7 ms·

'No One Lives Forever' turns 25 and you still can't buy it legitimately

372 points by speckx 1y ago

ferguess_k 1y ago
NOLF2 is one of best and interesting FPS I played. I wish they remastered it.
shalmanese 1y ago
So say someone decides to produce a remaster of NOLF. Does Activision have to produce this piece of paper once they sue to establish standing? If Activision's version of this piece of paper was chewed up by rats in the 90s, does their ownership stake vanish in a puff as well? If the potential victory from a lawsuit is $20K and Activision estimates it will cost them $50K to find this piece of paper, is the company relatively safe from a lawsuit?
- mandevil 1y ago
  They would need to prove that they have the rights to it to win court, yes. The chances of Activision actually pulling the trigger and suing if you made a remastered version are definitely less than 50-50. They'd have to actually have owned the rights in the first place, they still have the documentation to prove it, and that they'd find a suit a profitable idea? Let's say it's a 1/3 chance. That means if you publish it, you'd have a 2/3 chance of not getting sued by Activision, that can have a positive E(V) if you just go ahead and YOLO it. But the killer is that WB and Fox (now Disney) also are sitting out there as maybe rights-holders. Let's say that each of them also has a 1/3 chance of suing and that they are all independent. Now you have a 8/27th chance of not getting sued- less than 1/3. So the expected value has to be twice as large as with a normal, single company situation to justify the increased risk of lawsuit from one of three companies. And so no one pencils out the choice as a good one, compared to the opportunity cost of working on some other game with a clearer rights situation.
  - shalmanese 1y ago
    Why would you set the probability at 1/3rd? It feels closer to 1/100 at most. They've admitted the documents, if they're anywhere, are buried in a file cabinet at Iron Mountain. You can set a lower limit on the amount of labor required to produce the document. Activision is not going to go on this quest if the labor required * chance of the document existing exceeds the amount they can win in a lawsuit.
    - throwaway173738 1y ago
      What you’re describing is a risk/reward approach to decision making. But in practice many execs do not follow this calculus.
  - bluGill 1y ago
    It is reasonably sure that each party has a 90% chance of suing if they have rights. There is a 90% chance someone will send you a cease and desist just because all 3 are the type that will do it if they think they have rights. There is a reasonable chance more than 1 will send a cease and desist (some weaselly "we are still checking rights but if we have them your notice starts now - just enough to avoid fraud if it turns out they don't have rights)
    - shalmanese 1y ago
      OK, but according to ChatGPT (so correct me if the AI is wrong), if you ignore the cease and desist, then the process goes into default judgement where the claimants now need to prove standing to collect judgement. You now know with 100% certainty that they need to hire someone to dig through a file vault at Iron Mountain to collect judgment and they're not going to bother doing that so the default judgement means nothing and you can go about your merry way ignoring their cease and desist.
      - bluGill 1y ago
        I'm not a lawyer, but I believe that is wrong. Still consult a lawyer if you need real legal advice. If you ignore the cease and desist their next step is to sue you in court where the lawyers fight it out. They can sue immediately, without a cease and desist at if they want. However the reason to do a cease and desist is it costs a lawyer just a few minutes to write one up, while court often costs millions of dollars - thus if you just stop doing something after the cheap letter it is typically best for them to ignore the what they could have got by taking you to court right away. They can bring a cease and desist to court and show that they gave you time to stop which looks good to the judge and can influence how much the judge awards if they win (if they lose the cease and desists is at best meaningless). A default judgement is when they sue and nobody shows up in court. Because you don't defend yourself the courts just assume you are guilty (assuming the case isn't completely absurd). Sometimes you can get a default judgement when it is obvious someone is doing something bad but not who, and then if you later identify who you can collect immediately - but that person you accuse can fight the default judgement in a lot of ways.
- bluGill 1y ago
  > Does Activision have to produce this piece of paper once they sue to establish standing? Yes, but see below. > If Activision's version of this piece of paper was chewed up by rats in the 90s, does their ownership stake vanish in a puff as well? No, but complex. Legally the contract is still valid, but they still need to show the court what the details are. All parties to a contracts get a copy, and so Activation can legally force other people who should have a copy of the contract to produce it, any copy is enough (or several partially rat eaten copies may be enough to reproduce what the original said). Activision has all the time they want to find copies of the contract (unlike trademark, copyright isn't use it or lose it), so you are risking the above for a long time. Sometimes enough testimony in court of we did have a contract is enough - when it is obvious there must have been a contract at one time the court will put together obvious details which might be enough to sue. In this case the 3 parties can agree that while they don't know who as rights between the 3 of them the rights must be contained and so they can agree to a 3-way split for purposes of going to court - even if it latter turns out only one party had rights, that party agreed to the split (though if you years latter can prove a 4th party has rights they can sue the other 3). Of course if rats did eat all copies of the contract the lawyer fees to figure this out are likely more than the game is worth and so it probably isn't worthwhile to sue, so practically it may be as if they no longer have rights to the game just because they can't afford to enforce it. This is a very risky take though and so nobody should risk it.
  - shalmanese 1y ago
    > This is a very risky take though and so nobody should risk it. People keep on insisting when it comes to these things that various things are risky in a rather handwavey way but they never fully come out and articulate the risks. I asked this question to ChatGPT a bunch of ways and tried to understand what the specifics are when people say this is risky and I can't really seem to get to anything that is a nuclear level risk, just a garden variety risk that you need to manage amongst all the other garden variety risks involved in running a business (when inputted with a reasonable set of realistic assumptions, it's possible to create assumptions where this is a nuclear level risk but that doesn't seem to apply to the majority of real world cases, including this one).
skibz 1y ago
NOLF is actually source-available [0][1][2], and it has been since not that long after its original release. There's also a community-driven project [3] keeping it playable on modern hardware - however, it hasn't seen any activity in several years. If you haven't played or heard of NOLF before, I highly encourage checking it out. It's a fantastic title, even after all these years. 0: https://web.archive.org/web/20020217233624/http://pc.ign.com/articles/095/095995p1.html https://web.archive.org/web/20020217233624/http://pc.ign.com... 1: https://web.archive.org/web/20010720053220/http://noonelivesforever.com:80/ https://web.archive.org/web/20010720053220/http://noonelives... 2: https://github.com/osgcc/no-one-lives-forever https://github.com/osgcc/no-one-lives-forever 3: https://github.com/haekb/nolf1-modernizer https://github.com/haekb/nolf1-modernizer
- dfxm12 1y ago
  So you can't buy it, but you can play it, and the source is available. Is this really a problem? I know the article mentions this in passing, but preservation & the ability to actually play a 25 year old game is more important than its capitalization, IMO.
  - voxic11 1y ago
    They do mention that you can pirate it. But that is kind of the point of the article, the only way to play the game is to break the law.
    - dfxm12 1y ago
      Oh, no! Anyway... Seriously though, break a law that no one is interested in enforcing? What are we doing here, exactly, carrying water for a handful of companies that had nothing to do with the original development of the game in the first place? ETA: This aside from the fact that you can buy a used copy and play it...
      - nemomarx 1y ago
        I assume the community goal would be to find out who owns the rights and get them to either use them or give them up formally and bless the community project? Used copies won't be around forever, it would be better to have a proper community version.
lanthade 1y ago
I loved NOLF and NOLF2. I was actually thinking about pulling them off the shelf and loading them up again the other day. I had no idea that the rights around them was such a mess.
croes 1y ago
Everybody is waiting for HL3. I want NOLF3
- hnarayanan 1y ago
  This. This was such a charming game series.
- keyringlight 1y ago
  I'm torn about whether I'd want a direct continuation. It has similarities to the changing tone of the spy shows/movies and their satires that inspired it in that things change over time, and the reception to the feminism angle would be different now. A sequel would likely mean moving the time period on again which has additional challenges. I could definitely see starting over with a reboot, which would also give the studio involved a chance to dodge all the rights issues by doing a 'spiritual successor' and renaming everything. 25 years later you're likely trying to attract newcomers much more than you are fans of the old games that want specifically more NOLF. I'd also be interested in a cold war era spy thriller that played it straight, real spy history has a lot to pull from that could be weaved into an intriguing story to play through, and NOLF did touch on some of the issues around spying like taking advantage of people.
visarga 1y ago
Copyright kills works when rights cannot be negotiated, usually because the rights holder is not to be found, but in this case because the situation is just "complicated".
- bluGill 1y ago
  I've long thought copyright should only apply if the work is available for sale, or they are actively preparing another printing so they can sell it again in the near future.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - ianburrell 1y ago
    Then there would be digital stores where old works go to die. Which might be better than now if price was reasonable and support good. But could easily be expensive, unsupported, and goes after pirates. Authors already have problems with getting their books back when out of print. Ebooks make it worse cause they can stay in print with low effort. I like idea of copyright with short span, like 10 years, and then have to register and renew for every subsequent decade. That would give registry of owners who are serious about work. Would never see public domain movies, but there are lots of obscure works that would be public domain.
    - NooneAtAll3 1y ago
      > But could easily be expensive, unsupported, and goes after pirates. nothing stops that from happening even now, tho
  - giantrobot 1y ago
    Copyrights should have a similar schedule to patents. The first period of coverage is no-cost but subsequent renewals increase in price, perpetual copyright should be financially ruinous but copyright should exist so a creator of a work can profit off it for a reasonable duration.
- 1y ago
LarsDu88 1y ago
I remember playing the demos for NOLF and NOLF2 years ago. If I had known it would be impossible to buy 25 years later, I would have bought the game! I also remember reading articles in Game Developer magazine about how sophisticated the AI in NOLF2 was. Wish I could find that article
EvanAnderson 1y ago
A pertinent prior discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581
- r721 1y ago
  Another discussion from 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10710973 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10710973
Lammy 1y ago
Fuck “buying it legitimately” anyway when it's old enough that it would be Public Domain under a sane copyright regime. Relevant: NOLF Revival Edition (same as mentioned in the article and quoted article, but actual link): - https://archive.org/details/no-one-lives-forever-trilogy https://archive.org/details/no-one-lives-forever-trilogy - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581
- xandrius 1y ago
  Totally agree, buying makes sense if it helps the creator(s), if it is not possible or it is tainted, I'd say go to the high seas and enjoy.
tavavex 1y ago
No One Sells Forever, eh? But seriously, the way the copyright system prevents people from preserving and re-experiencing works as soon as the "rightful owner" stops caring about them is a travesty. I say that when an IP becomes orphaned, stops being claimed by a new rights-holder, or some time after it stops being sold/used, it should be forcibly removed from the grip of copyright and opened up for everyone to use. Otherwise, we're heading to a world where only a slim subset of well-performing properties are being offered, while the rest lie in a gigantic graveyard of things-someone-owns-but-will-never-use instead of being potentially put to use by someone who would actually care.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 1y ago
What is the downside to limiting all movie and software copyrights to 10 years? Source code and materials etc can remain trade secrets if desired? And all IP with a movie as well - including characters. This would stop a studio from forever milking the same piece of IP forever.
- eastbound 1y ago
  No, the opposite. To be protected by copyright, sources must be uploaded to a Library of Software. Downside: Movies will be made to not last; Software will be made to be incompatible with everything on a 10-year timeframe; and the country who enabled this open mindset will displease its copyright owners who will move to the other countries.
- GloriousKoji 1y ago
  One downside is it would motivate companies to get intellectual property registered under a trademark with indefinite protection rather than copyright. Even with our current lifetime + 70 year protection we have companies like Disney getting characters registered as a trademark.
AdmiralAsshat 1y ago
I struggle to understand why the (potential?) rights-holders are so intransigent about this. If a company came up to me and said "We have interest in reviving an IP of yours. We will take on the development costs, we will take on all the risk, all you have to do is say yes and you will get a fixed percentage of every sale"--that seems like an easy win-win, does it not? The only reasons I would imagine you would say NO were if: 1) Concern that the company will do a crappy job and tarnish the brand's reputation (which, fair, but Nightreign studios and/or GOG seem to have a pretty solid track record on this) 2) Your company's bean-counters are both so greedy and risk-averse such that their thinking is, "We only wish to allow something if it will be a guaranteed hit...but if it is a guaranteed hit, we want to do it internally so that we get to keep all of the profits!" In which case, the requirements are almost impossible to satisfy, since there is inevitably some level of risk undertaken during the remaster/re-release effort.
- TheJoeMan 1y ago
  I imagine there is a legal/admin cost, to locating the paper contract in Iron Mountain/wherever. So if they wait for the game to go ahead anyways, they could wait and see if its a smashing success, then sue and have a budget for tracking the docs down. Perhaps a lawyer could explain if sending a “cough up the docs in 60 days or we are invalidating your claim” would work.
- compiler-guy 1y ago
  3. They believe the IP may have potential that you won't exploit to the fullest. In other words, they believe that they may be able to do more than you with it, if they ever get around to it. If your potential market is tiny--and lets be honest, the market for an unpirated version of this is quite small,most people sufficiently interested have pirated it already--then keeping it out of the public in favor of some unknown potential later is a consideration.
  - shmeeed 1y ago
    I don't want to claim that NOLF is comparable to Zork, and without a doubt times have changed a lot since then, but it comes to my mind that it's a notable fact that even half forgotten and seemingly out-of-fashion IP can be much more valuable than anyone at any given time assumes. Namely back in 1992, having the rights to Infocom's catalogue, which earlier had been put up for grabs for 25k, literally saved a then bankrupt Activision (!) when they rereleased it as a compilation of The Lost Treasures of Infocom, for millions of revenue in total. [1] In addition to the problems and cost of establishing ownership that other people mentioned, I suppose this story was one hell of a lesson for any publisher not to forfeit any rights you may or may not be holding. [1] https://www.filfre.net/2019/04/an-unlikely-savior/ https://www.filfre.net/2019/04/an-unlikely-savior/
mattfrommars 1y ago
off topic: My goodness, anyone feel the UI/UX of the website to be really refreshing? I've lately been digging compact/industrialized looking UI vs 'touch'/comfort view that take up way too much real estate.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
ChrisArchitect 1y ago
No One Lives Forever is a game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Forever https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Fo... Usual insanely wordy paragraphs and endless linked text hiding everything on TechDirt.
marginalia_nu 1y ago
This was a fun series of games. They are especially fun if you've watched some of the source material they're constantly referencing and alluding to, like The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (the 1960s one, not the 2010s movie), Get Smart, etc. Still holds up.
- ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
  From what I remember of the game (played it on an Amiga), it also was very close in tone to the Austin Powers series of films. I wonder if I should spend some time trying to get it running on my Steam Deck - there's a couple of Reddit threads around getting it to work.
  - ChoGGi 1y ago
    It was a PC/PS2 game. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Forever https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Fo...
    - ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
      You're right - my memory must be failing. I would have played it on the PS2, not the Amiga.
  - marginalia_nu 1y ago
    Austin Powers references and parodies the same material, though leans a bit more toward the old Bond movies. NOLF may have referenced Austin Powers as well, but clearly pulls from a lot of the older material.
zeppelin101 1y ago
I only played the first one, because the second one was more finnicky and required newer hardware. But I must say, NOLF 1 is one of the best and most unique FPS games ever. It should be far, far more famous than it is.
DamnInteresting 1y ago
I remember buying NOLF--it was at retail, in a big box off the shelf at Media Play. I knew nothing about it, it just caught my eye, and the description on the back sounded interesting. I miss that kind of media discovery, our modern always-online world tends to smother serendipity. It was an excellent game. The idea of a continuation of the series is appealing, but a lot of modern adaptations really stink, so maybe it's better off in the amber of nostalgia.
- PeaceTed 1y ago
  I did discover a lot of great stuff like that. The funny thing is that there were a few titles that I discovered, absolutely loved and yet apparently were considered bad games. Oh well, I saw the good side of it. One that I grabbed for $10 was Adrenix, a 'Descent' clone that has very few mentions around and reviewed fairly averagely. I loved it! As for modern adaptions of games, if they can do it either like 3D Realms retro style like with Ion Fury, or go into the full re-imagined space like they did with Doom 2016. But any middle ground seems to lead to disappointment.
- EvanAnderson 1y ago
  I got it as a pack-in with a video card. I didn't expect it to be anything good, being a pack-in. Talk about being wrong...
- jeffwask 1y ago
  There is a team working on a "Spiritual Successor".
- Goronmon 1y ago
  I miss that kind of media discovery, our modern always-online world tends to smother serendipity. I don't really miss the time of having to choose games this way. If you lucked out it was great, but you were also potentially putting down upwards of $50+ bucks in 1995 dollars on a game that you might end up really disliking.
  - SkyeCA 1y ago
    Everyone I knew just rented games (and sometimes console too). You'd usually rent them for a weekend.
caycep 1y ago
this is true of a lot of indy films...I remember a talk by this one director, Joe Swanberg, who mentioned a lot of his early movies are in limbo and unwatchable because no one can figure out who has the rights...
TMWNN 1y ago
Reposting my proposals regarding copyright: Any content, once published/distributed/broadcast in the US, that is not made readily available to the public going forward loses copyright protection. This includes revisions. * A film, TV show, sound recording, book, or any other copyrighted content must, once made available for public purchase, always remain available. If the only streaming service willing to pay to stream your movie has the smallest market share, too bad; the market has spoken on the value of your content. An ebook can fulfill this purpose for a print book; streaming can fulfill this purpose for a theatrical or physical-media film. But it must be available to maintain copyright. * Compulsory licensing should apply; if Netflix wants to pay the same amount of money as the above-mentioned small market-share streaming service for the film, Netflix must be allowed to do so. The film's rights owner can demand more, raising the price for all, but if every outlet refuses, the film immediately goes into public domain. This process is reversible, but it would set a ceiling to prevent the owner from setting a ridiculously high price to prevent its availability. * If a Blu-ray of a film or TV show has excised or modified scenes for whatever reason, and the original isn't also made available (whether on a different "theatrical cut" release, or as a different cut on the same disc), the entire original version immediately goes into public domain. * If NBC posts Saturday Night Live skits on YouTube that have removed "problematic" scenes[1] without explaining the differences—a diff file, basically—the entire original skit loses copyright protection. Separate issue, but also very worthwhile: * Streaming services must make all data regarding their content available in some standardized format. Consumers should be able to use one application to access all content they have access to. The creator of SmartTube (a very nice YouTube-compatible player) should be able to add the appropriate API support to search for and play Netflix/Prime Video/Disney+/Paramount+ content. The above applies to software, too. Legalize abandonware! [1] Something I understand already happens
gwbas1c 1y ago
Makes me wonder if a good way to "reign in" on copyright abuse and abandonware is to require copyright holders to pay a tax based on some kind of formula. More importantly: If no tax is paid, after a reasonable amount of time, (1-3 years,) the work is considered abandoned and automatically moved to the public domain. Even more importantly, if the work isn't available for general consumption (rental and physical), at a reasonable cost, without a subscription / ads, no copyright claims can be perused for non-commercial piracy. (IE, it would become totally legal to torrent a TV show if it's stuck in a streaming service that requires ads / a subscription.)
- gwd 1y ago
  Georgism [1] but applied to copyright: If you want to extend your copyright past, say, 15 or 20 years, then you need to estimate the value of that copyright and pay tax on it. You can name any value you want, but someone can then buy it at that value. Maybe there can be different rules for copyrights owned by humans vs corporations; 5 years free for corporations, 20 years free for humans. Or maybe longer for humans, I dunno. But having corporations sit on IP just because they can is ridiculous. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism
  - thfuran 1y ago
    >If you want to extend your copyright past, say, 15 or 20 years, If you want to extend your copyright past 20 years, too bad. Come up with something new; that one's public domain now. Or it should be at any rate.
    - gwbas1c 1y ago
      I agree in principal. That being said: I think reforming copyright should allow fair use and incentives for curation. There's nothing wrong with the Beatles' heirs curating the Beatles recordings for streaming, and remastering them; as long as there's no prosecution for torrenting needle drops of old Beatles records, torrenting rips of old Beatles CDs from the 1990s, and making a streaming service of such recordings (the old ones, not the remasters) without needing permission of the heirs.
hiccuphippo 1y ago
So they can't release a sequel, but they could make a new game that has suspiciously similar vibes and call it "Some people eventually dies or something".
aidenn0 1y ago
It seems like one could negotiate a price for "possible rights," no? I.e. I pay you $X and you relinquish any rights you may or may not have to me.
kristianp 1y ago
That Bobby Banilla story is nuts. So instead of paying $5.9m in 2000, the Mets decided to defer the payments for 11 years! And also to stretch them out over 25 years! Didn't the Mets realise that just paying the full amount (with interest) 2 or 3 years later cost them a lot less. On the other hand, $1.1m is probably peanuts in terms of Mets expenses these days. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Bonilla https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Bonilla On the other hand there are claims this allowed the Mets to free up cash flow in the short term and also allowed them a draft pick in the next season. https://ftw.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2015/07/01/new-york-mets-bobby-bonilla-contract-2035-deal/82074686007/ https://ftw.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2015/07/01/new-yor...
- B1FF_PSUVM 1y ago
  I also fell into that rabbit hole, went here: https://neilpaine.substack.com/p/classic-post-bobby-bonilla-was-more https://neilpaine.substack.com/p/classic-post-bobby-bonilla-... Good stuff.
  - kristianp 1y ago
    That's a good article for some depth into his career and argues he wasn't overpaid for his career performance. Doesn't go into the deal. This article claims the Mets deferred Bonilla's pay so they could invest more money into Madoff's ponzi scheme: https://www.espn.com.au/mlb/story/_/id/31256115/bernie-madoff-scheme-affected-new-york-mets-dies-82 https://www.espn.com.au/mlb/story/_/id/31256115/bernie-madof...
- hearsathought 1y ago
  The bobby bonilla contract is the stuff of legends now but nobody would care if bonilla actually lived up to expectations.
expedition32 1y ago
I had to pirate Xenosaga and emualate a PS2. The reality is that the vast majority of entertainment is ephemeral. A videogame or movie get it's 5 minutes of fame. There are a few weirdos like me who want to play a 20 year old videogame but how much money can you get out of that and is it worth the trouble?
wilg 1y ago
It's very interesting how people think about copyright for this case (loosey goosey, yolo), as compared with copyright when discussing AI.
- ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
  Not that interesting really as this is about people wanting to play an excellent old game but there is no legal method to do so due to the actions of corporations. With AI, the corporations are hoovering up lots of copyright content so that it can be "repackaged" as AI output without wanting to attempt to do so legally.
TylerJaacks 1y ago
However you can actually compile from source
827a 1y ago
Hot take: If no one knows who has the rights to sell it, no one knows who has the rights to stop someone else from selling it. There'd be a legal battle. For a game like this, its probably not worth it. But I bet by the end of it we'd figure it out.
- bagels 1y ago
  You could figure it out, but if you're the one getting sued, it's going to cost you a lot of money to pay their lawyers to prove that you didn't have the rights, and someone else did.
cubefox 1y ago
Never played the game, but I still remember being intrigued by the lady on the cover: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61m7HINvtnL._AC_SL1500_.jpg https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61m7HINvtnL._AC_SL1500_....
bagels 1y ago
Game was really good. Fun gameplay, fun dialog. I played through it multiple times. I can't think of many games that I've done that for. If you haven't seen it, and aren't inclined to play it, there are some good playthroughs on youtube to get a sense of what it's about.
phplovesong 1y ago
I recall having this on PS, so it very much could be bought.
PeterHolzwarth 1y ago
I feel the reality is that if you own something, it's up to you to do what you want with it. I worry about, despite initial first-order good intentions, introducing strident limits on property such as being tossed about in this discussion. People are talking about putting somewhat severe, I think, limitations on ownership and property. Are you sure you want these limitations? Fairness under law means if it applies to a game, it also applies to you and what you own. Hot takes on the topic don't seem to have fully thought through the implications on that (tho I do understand people's feelings on the matter).
zenoprax 1y ago
> If a company, or group of companies, won’t offer a piece of work for sale, can’t be bothered to understand what they own of it, if anything, and have no plans to figure any of that out… then how can this be copyright infringement? The answer to the question in the quote is: "It's not until someone wins a lawsuit." The federal government recognizes, and will protect through legal enforcement, an exclusive right of the intellectual property holder to control its distribution. Copyright infringement only occurs when a court rules that it has because that is the only mechanism through which intellectual property holders can claim a legal right. It is not a "natural right". Streaming from a "piracy" site is effectively legal for the viewer because they are not infringing on any distribution or resell rights (but the hoster is). If Netflix is mistakenly giving access to all seasons of a show when it only paid for the latest one, how could anyone call the unknowing viewer who is watching Season 1 a pirate? "Abandonware" pushes this idea even further: as long as there is no reasonable expectation of a successful infringement case being brought against anyone then distribution is also without consequence. Perhaps there is a statue of limitations that might definitive codify this or a "defend or lose it" stipulation as exists with trademarks.
- eloisant 1y ago
  If none of the company has any document to prove ownership, because according to the article they lost them, how could they win a lawsuit?
  - generic92034 1y ago
    That is the gap in the argument of the parent. At least in the US already the threat to sue for copyright infringement has almost such a strong impact as a won lawsuit. You can also see that with things like the DMCA. This is often adhered to, even in ridiculous cases.
  - mattmaroon 1y ago
    It isn’t that they don’t have the documents, it’s that they don’t know if they have the documents and they’re not going to bother to look until there’s a reason to. If someone made the game, presumably they’d call up Iron Mountain and start digging. Making a game is enough of an investment that you wouldn’t do it if you knew you had a high likelihood of being sued by legitimate rights holders as soon as you started making the news. Digging through paper records from decades ago is enough of an investment that you wouldn’t do it unless you had a reason to also. Classic stalemate.
yason 1y ago
On the other hand, how the heck are they claiming to own any of that if they can't even produce the paperwork. A big enough developer would be able to remaster the game just enough to provoke a lawsuit from the "rights holders" and that would be the place to cross-check whether there's any meat in the deal. If they can't prove they actually own the rights, they can't sue. If they can, then they can sell/license it to the developer. Obviously this won't work for a small, independent actor because it's all going drown in the noise of legal billing. I've always maintained that if we must have copyright then it should be something like a trademark where you have to actively defend it to keep it valid. If you have the "rights" to a piece of music, movie or game then, to validate the copyright's original purpose, you will have to actively exercise those rights to make gains from the "intellectual property". Copyright does not promote innovation if you're not required to gain from your creation: if you're just keeping your work in a drawer there's no point in granting you a temporary monopoly over the right to copy the work.
intexpress 1y ago
If you like NOLF then check out Deathloop. It is the closest thing I have played to a NOLF sequel. Great game.
- eleveriven 1y ago
  Deathloop really nails that offbeat spy-thriller vibe
paxys 1y ago
Copyright (and all intellectual property in general) should have a "use it or lose it" provision, just like trademarks. If there's a piece of software that you own but aren't interested in selling or maintaining then someone else should be able to do it without asking for your permission. Simple as that.
- easytiger 1y ago
  So if I write a piece of software that does the job I designed it for, and you decide you want it to do something else, you should be handed the source code and right to redistribute it? Simple like that?
  - bcye 1y ago
    It sounds like you're still actively using the copyright (by distributing your software) in that case, so no?
    - easytiger 1y ago
      That's not what the parent comment posits.
- sebastialonso 1y ago
  I believe this provision already exists in screen media. That's why you get some awful movies, like 2015's Fantastic Four.
  - paxys 1y ago
    Only as a part of some private deals signed between studios. It isn't a legal requirement.
eleveriven 1y ago
At some point, refusing to sell a thing for decades should mean you forfeit the right to block others from preserving or enjoying it
ongytenes 1y ago
The modern copyright is having the opposite effect of what the founding Fathers had intended. The copyright was meant to provide protection and income to an author's family in the event of his death. Then after a reasonable time, the book passes into public domain for posterity. But today the copyright has an unreasonable time. A time that was for family to live on now has become a time for corporations to squeeze. Copyright law has become weaponized filled with landmines. Now instead, works become inaccessible, out of print, and forgotten by the time it becomes public domain. The cult following, the fans, and the curious have long died out, leaving the work to pass into the abyss to join the works in the Library of Alexandria.
phendrenad2 1y ago
There should be some kind of "challenge" process where people can demand that rightsholders "put up or shut up", or lose their work to the public domain. Right now, we have a perverse incentive where publishers are incentivized to say they DO NOT own a work, in hopes that someone will do all the work of making some derivative work and then they can swoop in and demand rent. There should be a way to say "we asked for proof, they didn't respond, so our ass is covered here, go pound rocks, Warner Brothers, Activision, and/or 20th Century Fox". Obviously this would only apply to things that sold above a certain number of units, making it something of cultural relevance. We also don't want this law abused to steal things if someone gets a copy of your dropbox files and you can't afford a lawyer to respond to legal demands.
- GTP 1y ago
  I would instead reduce the duration of copyright protection. Not an expert by any means, but my gut feeling is that in the case of art like books, movies, songs, videgames etc. the right-holders make most of the money in the first 10 years after release. If you're interested in a book, movie, or videogame, you will not wait 10 years to get it for free; you would still pay for it. So I think the duration of copyright should be reduced to circa 10 years, maybe 20 if we want to be generous to the right-holders, but no more than that.
thayne 1y ago
This wouldn't be an issue if copyright expired after 10 years, which seems like a reasonable length to me. Or if a work going out of "print" (or equivalent depending on thee medium) some limited number of years forfeits the copyright. This common situation where a work is still protected by copyright, but isn't available for purchase and it isn't even feasible to determine who currently holds the copyright is just not ok.
Dilettante_ 1y ago
So what's the mvp to qualify as a copyright-infringing game? Because what I'm hearing is that we need one brave soldier to put up a unity asset swap called NOLF 3: Return of the NOLF and wait for the court documents to roll in(or not), right? And if nobody manages to prove ownership, would the ip land in the public domain or with the asset-swapper? Because if it's the latter, that'd change the risk-reward ratio quite a bit.

372 points by speckx 1y ago

NOLF2 is one of best and interesting FPS I played. I wish they remastered it.

So say someone decides to produce a remaster of NOLF. Does Activision have to produce this piece of paper once they sue to establish standing? If Activision's version of this piece of paper was chewed up by rats in the 90s, does their ownership stake vanish in a puff as well? If the potential victory from a lawsuit is $20K and Activision estimates it will cost them $50K to find this piece of paper, is the company relatively safe from a lawsuit?

mandevil 1y ago
They would need to prove that they have the rights to it to win court, yes. The chances of Activision actually pulling the trigger and suing if you made a remastered version are definitely less than 50-50. They'd have to actually have owned the rights in the first place, they still have the documentation to prove it, and that they'd find a suit a profitable idea? Let's say it's a 1/3 chance. That means if you publish it, you'd have a 2/3 chance of not getting sued by Activision, that can have a positive E(V) if you just go ahead and YOLO it. But the killer is that WB and Fox (now Disney) also are sitting out there as maybe rights-holders. Let's say that each of them also has a 1/3 chance of suing and that they are all independent. Now you have a 8/27th chance of not getting sued- less than 1/3. So the expected value has to be twice as large as with a normal, single company situation to justify the increased risk of lawsuit from one of three companies. And so no one pencils out the choice as a good one, compared to the opportunity cost of working on some other game with a clearer rights situation.
- shalmanese 1y ago
  Why would you set the probability at 1/3rd? It feels closer to 1/100 at most. They've admitted the documents, if they're anywhere, are buried in a file cabinet at Iron Mountain. You can set a lower limit on the amount of labor required to produce the document. Activision is not going to go on this quest if the labor required * chance of the document existing exceeds the amount they can win in a lawsuit.
  - throwaway173738 1y ago
    What you’re describing is a risk/reward approach to decision making. But in practice many execs do not follow this calculus.
- bluGill 1y ago
  It is reasonably sure that each party has a 90% chance of suing if they have rights. There is a 90% chance someone will send you a cease and desist just because all 3 are the type that will do it if they think they have rights. There is a reasonable chance more than 1 will send a cease and desist (some weaselly "we are still checking rights but if we have them your notice starts now - just enough to avoid fraud if it turns out they don't have rights)
  - shalmanese 1y ago
    OK, but according to ChatGPT (so correct me if the AI is wrong), if you ignore the cease and desist, then the process goes into default judgement where the claimants now need to prove standing to collect judgement. You now know with 100% certainty that they need to hire someone to dig through a file vault at Iron Mountain to collect judgment and they're not going to bother doing that so the default judgement means nothing and you can go about your merry way ignoring their cease and desist.
    - bluGill 1y ago
      I'm not a lawyer, but I believe that is wrong. Still consult a lawyer if you need real legal advice. If you ignore the cease and desist their next step is to sue you in court where the lawyers fight it out. They can sue immediately, without a cease and desist at if they want. However the reason to do a cease and desist is it costs a lawyer just a few minutes to write one up, while court often costs millions of dollars - thus if you just stop doing something after the cheap letter it is typically best for them to ignore the what they could have got by taking you to court right away. They can bring a cease and desist to court and show that they gave you time to stop which looks good to the judge and can influence how much the judge awards if they win (if they lose the cease and desists is at best meaningless). A default judgement is when they sue and nobody shows up in court. Because you don't defend yourself the courts just assume you are guilty (assuming the case isn't completely absurd). Sometimes you can get a default judgement when it is obvious someone is doing something bad but not who, and then if you later identify who you can collect immediately - but that person you accuse can fight the default judgement in a lot of ways.
bluGill 1y ago
> Does Activision have to produce this piece of paper once they sue to establish standing? Yes, but see below. > If Activision's version of this piece of paper was chewed up by rats in the 90s, does their ownership stake vanish in a puff as well? No, but complex. Legally the contract is still valid, but they still need to show the court what the details are. All parties to a contracts get a copy, and so Activation can legally force other people who should have a copy of the contract to produce it, any copy is enough (or several partially rat eaten copies may be enough to reproduce what the original said). Activision has all the time they want to find copies of the contract (unlike trademark, copyright isn't use it or lose it), so you are risking the above for a long time. Sometimes enough testimony in court of we did have a contract is enough - when it is obvious there must have been a contract at one time the court will put together obvious details which might be enough to sue. In this case the 3 parties can agree that while they don't know who as rights between the 3 of them the rights must be contained and so they can agree to a 3-way split for purposes of going to court - even if it latter turns out only one party had rights, that party agreed to the split (though if you years latter can prove a 4th party has rights they can sue the other 3). Of course if rats did eat all copies of the contract the lawyer fees to figure this out are likely more than the game is worth and so it probably isn't worthwhile to sue, so practically it may be as if they no longer have rights to the game just because they can't afford to enforce it. This is a very risky take though and so nobody should risk it.
- shalmanese 1y ago
  > This is a very risky take though and so nobody should risk it. People keep on insisting when it comes to these things that various things are risky in a rather handwavey way but they never fully come out and articulate the risks. I asked this question to ChatGPT a bunch of ways and tried to understand what the specifics are when people say this is risky and I can't really seem to get to anything that is a nuclear level risk, just a garden variety risk that you need to manage amongst all the other garden variety risks involved in running a business (when inputted with a reasonable set of realistic assumptions, it's possible to create assumptions where this is a nuclear level risk but that doesn't seem to apply to the majority of real world cases, including this one).

skibz 1y ago

NOLF is actually source-available [0][1][2], and it has been since not that long after its original release. There's also a community-driven project [3] keeping it playable on modern hardware - however, it hasn't seen any activity in several years. If you haven't played or heard of NOLF before, I highly encourage checking it out. It's a fantastic title, even after all these years. 0: https://web.archive.org/web/20020217233624/http://pc.ign.com/articles/095/095995p1.html https://web.archive.org/web/20020217233624/http://pc.ign.com... 1: https://web.archive.org/web/20010720053220/http://noonelivesforever.com:80/ https://web.archive.org/web/20010720053220/http://noonelives... 2: https://github.com/osgcc/no-one-lives-forever https://github.com/osgcc/no-one-lives-forever 3: https://github.com/haekb/nolf1-modernizer https://github.com/haekb/nolf1-modernizer

dfxm12 1y ago
So you can't buy it, but you can play it, and the source is available. Is this really a problem? I know the article mentions this in passing, but preservation & the ability to actually play a 25 year old game is more important than its capitalization, IMO.
- voxic11 1y ago
  They do mention that you can pirate it. But that is kind of the point of the article, the only way to play the game is to break the law.
  - dfxm12 1y ago
    Oh, no! Anyway... Seriously though, break a law that no one is interested in enforcing? What are we doing here, exactly, carrying water for a handful of companies that had nothing to do with the original development of the game in the first place? ETA: This aside from the fact that you can buy a used copy and play it...
    - nemomarx 1y ago
      I assume the community goal would be to find out who owns the rights and get them to either use them or give them up formally and bless the community project? Used copies won't be around forever, it would be better to have a proper community version.

lanthade 1y ago

I loved NOLF and NOLF2. I was actually thinking about pulling them off the shelf and loading them up again the other day. I had no idea that the rights around them was such a mess.

croes 1y ago

Everybody is waiting for HL3. I want NOLF3

hnarayanan 1y ago
This. This was such a charming game series.
keyringlight 1y ago
I'm torn about whether I'd want a direct continuation. It has similarities to the changing tone of the spy shows/movies and their satires that inspired it in that things change over time, and the reception to the feminism angle would be different now. A sequel would likely mean moving the time period on again which has additional challenges. I could definitely see starting over with a reboot, which would also give the studio involved a chance to dodge all the rights issues by doing a 'spiritual successor' and renaming everything. 25 years later you're likely trying to attract newcomers much more than you are fans of the old games that want specifically more NOLF. I'd also be interested in a cold war era spy thriller that played it straight, real spy history has a lot to pull from that could be weaved into an intriguing story to play through, and NOLF did touch on some of the issues around spying like taking advantage of people.

visarga 1y ago

Copyright kills works when rights cannot be negotiated, usually because the rights holder is not to be found, but in this case because the situation is just "complicated".

bluGill 1y ago
I've long thought copyright should only apply if the work is available for sale, or they are actively preparing another printing so they can sell it again in the near future.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- ianburrell 1y ago
  Then there would be digital stores where old works go to die. Which might be better than now if price was reasonable and support good. But could easily be expensive, unsupported, and goes after pirates. Authors already have problems with getting their books back when out of print. Ebooks make it worse cause they can stay in print with low effort. I like idea of copyright with short span, like 10 years, and then have to register and renew for every subsequent decade. That would give registry of owners who are serious about work. Would never see public domain movies, but there are lots of obscure works that would be public domain.
  - NooneAtAll3 1y ago
    > But could easily be expensive, unsupported, and goes after pirates. nothing stops that from happening even now, tho
- giantrobot 1y ago
  Copyrights should have a similar schedule to patents. The first period of coverage is no-cost but subsequent renewals increase in price, perpetual copyright should be financially ruinous but copyright should exist so a creator of a work can profit off it for a reasonable duration.
1y ago

LarsDu88 1y ago

I remember playing the demos for NOLF and NOLF2 years ago. If I had known it would be impossible to buy 25 years later, I would have bought the game! I also remember reading articles in Game Developer magazine about how sophisticated the AI in NOLF2 was. Wish I could find that article

EvanAnderson 1y ago

A pertinent prior discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581

r721 1y ago
Another discussion from 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10710973 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10710973

Lammy 1y ago

Fuck “buying it legitimately” anyway when it's old enough that it would be Public Domain under a sane copyright regime. Relevant: NOLF Revival Edition (same as mentioned in the article and quoted article, but actual link): - https://archive.org/details/no-one-lives-forever-trilogy https://archive.org/details/no-one-lives-forever-trilogy - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43146581

xandrius 1y ago
Totally agree, buying makes sense if it helps the creator(s), if it is not possible or it is tainted, I'd say go to the high seas and enjoy.

tavavex 1y ago

No One Sells Forever, eh? But seriously, the way the copyright system prevents people from preserving and re-experiencing works as soon as the "rightful owner" stops caring about them is a travesty. I say that when an IP becomes orphaned, stops being claimed by a new rights-holder, or some time after it stops being sold/used, it should be forcibly removed from the grip of copyright and opened up for everyone to use. Otherwise, we're heading to a world where only a slim subset of well-performing properties are being offered, while the rest lie in a gigantic graveyard of things-someone-owns-but-will-never-use instead of being potentially put to use by someone who would actually care.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 1y ago

What is the downside to limiting all movie and software copyrights to 10 years? Source code and materials etc can remain trade secrets if desired? And all IP with a movie as well - including characters. This would stop a studio from forever milking the same piece of IP forever.

eastbound 1y ago
No, the opposite. To be protected by copyright, sources must be uploaded to a Library of Software. Downside: Movies will be made to not last; Software will be made to be incompatible with everything on a 10-year timeframe; and the country who enabled this open mindset will displease its copyright owners who will move to the other countries.
GloriousKoji 1y ago
One downside is it would motivate companies to get intellectual property registered under a trademark with indefinite protection rather than copyright. Even with our current lifetime + 70 year protection we have companies like Disney getting characters registered as a trademark.

AdmiralAsshat 1y ago

I struggle to understand why the (potential?) rights-holders are so intransigent about this. If a company came up to me and said "We have interest in reviving an IP of yours. We will take on the development costs, we will take on all the risk, all you have to do is say yes and you will get a fixed percentage of every sale"--that seems like an easy win-win, does it not? The only reasons I would imagine you would say NO were if: 1) Concern that the company will do a crappy job and tarnish the brand's reputation (which, fair, but Nightreign studios and/or GOG seem to have a pretty solid track record on this) 2) Your company's bean-counters are both so greedy and risk-averse such that their thinking is, "We only wish to allow something if it will be a guaranteed hit...but if it is a guaranteed hit, we want to do it internally so that we get to keep all of the profits!" In which case, the requirements are almost impossible to satisfy, since there is inevitably some level of risk undertaken during the remaster/re-release effort.

TheJoeMan 1y ago
I imagine there is a legal/admin cost, to locating the paper contract in Iron Mountain/wherever. So if they wait for the game to go ahead anyways, they could wait and see if its a smashing success, then sue and have a budget for tracking the docs down. Perhaps a lawyer could explain if sending a “cough up the docs in 60 days or we are invalidating your claim” would work.
compiler-guy 1y ago
3. They believe the IP may have potential that you won't exploit to the fullest. In other words, they believe that they may be able to do more than you with it, if they ever get around to it. If your potential market is tiny--and lets be honest, the market for an unpirated version of this is quite small,most people sufficiently interested have pirated it already--then keeping it out of the public in favor of some unknown potential later is a consideration.
- shmeeed 1y ago
  I don't want to claim that NOLF is comparable to Zork, and without a doubt times have changed a lot since then, but it comes to my mind that it's a notable fact that even half forgotten and seemingly out-of-fashion IP can be much more valuable than anyone at any given time assumes. Namely back in 1992, having the rights to Infocom's catalogue, which earlier had been put up for grabs for 25k, literally saved a then bankrupt Activision (!) when they rereleased it as a compilation of The Lost Treasures of Infocom, for millions of revenue in total. [1] In addition to the problems and cost of establishing ownership that other people mentioned, I suppose this story was one hell of a lesson for any publisher not to forfeit any rights you may or may not be holding. [1] https://www.filfre.net/2019/04/an-unlikely-savior/ https://www.filfre.net/2019/04/an-unlikely-savior/

mattfrommars 1y ago

off topic: My goodness, anyone feel the UI/UX of the website to be really refreshing? I've lately been digging compact/industrialized looking UI vs 'touch'/comfort view that take up way too much real estate.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

ChrisArchitect 1y ago

No One Lives Forever is a game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Forever https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Fo... Usual insanely wordy paragraphs and endless linked text hiding everything on TechDirt.

marginalia_nu 1y ago

This was a fun series of games. They are especially fun if you've watched some of the source material they're constantly referencing and alluding to, like The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (the 1960s one, not the 2010s movie), Get Smart, etc. Still holds up.

ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
From what I remember of the game (played it on an Amiga), it also was very close in tone to the Austin Powers series of films. I wonder if I should spend some time trying to get it running on my Steam Deck - there's a couple of Reddit threads around getting it to work.
- ChoGGi 1y ago
  It was a PC/PS2 game. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Forever https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Operative:_No_One_Lives_Fo...
  - ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
    You're right - my memory must be failing. I would have played it on the PS2, not the Amiga.
- marginalia_nu 1y ago
  Austin Powers references and parodies the same material, though leans a bit more toward the old Bond movies. NOLF may have referenced Austin Powers as well, but clearly pulls from a lot of the older material.

zeppelin101 1y ago

I only played the first one, because the second one was more finnicky and required newer hardware. But I must say, NOLF 1 is one of the best and most unique FPS games ever. It should be far, far more famous than it is.

DamnInteresting 1y ago

I remember buying NOLF--it was at retail, in a big box off the shelf at Media Play. I knew nothing about it, it just caught my eye, and the description on the back sounded interesting. I miss that kind of media discovery, our modern always-online world tends to smother serendipity. It was an excellent game. The idea of a continuation of the series is appealing, but a lot of modern adaptations really stink, so maybe it's better off in the amber of nostalgia.

PeaceTed 1y ago
I did discover a lot of great stuff like that. The funny thing is that there were a few titles that I discovered, absolutely loved and yet apparently were considered bad games. Oh well, I saw the good side of it. One that I grabbed for $10 was Adrenix, a 'Descent' clone that has very few mentions around and reviewed fairly averagely. I loved it! As for modern adaptions of games, if they can do it either like 3D Realms retro style like with Ion Fury, or go into the full re-imagined space like they did with Doom 2016. But any middle ground seems to lead to disappointment.
EvanAnderson 1y ago
I got it as a pack-in with a video card. I didn't expect it to be anything good, being a pack-in. Talk about being wrong...
jeffwask 1y ago
There is a team working on a "Spiritual Successor".
Goronmon 1y ago
I miss that kind of media discovery, our modern always-online world tends to smother serendipity. I don't really miss the time of having to choose games this way. If you lucked out it was great, but you were also potentially putting down upwards of $50+ bucks in 1995 dollars on a game that you might end up really disliking.
- SkyeCA 1y ago
  Everyone I knew just rented games (and sometimes console too). You'd usually rent them for a weekend.

caycep 1y ago

this is true of a lot of indy films...I remember a talk by this one director, Joe Swanberg, who mentioned a lot of his early movies are in limbo and unwatchable because no one can figure out who has the rights...

TMWNN 1y ago

Reposting my proposals regarding copyright: Any content, once published/distributed/broadcast in the US, that is not made readily available to the public going forward loses copyright protection. This includes revisions. * A film, TV show, sound recording, book, or any other copyrighted content must, once made available for public purchase, always remain available. If the only streaming service willing to pay to stream your movie has the smallest market share, too bad; the market has spoken on the value of your content. An ebook can fulfill this purpose for a print book; streaming can fulfill this purpose for a theatrical or physical-media film. But it must be available to maintain copyright. * Compulsory licensing should apply; if Netflix wants to pay the same amount of money as the above-mentioned small market-share streaming service for the film, Netflix must be allowed to do so. The film's rights owner can demand more, raising the price for all, but if every outlet refuses, the film immediately goes into public domain. This process is reversible, but it would set a ceiling to prevent the owner from setting a ridiculously high price to prevent its availability. * If a Blu-ray of a film or TV show has excised or modified scenes for whatever reason, and the original isn't also made available (whether on a different "theatrical cut" release, or as a different cut on the same disc), the entire original version immediately goes into public domain. * If NBC posts Saturday Night Live skits on YouTube that have removed "problematic" scenes[1] without explaining the differences—a diff file, basically—the entire original skit loses copyright protection. Separate issue, but also very worthwhile: * Streaming services must make all data regarding their content available in some standardized format. Consumers should be able to use one application to access all content they have access to. The creator of SmartTube (a very nice YouTube-compatible player) should be able to add the appropriate API support to search for and play Netflix/Prime Video/Disney+/Paramount+ content. The above applies to software, too. Legalize abandonware! [1] Something I understand already happens

gwbas1c 1y ago

Makes me wonder if a good way to "reign in" on copyright abuse and abandonware is to require copyright holders to pay a tax based on some kind of formula. More importantly: If no tax is paid, after a reasonable amount of time, (1-3 years,) the work is considered abandoned and automatically moved to the public domain. Even more importantly, if the work isn't available for general consumption (rental and physical), at a reasonable cost, without a subscription / ads, no copyright claims can be perused for non-commercial piracy. (IE, it would become totally legal to torrent a TV show if it's stuck in a streaming service that requires ads / a subscription.)

gwd 1y ago
Georgism [1] but applied to copyright: If you want to extend your copyright past, say, 15 or 20 years, then you need to estimate the value of that copyright and pay tax on it. You can name any value you want, but someone can then buy it at that value. Maybe there can be different rules for copyrights owned by humans vs corporations; 5 years free for corporations, 20 years free for humans. Or maybe longer for humans, I dunno. But having corporations sit on IP just because they can is ridiculous. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism
- thfuran 1y ago
  >If you want to extend your copyright past, say, 15 or 20 years, If you want to extend your copyright past 20 years, too bad. Come up with something new; that one's public domain now. Or it should be at any rate.
  - gwbas1c 1y ago
    I agree in principal. That being said: I think reforming copyright should allow fair use and incentives for curation. There's nothing wrong with the Beatles' heirs curating the Beatles recordings for streaming, and remastering them; as long as there's no prosecution for torrenting needle drops of old Beatles records, torrenting rips of old Beatles CDs from the 1990s, and making a streaming service of such recordings (the old ones, not the remasters) without needing permission of the heirs.

hiccuphippo 1y ago

So they can't release a sequel, but they could make a new game that has suspiciously similar vibes and call it "Some people eventually dies or something".

aidenn0 1y ago

It seems like one could negotiate a price for "possible rights," no? I.e. I pay you $X and you relinquish any rights you may or may not have to me.

kristianp 1y ago

That Bobby Banilla story is nuts. So instead of paying $5.9m in 2000, the Mets decided to defer the payments for 11 years! And also to stretch them out over 25 years! Didn't the Mets realise that just paying the full amount (with interest) 2 or 3 years later cost them a lot less. On the other hand, $1.1m is probably peanuts in terms of Mets expenses these days. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Bonilla https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Bonilla On the other hand there are claims this allowed the Mets to free up cash flow in the short term and also allowed them a draft pick in the next season. https://ftw.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2015/07/01/new-york-mets-bobby-bonilla-contract-2035-deal/82074686007/ https://ftw.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2015/07/01/new-yor...

B1FF_PSUVM 1y ago
I also fell into that rabbit hole, went here: https://neilpaine.substack.com/p/classic-post-bobby-bonilla-was-more https://neilpaine.substack.com/p/classic-post-bobby-bonilla-... Good stuff.
- kristianp 1y ago
  That's a good article for some depth into his career and argues he wasn't overpaid for his career performance. Doesn't go into the deal. This article claims the Mets deferred Bonilla's pay so they could invest more money into Madoff's ponzi scheme: https://www.espn.com.au/mlb/story/_/id/31256115/bernie-madoff-scheme-affected-new-york-mets-dies-82 https://www.espn.com.au/mlb/story/_/id/31256115/bernie-madof...
hearsathought 1y ago
The bobby bonilla contract is the stuff of legends now but nobody would care if bonilla actually lived up to expectations.

expedition32 1y ago

I had to pirate Xenosaga and emualate a PS2. The reality is that the vast majority of entertainment is ephemeral. A videogame or movie get it's 5 minutes of fame. There are a few weirdos like me who want to play a 20 year old videogame but how much money can you get out of that and is it worth the trouble?

wilg 1y ago

It's very interesting how people think about copyright for this case (loosey goosey, yolo), as compared with copyright when discussing AI.

ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
Not that interesting really as this is about people wanting to play an excellent old game but there is no legal method to do so due to the actions of corporations. With AI, the corporations are hoovering up lots of copyright content so that it can be "repackaged" as AI output without wanting to attempt to do so legally.

TylerJaacks 1y ago

However you can actually compile from source

827a 1y ago

Hot take: If no one knows who has the rights to sell it, no one knows who has the rights to stop someone else from selling it. There'd be a legal battle. For a game like this, its probably not worth it. But I bet by the end of it we'd figure it out.

bagels 1y ago
You could figure it out, but if you're the one getting sued, it's going to cost you a lot of money to pay their lawyers to prove that you didn't have the rights, and someone else did.

cubefox 1y ago

Never played the game, but I still remember being intrigued by the lady on the cover: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61m7HINvtnL._AC_SL1500_.jpg https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61m7HINvtnL._AC_SL1500_....

bagels 1y ago

Game was really good. Fun gameplay, fun dialog. I played through it multiple times. I can't think of many games that I've done that for. If you haven't seen it, and aren't inclined to play it, there are some good playthroughs on youtube to get a sense of what it's about.

phplovesong 1y ago

I recall having this on PS, so it very much could be bought.

PeterHolzwarth 1y ago

I feel the reality is that if you own something, it's up to you to do what you want with it. I worry about, despite initial first-order good intentions, introducing strident limits on property such as being tossed about in this discussion. People are talking about putting somewhat severe, I think, limitations on ownership and property. Are you sure you want these limitations? Fairness under law means if it applies to a game, it also applies to you and what you own. Hot takes on the topic don't seem to have fully thought through the implications on that (tho I do understand people's feelings on the matter).

zenoprax 1y ago

> If a company, or group of companies, won’t offer a piece of work for sale, can’t be bothered to understand what they own of it, if anything, and have no plans to figure any of that out… then how can this be copyright infringement? The answer to the question in the quote is: "It's not until someone wins a lawsuit." The federal government recognizes, and will protect through legal enforcement, an exclusive right of the intellectual property holder to control its distribution. Copyright infringement only occurs when a court rules that it has because that is the only mechanism through which intellectual property holders can claim a legal right. It is not a "natural right". Streaming from a "piracy" site is effectively legal for the viewer because they are not infringing on any distribution or resell rights (but the hoster is). If Netflix is mistakenly giving access to all seasons of a show when it only paid for the latest one, how could anyone call the unknowing viewer who is watching Season 1 a pirate? "Abandonware" pushes this idea even further: as long as there is no reasonable expectation of a successful infringement case being brought against anyone then distribution is also without consequence. Perhaps there is a statue of limitations that might definitive codify this or a "defend or lose it" stipulation as exists with trademarks.

eloisant 1y ago
If none of the company has any document to prove ownership, because according to the article they lost them, how could they win a lawsuit?
- generic92034 1y ago
  That is the gap in the argument of the parent. At least in the US already the threat to sue for copyright infringement has almost such a strong impact as a won lawsuit. You can also see that with things like the DMCA. This is often adhered to, even in ridiculous cases.
- mattmaroon 1y ago
  It isn’t that they don’t have the documents, it’s that they don’t know if they have the documents and they’re not going to bother to look until there’s a reason to. If someone made the game, presumably they’d call up Iron Mountain and start digging. Making a game is enough of an investment that you wouldn’t do it if you knew you had a high likelihood of being sued by legitimate rights holders as soon as you started making the news. Digging through paper records from decades ago is enough of an investment that you wouldn’t do it unless you had a reason to also. Classic stalemate.

yason 1y ago

On the other hand, how the heck are they claiming to own any of that if they can't even produce the paperwork. A big enough developer would be able to remaster the game just enough to provoke a lawsuit from the "rights holders" and that would be the place to cross-check whether there's any meat in the deal. If they can't prove they actually own the rights, they can't sue. If they can, then they can sell/license it to the developer. Obviously this won't work for a small, independent actor because it's all going drown in the noise of legal billing. I've always maintained that if we must have copyright then it should be something like a trademark where you have to actively defend it to keep it valid. If you have the "rights" to a piece of music, movie or game then, to validate the copyright's original purpose, you will have to actively exercise those rights to make gains from the "intellectual property". Copyright does not promote innovation if you're not required to gain from your creation: if you're just keeping your work in a drawer there's no point in granting you a temporary monopoly over the right to copy the work.

intexpress 1y ago

If you like NOLF then check out Deathloop. It is the closest thing I have played to a NOLF sequel. Great game.

eleveriven 1y ago
Deathloop really nails that offbeat spy-thriller vibe

paxys 1y ago

Copyright (and all intellectual property in general) should have a "use it or lose it" provision, just like trademarks. If there's a piece of software that you own but aren't interested in selling or maintaining then someone else should be able to do it without asking for your permission. Simple as that.

easytiger 1y ago
So if I write a piece of software that does the job I designed it for, and you decide you want it to do something else, you should be handed the source code and right to redistribute it? Simple like that?
- bcye 1y ago
  It sounds like you're still actively using the copyright (by distributing your software) in that case, so no?
  - easytiger 1y ago
    That's not what the parent comment posits.
sebastialonso 1y ago
I believe this provision already exists in screen media. That's why you get some awful movies, like 2015's Fantastic Four.
- paxys 1y ago
  Only as a part of some private deals signed between studios. It isn't a legal requirement.

eleveriven 1y ago

At some point, refusing to sell a thing for decades should mean you forfeit the right to block others from preserving or enjoying it

ongytenes 1y ago

The modern copyright is having the opposite effect of what the founding Fathers had intended. The copyright was meant to provide protection and income to an author's family in the event of his death. Then after a reasonable time, the book passes into public domain for posterity. But today the copyright has an unreasonable time. A time that was for family to live on now has become a time for corporations to squeeze. Copyright law has become weaponized filled with landmines. Now instead, works become inaccessible, out of print, and forgotten by the time it becomes public domain. The cult following, the fans, and the curious have long died out, leaving the work to pass into the abyss to join the works in the Library of Alexandria.

phendrenad2 1y ago

There should be some kind of "challenge" process where people can demand that rightsholders "put up or shut up", or lose their work to the public domain. Right now, we have a perverse incentive where publishers are incentivized to say they DO NOT own a work, in hopes that someone will do all the work of making some derivative work and then they can swoop in and demand rent. There should be a way to say "we asked for proof, they didn't respond, so our ass is covered here, go pound rocks, Warner Brothers, Activision, and/or 20th Century Fox". Obviously this would only apply to things that sold above a certain number of units, making it something of cultural relevance. We also don't want this law abused to steal things if someone gets a copy of your dropbox files and you can't afford a lawyer to respond to legal demands.

GTP 1y ago
I would instead reduce the duration of copyright protection. Not an expert by any means, but my gut feeling is that in the case of art like books, movies, songs, videgames etc. the right-holders make most of the money in the first 10 years after release. If you're interested in a book, movie, or videogame, you will not wait 10 years to get it for free; you would still pay for it. So I think the duration of copyright should be reduced to circa 10 years, maybe 20 if we want to be generous to the right-holders, but no more than that.

thayne 1y ago

This wouldn't be an issue if copyright expired after 10 years, which seems like a reasonable length to me. Or if a work going out of "print" (or equivalent depending on thee medium) some limited number of years forfeits the copyright. This common situation where a work is still protected by copyright, but isn't available for purchase and it isn't even feasible to determine who currently holds the copyright is just not ok.

Dilettante_ 1y ago

So what's the mvp to qualify as a copyright-infringing game? Because what I'm hearing is that we need one brave soldier to put up a unity asset swap called NOLF 3: Return of the NOLF and wait for the court documents to roll in(or not), right? And if nobody manages to prove ownership, would the ip land in the public domain or with the asset-swapper? Because if it's the latter, that'd change the risk-reward ratio quite a bit.