wtallis 3y ago
      > AI art isn't illegal All indications are that the dubious legality of ML-generated art is exactly why Valve is not approving those games. Valve isn't taking a moral stance against ML-generated art, they're playing it safe legally by avoiding distributing such games when they cannot ensure the ML models were not trained on unlicensed content and will not spew copyright infringements.
      - shagie 3y ago
        Consider then the statement: Valve isn't taking a moral stance against emulators, they're playing it safe legally by avoiding distributing such games when they cannot ensure that unlicensed software won't be run on them and will not invite copyright takedowns. --- Valve doesn't want to carry software that they may be sued over as a distributor. Until they are on very firm standing that it is ok, they pull the software. https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-steam-pc-dmca-takedown-communism-1850125125 https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-steam-pc-dmca-takedown-... https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-soviet-republic-pc-dmca-city-builder-1850190837 https://kotaku.com/workers-resources-soviet-republic-pc-dmca... As a distributor of software, Steam has no appetite for distributing any software that may lead it to legal entanglements. Spurious DMCA requests, AI art, or credible threats from Nintendo - that game cannot be distributed.
    - dathinab 3y ago
      Different situation. Valve limited there store to "in general not contain products of a certain type (here AI art containing)". But in case of Dolphin this isn't the case but a explicit ban of dolphine without it braking Valve TOS. If Valve would but in their TOS that "emulators are generally not allowed" then rejecting Dolphine would be okay and no one would have wirten any blogs or news articles about it, or even tried to put it on steam.

ohgodplsno 3y ago

Go to your local supermarket and start selling things, let's see how long until you get kicked out by security. If Valve says no, Dolphin doesn't come out on Steam. If Valve says "ask Nintendo", and Nintendo says no, Dolphin doesn't come out on Steam. Dolphin doesn't get a pass to be published everywhere because what they're doing is legal.

red-iron-pine 3y ago

> And the one thing Nintendo does not want is a legal case, because they know they are most likely going to lose it and then it's likely not just dolphin which would take advantage of the additional legal clarity created by the case. Bollocks. Nintendo has a reputation for suing the hell out of anyone, often repeatedly, even if they would likely lose. They're rabid about protecting their IP, to the point where they're infamous for it. Family friendly front-end, but ruthless corporation behind it. They'd absolutely get lawyers and charge in aggressively. Valve has nothing to gain by putting their money at risk for someone else's emulator; "no dog in this fight".

dathinab 3y ago
But in this case if they lose in court they will lose far more then "just" dolphin being on steam. And with how it's currently they for sure guaranteed won't see dolphin or similar on steam, a sure fire way which might even be cheaper then suing. Also AFIK in most cases where they sue they either have a good chance of winning or losing will just lose that case and not set a precedence which can cost them dearly.
- mcpackieh 3y ago
  > But in this case if they lose in court they will lose far more then "just" dolphin being on steam. The only thing they'd really lose is the money they already spent on lawyers, and they're more than happy to accept that loss. Nintendo will sue in futile situations just to make the other party miserable.
  - dathinab 3y ago
    No they set legal precedence that Nintendo device emulators are legally okay (as long as they don't do anything additional etc.). And publicity, too. If you considers how many people in this chat alone just blindly assumed it's illegal, and that's given a "more tech affine audience of HN, then that is a huge deal.
    - 3y ago

johnnyanmac 3y ago

>they don't need approval from Nintendo Valve just said they did. >They need Valve to not block them for Nintendo without legal case based on some excuses Or what, they sue Valve? It's still their store. Valve can reject any title for any reason (well, almost any reason. But proving discimination here would be difficult). I've come across this issue with Valve's vague rulings for dozens of titles, so I'm not exactly surprised the outcome here once again favors Valve. But people are still in blind devotion for Valve instead of realizing that they have been leveraging their pseudo-monopoly on the Pc platform for years now.