Report sellers who infringe copyrights!

Posts: 32 · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 6:24 pm

This is not selling of copyrighted materials but it's definately file sharing gone bad.

http://www.4shared.com/network/search.jsp?sortType=1&sortOrder=1&sortm ode=2&searchName=%22d%26d%22&searchmode=2&searchName=%22d%26d%22&searc hDescription=&searchExtention=&sizeCriteria=atleast&sizevalue=10&start =0

(1473 total) shared documents with just d&d in the titles.

I reported some of it but does anyone know how to get this stuff off their site.

Posts: 46 · Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:26 pm

Malakai wrote:

This is not selling of copyrighted materials but it's definately file sharing gone bad.

http://www.4shared.com/network/search.jsp?sortType=1&sortOrder=1&sortm ode=2&searchName=%22d%26d%22&searchmode=2&searchName=%22d%26d%22&searc hDescription=&searchExtention=&sizeCriteria=atleast&sizevalue=10&start =0

(1473 total) shared documents with just d&d in the titles.

I reported some of it but does anyone know how to get this stuff off their site.

if you're worried about file sharing, i think your time might be better spent writing a cancel-bot in alt.rpg.xxxxxx, e-books are everywhere.

Posts: 3193 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 5:35 am

http://cgi.ebay.com/TSR-Original-Dungeons-Dragons-1974-and-beyond-CD-P DF_W0QQitemZ360035570625QQihZ023QQcategoryZ1183QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1 QQcmdZViewItem

Needs to be reported.

ShaneG.

Posts: 579 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 7:28 am

Plaag wrote:

http://cgi.ebay.com/TSR-Original-Dungeons-Dragons-1974-and-beyond-CD-P DF_W0QQitemZ360035570625QQihZ023QQcategoryZ1183QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1 QQcmdZViewItem

Needs to be reported.

ShaneG.

A pity though. The guy made a nice work with the artwork.

Posts: 51 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 10:24 am

Plaag wrote:

http://cgi.ebay.com/TSR-Original-Dungeons-Dragons-1974-and-beyond-CD-P DF_W0QQitemZ360035570625QQihZ023QQcategoryZ1183QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1 QQcmdZViewItem

Needs to be reported.

ShaneG.

Looks like this guy has quite the .pdf product line: http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZhu11114

And has had more than a few sales: http://feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFeedback2&userid=hu11114 &ftab=AllFeedback&myworld=true

Posts: 2526 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 11:19 am

This is the guy that's been selling the Ares Magazine Archive for years. Are the SPI products legit? Does anyone know if he was in anyway involved with SPI and has permission?

Posts: 4717 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 4:22 pm

If someone can assure me that buyers cannot get negged, I'll buy two of them and hit him with negs.

Posts: 2339 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 4:23 pm

mbassoc2003 wrote:

This is the guy that's been selling the Ares Magazine Archive for years. Are the SPI products legit? Does anyone know if he was in anyway involved with SPI and has permission?

I strongly doubt that he has permission. Since TSR bought out SPI and was then bought out by Wotc and Hasbro, I think Hasbro probably owns the rights to it now.

Some of this sellers other compilations include GDW Twilight 2000 stuff and the TSR stuff so its probably all done without permission.

Posts: 2339 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 4:24 pm

Deadlord39 wrote:

If someone can assure me that buyers cannot get negged, I'll buy two of them and hit him with negs.

I don't think that this has come into effect yet.

Posts: 2616 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 5:19 pm

The biggest clue as to why these compilations are never legal: if the companies that own the rights were interested in supporting a project of this sort, they would back it up with publicity and advertising.

The D&D one, for example: why wouldn't WotC/Hasborg send out a press release to the various news sites (free) and at least advertise it on their own site (free). Answer: they aren't involved; it's a bootleg product.

The Dragon Archive is the only legal one I can think of ... the rest is just random guys with DVD-burning computers.

Posts: 2564 · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 5:53 pm

Mars wrote:

I strongly doubt that he has permission. Since TSR bought out SPI and was then bought out by Wotc and Hasbro, I think Hasbro probably owns the rights to it now.

Some of this sellers other compilations include GDW Twilight 2000 stuff and the TSR stuff so its probably all done without permission.

I noticed the seller no longer has the Twilight 2000 compilations available but had them up about a week ago. Far Future Enterprises sells the compilations on their website here:

http://www.farfuture.net/t2kv1.html

But the ones that the Ebay seller has up look nothing like the ones FFE sells. And his versions are DVD while the FFE versions are CD-ROM. The next time the seller has them on Ebay it might be worth sending Marc Milller a heads up (since I believe he is at least part owner of FFE) and report the infringement to him as well. A nice cease and desist email to the seller and Ebay would probably be extremely effective.

Posts: 161 · Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2008 4:05 am

Xaxaxe wrote:

The Dragon Archive is the only legal one I can think of ...

And boy did they pay for that one. We all won with the wonderful Hackmaster, but it's probably why they'll never do a Dungeon compilation.

Posts: 508 · Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2008 1:27 pm

Busman wrote:

And boy did they pay for that one.

They did? What happened with it?

Posts: 2339 · Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2008 2:39 pm

sauromatian wrote:

They did? What happened with it?

TSR/WotC had to pay half a million dollars to authors etc for royalties.

Posts: 3193 · Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2008 4:29 pm

Course it also allowed Kenzer, since the Dragon Magazines had the KotD comics in them, to get special rights for creating Hackmaster versions of old D&D modules. Course then WotC learned they only had to delay the approval process of those modules and Kenzer was forced to abandon that type of material.

ShaneG.

Posts: 46 · Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2008 6:27 pm

Plaag wrote:

Course it also allowed Kenzer, since the Dragon Magazines had the KotD comics in them, to get special rights for creating Hackmaster versions of old D&D modules. Course then WotC learned they only had to delay the approval process of those modules and Kenzer was forced to abandon that type of material.

ShaneG.

never knew that. for anyone lazier than i am, here is the wiki entry that seems to nicely sum up the 'whys' of shane's post

"Kenzer & Company received many requests from fans of the comic to produce an actual HackMaster game, but initially they thought that licensing Dungeons & Dragons would be impossible. However, when they asked Wizards of the Coast about creating a derivative work, they reached an agreement that led in 2001 to the publication of HackMaster 4th Edition, sometimes ironically referred to as the most realistic and complete set of role-playing rules in existence.[citation needed]

K&C acquired the rights to produce HackMaster after the Dragon Magazine Archive software was published where Wizards of the Coast failed to get permission to reprint many of the original articles such as the Knights of the Dinner Table comic in the electronic media archive. A lawsuit was settled out of court, and K&C started producing HackMaster afterwards. In part of that ability to use AD&D rules, K&C is required to maintain a higher level of humor than in the Knights of the Dinner Table comic for products that are revised from previous AD&D material.[citation needed] Completely original works for Hackmaster are not subject to this restriction imposed by Wizards of the Coast.

Whereas Wizards of the Coast overhauled the rules for 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons, Kenzer & Company took the opposite action by revising the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons First and Second Edition rules (including various supplements such as 1st Edition Unearthed Arcana and Oriental Adventures and the mid-90's Skills & Powers supplements) into a more coherent system and adding an element of parody. However, as a nod to the version from the comic, the first edition of Hackmaster was published as the 4th Edition."

Posts: 3193 · Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2008 6:56 pm

Yeah basically it all happened last year, Kenzer got fed up with having no response. Course they then abandoned all d20, even going so far as to sell everything with the d20 logo for cheap. I don't visit their boards/site much anymore, but I think they are still producing Kalamar stuff though not sure if its their own system or True20.

ShaneG.

Posts: 24 · Posted: Fri Apr 04, 2008 9:27 pm

Plaag wrote:

Yeah basically it all happened last year, Kenzer got fed up with having no response. Course they then abandoned all d20, even going so far as to sell everything with the d20 logo for cheap. I don't visit their boards/site much anymore, but I think they are still producing Kalamar stuff though not sure if its their own system or True20.

ShaneG.

Hi, new poster here. KenzerCo decided not to renew their WotC/Hasbro license (for the reasons already mentioned by previous posters).

There is a Hackmaster 5th Ed. in the works, previews have been promised to appear in Hackjournal this year (release date is still unknown, but maybe/probably/hopefully next year). As far as I know, KenzerCo are making Kalamar the officiel campaign world for Hackmaster 5th Ed.

Posts: 3999 · Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 6:51 pm

I can imagine that TSR might have had to pay cover artists or cartoon artists for reprints of the work in electronic format.

TSR always paid for complete rights to any articles or modules they published. They would have had the right to reprint those at will.

Posts: 710 · Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 6:05 am

Big lot of Shadowrun pdfs on eBay.uk:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/68-Shadowrun-RPG-Books-Manuals-in-PDF-format_W0Q QitemZ290225386101QQihZ019QQcategoryZ44111QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmd ZViewItem