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So they were not "pressured" but Atari contacted them and they proceeded to make this decision based because they "needed to balance Atari’s commercial interest
by jwitthuhn 7mo ago
So they were not "pressured" but Atari contacted them and they proceeded to make this decision based because they "needed to balance Atari’s commercial interests".
That sound indistinguishable from being pressured.
- singpolyma3 7mo agoIndeed. It sounds like they were further pressured to say they were not being pressured.
- JoshTriplett 7mo agoThe types of folks who make reimplemented game engines often do it as a labor of love towards the original. And the best companies often have great appreciation for their modding communities and preservationists. (Witness the good collaborations between some companies and SCUMMVM, for instance.) This may well have been a conversation that was entirely reasonable and respectful.
- singpolyma3 7mo agoI just can't believe that given the outcome and the wording of the posts from the project. If there was respect here there would have been no threats. If there were no threats there would be no talk of "balancing commercial interests"
- IshKebab 7mo agoI think they're saying Atari didn't threaten them but they both understood that they could have. Honestly it sounds like Atari were trying to be nice. Like "you technically aren't allowed to do that, and we could just set our lawyers on you, but we'd like to not do that while also making money on our re-release". This seems like a perfectly reasonable compromise to me.
- singpolyma3 7mo agoHow is "I haven't talked to my lawyer yet but you know I could" not a threat/pressure?
- NietTim 7mo agoThere is no reason to assume they said that and all the reason to assume they didn't say that.
- IshKebab 7mo agoIn the same way that "you kids aren't allowed to skate here, but maybe if you do it over there I could just turn around and not notice you" isn't a threat.
- singpolyma3 7mo ago"you kids can't skate here" is the threat part.
- IshKebab 7mo agoThat's just stretching the definition of "threat" beyond its normal meaning. If I tell my kids "it's bedtime" is that a threat?
- singpolyma3 7mo agoIf they say "no" are you gonna let them stay up? If not then it may not be a literal threat but it contains the implied threat
- freehorse 7mo agoReaching compromises with others is part of life. If the question is whether a copyright from 1995 should hold in this case, I would say no. But the world is sometimes not as we may want it to be. So taking that for granted, this seems like a very reasonable and mature resolution.