Using free art as samples in Packages

I'm a coder and not really good at this art thing, as can be seen from the sample art in my packages, and was wondering if it is allowed if we use free art as sample art in packages seeing as I would not be selling the art in the package but only be using it to demonstrate how to use the package.

I was thinking of perhaps using a model or two from http://media.ryzom.com/ for my next UnIRPG update - that is if I could get 'em working properly.

[edit] I don't think the Ryzom assets would be allowed, but is interested in knowing what you guys have to say about this, and is curious cause I've seen another AS package including ryzom assets before.

 

You're asking the wrong people. You have to ask the content owners if you can use their work. There's no way around that.

 

Yes, guess you are right. As I understand it, everything in your package is covered by the asset store lciense and can't be covered by any other license. So if we take ryzom assets for example, it would conflict with the commons lic. except if I could get permission to incl. it in my package under the asset store lic.. which would not happen.

 

The ryzom assets are definitely allowed. They are released under CC3 including for commercial purposes, as long as you attribute them. There is no conflict, the license is very simple (relavent parts quoted below):

I've asked the CTO or ryzome what needs to be stated - here is his reply:

I've converted all the art assets and animations to FBX, took a ton of time and writing scripts to fix assets, etc. Here's what they look like in Unity:

http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/122297-RPG-Character-Editor

 

Thank you Jaimi u have cleared doubts for others too !

 

Thanks for that info, Jaimi. I always read these licenses so wrong and then stay away.
I still have one concern though. The asset store license, the one you sell your package under, gives your customer full rights to whatever is in your package to use in comercial work and to not attribute anyone, so would that not conflict with ...

 

I contacted Unity about this and while it is technically against the license to include someone else's free assets in your commercial asset, they didn't seem to think it was worth enforcing. The problem is exactly what you said: if you put something commercial on the asset store, you HAVE to use Unity's asset store license and only their license, and that means you can't include Ryzom's license requiring attribution or any other license. However, if you put a free asset on the asset store, you have the option of using whatever license you want (though you have to put it on the asset store page for your asset, not just hidden in a readme). So a free asset including Ryzom assets and their license is doable.

There are other commercial assets that use other people's free assets without any attribution; one of the top sellers now is Fantasy AI 2, which includes a ton of other people's free assets without attribution and which is technically against the license, but Unity didn't see a need to enforce anything. I had concerns about using it in my project since the licensing is vague, and their answer was basically that they were "pretty sure" it was fine, but claimed no legal responsibility for guaranteeing the legality of anything on the asset store and that it would be my ass on the line if one of the copyright holders of the free assets decided to sue me. I think they're probably not exactly safe though, since a class action could have a reasonable claim of false advertising since Unity willingly advertises and profits from things that they know are technically against their own license. So you're probably fine, but if you're a stickler for remaining fully legal and want to be certain that no lawyer can come after you, it would probably be better to stick to the letter of the law and not include other people's free assets in your commercial one. If you trust that the makers of the free assets are reasonable people and aren't going to sue you, you shouldn't need to worry.

 

One other thing - I wouldn't be as confident as Jaimi that you're completely safe using CC-SA in a commercial product. A lot of commercial developers avoid CC-SA and other "viral" licenses because it is unclear how much of your own work the other person's license covers. Using CC-SA means you have to distribute anything you make that "alters, transforms, or builds upon this work" under CC-SA as well (in other words, you have to give it away for free and let other people use it in their own commercial products). Lawyers disagree on whether "builds upon this work" means a game that uses the assets or if it only means 3D models that use the asset. Some CC-SA holders seem to think that using their work means you have to open source your game, while other CC-SA holders are fine with you using it in a commercial game as long as you give back any new models based on the old ones. The legally best thing to do in any case would be to contact the original copyright holder directly and try to get at least an emailed agreement of a personal license to ensure you're ok.

 

I hold that a game does not count as an adaption of a model. However, I have emailed Ryzom directly, and hope to hear their take and their intent directly from them.

 

This is too tricky and I don't want my customers ending up using sample art from my packages that they thought where covered under the Unity AS lic while the original lic sais different; so I'll rather stay away from including anything not made by me. Luckily an artist friend of mine said I can include some free samples from his next art package for UniRPG so that I can have better looking samples, now I just need to sort out characters and monsters for the next update's samples - cubemen, here we come .

 

I have already gotten a response.

Here is my query:

And the response:

So it is clear it is OK to use in a commercial game without forcing the game to become CC3.0-SA. Only if you modify the model or texture do you need to distribute it.

 

Not to belabor a point, but... it's not clear that CC-SA lets you sell a commercial game; it's only clear that the Ryzom guy says it's ok. The actual authors of the CC licenses have a blanket statement of "CC doesn't work well when it comes to software" and "We officially can not give legal advice on whether you can use CC in software". It's one of the most commonly asked questions of CC, and they strangely do not answer it anywhere in their FAQ or on their page. That's because they themselves don't know the legality of their own license. It has not yet been challenged in court, and lawyers usually warn big companies away from using any copyleft because of the unknown legalities. Here's a quote from one of the authors of CC himself:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8893135/using-cc-by-sa-music-in-a-closed-source-game

That about spells it out... no one is sure of the legality, because copyright / copyleft itself is still pretty vague about derivative works. What actually happens in real life most of the time when someone gets sued for copyright infringement, is whoever has the highest paid lawyers generally wins. Big corporations usually maneuver in court until one side gives up and agrees to a settlement with the other because that would be cheaper than continuing to pay lawyers, so a lot of it ends up never making it to a final verdict. People who distribute their art under CC generally aren't particularly sue-happy and are fine with sharing, which is why they use CC in the first place, so as far as I know no one has taken anyone else to court over abuse of a CC license.

The best recommendation is to contact the holder of the copyright and make sure you have their permission, even if it's under a license like CC-SA. An email from someone saying "Sure you can sell it in a game, that's fine" will hold up in court much better than a copyleft license in case they ever get the itch to sue you. If you absolutely can't get a yes or no from the original owner, talk to an actual lawyer if you think you might make enough money to be a worthwhile target for suing.

 

Sure - using it for software is bad. But these are the models. Still, I was only referring to the Ryzom assets above, and it is clear it is fine in this case. I am not a lawyer, just a guy who asked for (and got) clarification from Ryzom. I suggest that anyone who uses any sort of media like this get clarification and/or consult with a lawyer if there is any question.