Developers With Illegal Licences

Heya folks, quick question if you please - we are close to releasing our first game and I made sure that every box in the office has a valid licence (three developers), but apparently one one of the guys, working from his laptop, used a pirated Unity version. What I'm wondering is - did this "defile" the project files? Will it flag the released binary as being made with pirated software? Or will it be alright if it's built with a legit copy? Thanks in advance!

Best regards,
Damir H.

 

It might effect builds, but its fairly senseless for it to affect the source files. Just make sure a clean legit Unity is installed.

 

He should be able to use his work license on his laptop. If I remember correct a license of Unity Pro can be put onto two machines at once so long as only one person is using the license.

 

Thanks, this is a relief.

Yeah, but when you live in an area where piracy is the default setting, it makes it easy for people to forget themselves and become careless. This developer needed to just quickly alter something, remembered he had Unity on his laptop and just used that, not thinking about the fact that it's pirated.

 

I don't think you need to worry. It's impossible to define if you used a cracked or legal or free version (except for some things like starting Unity logo). You may use a cracked to make a game and a legal to release it.
Lots of people in the World use cracked software which is a LOT more expensive than Unity (3ds max, visual studio etc), and nothing happens to them.

As for me, I also live in a place where people almost always crack software rathe that buy it. But when I started to use Unity I also decided what to do with it. And you know, free version is really enough for me, so I didn't crack it and didn't buy it (yet).

 

While what some people do is 'bad', those people make some damn good crack!

I'd think that with all of the DRM-esque policies being put into place, things would get more difficult to crack instead of easier. Oh well.

 

Yes, it's quite impressive how quickly they can crack EAs year of DRM work in a few hours. Not good, but impressive nonetheless.

 

Yes, good. Maybe one day EA will realize they're wasting their time working on useless drm and invest it onto making better games...

 

I'll never support stealing, but ok. If they're not good games, then why even pirate them?

 

People will do it and people will download anything to say they got it. Like a pack rat or pokeman.... gotta collect them all crap or not..

 

A majority of complaints are generated by DRM in which legitimate customers are the only ones to suffer because the protection measures fail in pretty much 100% of cases. I would say 99.9999% because of diablo 3, but I have personal experience running Mooege so I count it in the list of FAILURES.

It's good to pirate those games after you buy them so you don't have to deal with network based latency in a singleplayer game or if you visit a relative (or other location) where there is no internet, or the biggest concern, the future of tiered internet, you aren't screwed by DRM. Can you imagine a game with always online authentication servers being played by people with an allowance of 2GB (or less) internet usage per month?

 

I hate DRM too but:

If you want them to stop then don't buy the game. Don't pirate the game. Ignore the game.

They'll stop then, and only then.

Edit: Let's get off this topic. We don't need another flame war.

 

All of my flame was aimed at blizzard for what they did to the North's legacy. But I agree this is getting off topic, haha. I don't buy or pirate the games, but I do smirk at the failures and the burden it puts on the end users

 

Well if they're caught driving they will be arrested for sure.

 

hangon, is this a thread on a companies message board saying "one of our team stole your product, do you think we'll get away with that"

 

Precisely.

 

And first response from a moderator saying "sure, you'll get away with it?"

Um, ok then.

 

That member already owns the product though. It's not like physical goods in which stealing a copy removes 1 from a stock of them, this person already owns a legitimate copy of unity and the unity license covers 1 person and 2 computers to be used by that person.

So... is it stealing? The answer is yes only if the stolen version was obtained via torrenting and the seeding rate was greater than 0 at any point in the transfer

 

That sounds idiotic.

 

It's the best logic we can do with gray areas xD You can't steal something you already own if it's digital because you're authorized to own the product, but you still break laws regarding piracy if you seed a torrent, because you're redistributing the product which is against the ToS.

 

Unless you have links to some cases where this has proven to be legal I think it is safer to assume it isn't. Something to keep in mind too is that you don't own the software. You are licensing it.

Yes, this is what I do as well. Vote with my wallet.

 

Naw a few years ago, well actually probably a decade ago when Roms and Emulators started getting popular.
It was either Bill Clinton or George Bush, they authorized some act to where if you have purchased this so product then you have a legal right to have a digital copy of said product, and if you do not own said product you have to destroy it within 24 to 48 hours or something like that.

But of course this is in America, not the entire globe.

 

That's not even vaguely true, in any way.

--Eric

 

Uhh yes it is.

 

OK, so provide a citation. "I think someone on the internet said so" doesn't count, by the way.

--Eric

 

Directly from Nintendo sense it's hard to find anything on it.

There is a good deal of misinformation on the Internet regarding the backup/archival copy exception. It is not a "second copy" rule and is often mistakenly cited for the proposition that if you have one lawful copy of a copyrighted work, you are entitled to have a second copy of the copyrighted work even if that second copy is an infringing copy. The backup/archival copy exception is a very narrow limitation relating to a copy being made by the rightful owner of an authentic game to ensure he or she has one in the event of damage or destruction of the authentic. Therefore, whether you have an authentic game or not, or whether you have possession of a Nintendo ROM for a limited amount of time, i.e. 24 hours, it is illegal to download and play a Nintendo ROM from the Internet.

However it does say you can make your own copies just don't download it from the internet.

 

Which makes sense if you think about it. Who are you acquiring the backup from if you download it? Someone who is illegally sharing what they do not have the right to share. It isn't legal to acquire stolen goods, so why would it be legal to download stolen software?

 

It's "hard to find anything on it" because it doesn't exist. There was never any legislation that let you keep pirated materials for 24-48 hours; that was something just made up in an attempt to justify ROM sites' existence, nothing more.

--Eric

 

That was directly Nintendo's website that said that.
I wasn't talking about pirated copies, I was just talking about making a backup.

How it is illegal to download it yes, but to make an archival backup it is not.

Exactly lol.

 

It says "Therefore, whether you have an authentic game or not, or whether you have possession of a Nintendo ROM for a limited amount of time, i.e. 24 hours, it is illegal to download and play a Nintendo ROM from the Internet", which means it's illegal to download a ROM under any circumstances, even if you had it for, like, a day or whatever.

--Eric

 

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/108

(3) the reproduction or distribution of the work includes a notice of copyright that appears on the copy or phonorecord that is reproduced under the provisions of this section, or includes a legend stating that the work may be protected by copyright if no such notice can be found on the copy or phonorecord that is reproduced under the provisions of this section.
(b) The rights of reproduction and distribution under this section apply to three copies or phonorecords of an unpublished work duplicated solely for purposes of preservation and security or for deposit for research use in another library or archives of the type described by clause (2) of subsection (a), if—
(1) the copy or phonorecord reproduced is currently in the collections of the library or archives; and
(2) any such copy or phonorecord that is reproduced in digital format is not otherwise distributed in that format and is not made available to the public in that format outside the premises of the library or archives.
(c) The right of reproduction under this section applies to three copies or phonorecords of a published work duplicated solely for the purpose of replacement of a copy or phonorecord that is damaged, deteriorating, lost, or stolen, or if the existing format in which the work is stored has become obsolete, if—
(1) the library or archives has, after a reasonable effort, determined that an unused replacement cannot be obtained at a fair price; and
(2) any such copy or phonorecord that is reproduced in digital format is not made available to the public in that format outside the premises of the library or archives in lawful possession of such copy.

 

Well I don't feel like arguing about this with anyone, but I will say one thing.

We all have made backups of everything we purchase or use once or twice or more, so if you say you've never once in your life bought something and made a backup you are a lying fool.

(Not directing that to anyone specific) just saying in general we have all done it.

 

Sigh. Bad reference to oversimplifying copyright law, and bad appeal to the crowd. If you ever read how those ROMs were copied to computers, they were done illegally and without permission from Nintendo.

 

I've never once downloaded something I previously purchased from an illegal source under the pretense that I was creating a backup. I've created backups of original discs, typically by using Daemon Tools to create an image, and then stored them on more durable media.

 

Why does everyone keep saying downloading, I'm not talking about downloading anything, I was just talking about making your own backup (your self).
Illegal or not, we've all done it at least once lol.

 

This statement is the cause of it.

 

Sorry didn't mean to come off with downloading LOL.

I was just trying to say about making a backup your self lol.