Recreating abandonware

Public domain should always exist. It’s not simply result of copyright expiration, many things enter the public domain when created. And certainly when content is no longer tied to creator/owner, it should enter the public domain.

Personally, I feel there should be some sort limitations on constant selling/transfer of ip, but I don’t know how that would work fairly. (yes, slightly ironic given my current company). Something along the line of: if the owner isn't the originator of the ip, and they haven't actively built on it or used it, it would expire into public domain after a time. But the details could get kludgy. You end up with things like the Fantastic Four where Fox could maintain the licence by putting out a half-ass attempt every few years.

 

Then everyone's a hypicrite and nobody should own anything. I'm struggling to think of any human creation that didn't start with some kind of public domain or equivalent resource if traced back to roots.

The resource isn't what matters. The point is to protect people's ability to generate value.

Neither of those things are possible.

"Public domain" isn't a thing we can choose to have or not to have. It's a category for things that aren't owned by anyone. There's no meaningful way to give it an owner, and (short of some Orwelian censorship policy) we can't stop that content from existing.

Note that there is, as far as I understand, the legal possibility of the strict opposite to Public Domain. I believe it's possible for IP to be owned by a defunct entity, such that it can no longer be reassigned but is not in the public domain. As a result it can't be copied or derived from by anyone... though heck knows how that would be enforced.

 

*slides a book across the table*

 

I nearly raised agriculture as an example, but decided it was getting a bit off topic. (In reference to no more than the title.)

 

So what? They still own the trademark, so it's not like people can go as crazy as you want to believe. At this point, Mickey Mouse may as well be as much a part of myth and legend as King Arthur. Hell, what have they even done with him in the last twenty years that wasn't Kingdom Hearts?

So what else is in the Disney vault that hasn't seen the light of day in decades?

The fact that fansubbing ever existed was a symptom of the Japanese being incompetent at tapping into a demand that was already there. Fansub groups have been on their deathbed for the last few years thanks to simulcasting finally getting somewhere.

Merchandising is trademark. Branding is all under trademark... or at least is was. Again, thank you Disney for having F***ed that up.

If you don't think you can make most, if not all, of the revenue you can out of it in thirty years, you probably F***ed up. Now maybe you got the one in a million cash cow that milks cut diamonds and S***'s gold bullion til the end of time, but the overwhelming likelihood is it won't even make a penny after ten years.

Why is there a market for bootleg reproduction cartridges? Let's say I want to buy a physical copy of Earthbound. Looking at ebay, it sure doesn't seem like anyone at Nintendo thinks there would be any money to be made. What gives? It's like it's been abandoned or something... And thus the conversation has come full circle (or is this more a mobius strip?). It's almost like people might sometimes be too stupid to understand how to fulfill the demands of a market or something

I realize you are invested in the narrative that you've built something with your blood, sweat, and tears and how dare anyone think they can just piggyback off your hard work, but the reality is you likely aren't going to give a S*** as you've moved on. Frankly if this conversation was about patents, you would be singing a very different tune.

 

I wouldn't go about calling these people "stupid". You can still get Earthbound, and judging by how those things sold they hit the demands of that market perfectly.

Physical and/or international distribution isn't cheap or easy, and for a niche product for an obsolete platform it may well not be worth it. Which brings us to...

I would hardly call this "incompetent", especially in a pre-internet age. That stuff was difficult and expensive. Even today, with the benefit of the Internet and online distribution, not everything gets translated into all languages and distributed to all regions. That doesn't make creators "incompetent", it means they're focusing on where they think they can most likely gain traction.

Are you honestly suggesting that the practicalities of media creation and content distribution haven't changed since the days when troubadors travelled from village to village telling stories in town squares?

By the time copyright and other IP law was a thing there was already nothing left to protect of King Arthur and other myths and legends. Furthermore, myths and legends are often comunually developed stories in the first place. Neither of those things are true of Mickey Mouse at all.

Regardless of what we call it, why the heck should Disney share the rights Mickey Mouse? It's their creation which they've invested ridiculous amounts of money, time and other resources into over the years. This kind of strikes me as Tall Poppy Syndrome, or maybe some misguided attempt at fairness.

Again, I agree that the system could definitely use some further evolution to solve other problems. But that's the one that's getting beaten up, and I really can't imagine why other than taking a stab at someone else's success.

Lets not make this about individuals. I've never worked for Disney, so none of that applies to me, yet my point of view is pretty much the same.

I think we're hearing different tunes. There's been pretty clear acknowledgement that the systems discussed are meant to solve particular problems. Both the problems and the systems have evolved over time. There's been explicit acknowledgement that the systems currently aren't perfect at solving contemporary problems.

Broadly, I think that applies to patents as well as it does copyright. Probably moreso, in fact.

 

Literally hundreds if not thousands of things, many games, tv shows, books, comics, movies, digital media, vr and tons of merch. He is in constant use.

So you think those who are successful should be punished?

That is just random complaining, not related to copyright. Because you don't like something someone does or does not do with their content, doesn't mean they should legally be stripped of their rights. It's simply not your call. Whether or not it is good business for them is something they will have to live with.

Absolutely that is true that as a content creator for my whole life, I believe I have the right to control and benefit from the work I created. Your assumptions beyond that are dead wrong and not appreciated. Patents are different story completely and not part of the conversation. So far your most of your arguments have been success should be limited, and that you think your beliefs should imposed on those who actually create work. Not seeing much else of substance.

 

Indeed. And my views are about content creation, my time at Disney had zero impact on my opinions of it.

Let's not make assumptions or personal attacks. Keep it calm and civilized.

 

Sure, but people have a tendency to really want to protect those "one in a million" things. Here's a few franchises that are still going strong after 30 years:

• Star Wars.
  
• Star Trek.
  
• Indiana Jones.
  
• Warhammer.
  
• James Bond.
  
• The Lord of the Rings.
  
• Tom Clancy's various characters.
  
• Dungeons and Dragons.
  
• Just... so many comic book characters and superheroes.

Putting aside the creators, every single one of those has fans who'd be pretty disappointed if the rights holders lost control of their interests. Heck, look what happens even when stuff deliberately has a change in creative leadership or direction!

 

I dunno, I am a fan that would be pretty happy to see the rights holders to Star Wars and Star Trek lose control of those IP's.

Thats just me though

 

Dr Who
Simpsons
Red Dwarf
Looney toons
(Just adding some favorites)

 

As a fan, you are not alone. .
But I am just as happy to new things that aren't tied to those universes. Expanse, Westworld, Orville to name a few.

 

Hehe, I'm also not necessarily a fan of how the modern versions of things go. Still, imagine if 30 years after something popular is created it became a free for all as long as people made their own logos. It would be far worse than what we see when a franchise takes a new creative direction. We would basically see all of the creative directions. Everything would devolve into an onslaught of fanfic...

 

Indeed. And Paramount did allow for fan shows (Star Wars still does). With a couple of notable exceptions, they are mostly garbage. But allowing for it is a something that creators can allow for, and have done. (and in the case of SW, actually endorse it).

 

So you (not actually you, but whomever wants to cash in on other people's work) cannot come up with something new and different from the things which currently other people's IP?

I don't see the problem you're describing, I'm not an artist, I'm an engineer, and I don't like the idea when people trying to cash in on other people's work. After a long time? Like Sherlock Holmes? Yes, why not, the original author and the descendants are long gone and lost interest in the original IP. But with living creators? Why would you force them to give up their IP? It's their work, they can put in PD if they want, but if they don't want, it's bad idea to force them.

Also, you can't guarantee that only good people and good stuff would come out for any given IP. It can and would hurt the original IP too. Just imagine, someone forced you to put your own work in PD, other people started to publish junk under the same name, consumers get fed up with the garbage they were bombarded with and when you would publish something which is good and faithful to the original, no one cares because the immense garbage scared them away...

 

Keep thing civil and refrain from personal attacks. Those not doing so will been banned from participating in the discussion.

 

I always wanted to make a Buffy tVS videogame. It would be much-much better than the rebooted TR... (yeah, I know the Buffy VG from the past, but those were pure junk).

 

God do not even get me started on the licensing nightmare that is dealing with the estate in charge of Sherlock Holmes.

 

Have you seen Star Wars in the last few decades? Even in the old EU, there was plenty of hit and miss books. Then you've got Games Workshop that's been letting people go crazy with their IP, and there's a lot of crap but also plenty that's been well received.

It's not like fanfic is a new concept, or that people can't tell good from bad... most of the time. Comic book fans usually start paying attention to things like who the writer and artist are so that they can start to figure who's work is good.

 

Well, I can see, you can cherry pick things to respond and drop things you aren't bothered to respond to.
So people can't come up with new things, they have to blatantly copy other people's work for some reason.

And you forget one very important thing: when you're steering your own IP into the ground, that's your decision, like if you do the same with your own business, that's okay, it's your choice, it's your doing. But when someone else does that, it's not okay at all.

BTW, fan fiction usually isn't published, or at least not on the way the IP owner is publishing. Also when it's fan fiction, you have to state that it is unofficial, fan fiction. When you are allowed to publish originals, it becomes 'original', so basically indistinguishable from the original-original.

 

Mostly because at this point I'm just done.

Yeah, like Disney. Oh god, I just remembered Kimba the White Lion. That definitely wasn't public domain.

Let's be fair here, for every instance of straight up republishing there is likely a dozen instances that try to go somewhere else with it. Half of them are likely terrible, a quarter are fair to middling, and the last quarter is at least interesting. You would probably have the same odds picking a book at random at a library.

There are a mountain of creators that have seen a project be steered out from underneath them. They have seen design by committee ruin something that could have been. I realize that letting go is hard, but you give it a good run then watch what other people can do with it. It might even be that someone makes something greater than you could have ever done.

No, if it's on the internet, it is published. Just about all fan fiction and fan art is in violation of copyright. It's just that most companies look away, since it would take awhile to sort through all the teenagers to get to the people that may have ever made any real money off it. Pretty much the only company that has cared enough to do something in recent memory is Nintendo getting a bunch of stuff pulled off tumbler. And no, stating it's unofficial means about as much legally as those opening cards with the fair use exemption on youtube reviews.