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Lucas Confuses ScummVM With Abandonware
Anonymous Coward writes: "Seems LucasArts finally noticed ScummVm although they seem to be confused about what it is.
ScummVM is a 'virtual machine'(yes like Java) that allows you to play scumm games (Monkey Island, for example) in modern OS (Linux, BSD, err Windows XP) and weird machines like PDAs and the Dreamcast, but Lucas have confused them with an abandonware site."
(sorry, it had to be said)
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Although I'm glad that more people are noticing this, the natural tendency at Slashdot is to fire off an e-mail campaign, which is exactly what is not needed in this case.
Lucasarts has made a mistake. As was mentioned on the mailing list, they have to deal with hundreds of Abandonware sites weekly.
From their quotes, Lucas thought that ScummVM was re-distributing the original engine, and saying it was under the GPL.
I believe this situation will soon be resolved calmly, but a hundred "You SUCK!" e-mail cannot help.
Colin Davis
LeChuck is a pirate. I seriously doubt he would be involved in anti-warez activity of any kind.
Duh.
I believe I did mention both of these points, in the second paragraph... In any case, this first volly seems to be a simple misunderstanding regarding the nature of ScummVM... However I fully expect LucasArts to probably persue legal action now they are aware it's more than simply abandonware. I'm being hopeful that they will just drop it, but the legal teams of the wonderful Lucas group of companies seem to be very trigger-happy when it comes to lawsuits. This first letter wasn't actually a legal threat. They have already asked SourceForge to remove our site, but hopefully it won't come to that. Their original letter was asking for the removal of something that simply doesn't exist - downloadable copies of LucasArts software. At least that wonderful four letter acronym we all have come to love and hate (you know, the one beginning with 'D' that sounds like a Village People song?) hasn't come into it. Yet. (Oh, and to reply to another reply regarding my grammer and spelling.. hey, I wrote the response after waking up at 6am, rolling over and noticing the flashing message in my ssh session :)
- James 'Ender' Brown
Project Leader,
ScummVM
(Doesn't this sound all official?)
INSERT IANAL DISCLAIMER.
This is a boiler plate letter. They had a legal assitant (billing rate: usually under $100. Pay rate: $15? plus overtime.) do the research on the web. Criteria: does this allow someone to play LEC games? If yes, fill in the blanks and send the letter. Charge the client. Go home happy.
Given the response, this may get boiled up to a summer associate (hasn't passed the bar but has somewhat of a clue regarding the law) (bill rate: $125) or (egads!) and associate (a *real* lawyer) (bill rate $150 min.) who will weigh the ScummVM developers claims and decide wether to persue.
If they investigate the research on the "applicable state laws" will be given to a Legal assistant or a summer associate and that will determine the amount of work necessary to determine if ScummVM is an actual infringement.
I'm not saying LEC is poor, but I doubt they will waste their money past here.
Any IP lawyers who would like to clarify?
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Once upon a time, there was a company that had a bunch of games that ran under a virtual machine. Eventually, people who loved those games reverse-engineered the virtual machine and wrote interpreters for the VM that ran on everything and anything, from Palms to BeOS to OS/2. And the company decided that that was okay.
The company was Activision, which bought up Infocom in the late 1980s. Remember all those Infocom text adventures? People reverse-engineered the virtual machine, known as the z-machine, and wrote plenty of z-machine interpreters, all of which are freely available. Activision apparently decided that this was fine with them, as long as the games themselves weren't being distributed.
Now LucasArts is in a similar situation. Will they be as calm about a new VM interpreter as Activision was? Sadly, I'm not so sure.
The reply to lucas arts states:
We mean no ill harm to LucasArts, and it is well known that many people (at least 50 to my knowledge, although I am sure there are many more) have brought classic LEC games simply to play them using our software.
which clearly mentions that people purchase the original software to play using ScummVM. And...
ScummVM is a valid clone of the SPU engine, designed to facitiate the playing of LucasArts adventures on modern machines and operating systems.
Which I think also clearly states that ScummVM is a clone of SPU, and not the original engine, or any original game content.
Also their FAQ clearly states in section 2:
1. Do I need original CD or Floppy disks?Most definitely. ScummVM won't work without them. If you would like to buy these games, we suggest you browse Ebay. Do not ask the ScummVM team where you can download the full versions of Lucas Arts games. These requests will be ignored.
What else should they have done? A little "research" into the site would quickly have shown that this is not an abandonware site.
If you ever drop your keys into a river of molten lava, let'em go, because, man, they're gone.
Sorry, Offtopic, but anyone else remember when Lucasarts games were this funny? Heck, I don't think you can even put that third line of text in a game nowadays.
(IIRC, what Elaine had asked Guybrush in that screenshot was something like "What have we learned from all of this?" at the end of the game.)
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Paraphrased:
While this would be true, it could still be argued (successfully) that the emulator would have a negative impact on potential future revenue of LucasArts products, such as a LucasArts Classics package for BSD.
There are 2 arguments that the scummVM ppl need to make. However, they only made one of these arguments.
1. ScummVM is an emulator, and was created using legally valid and sound reverse engineering techniques. (this agument they made)
2. ScummVM was created as an academic exercise in software and reverse engineering techniques. As such, ScummVM is not bound to the DMCA, or any other such laws, as it is considered a form of free speech, and is protected under First Amendment Rights.
-Dennis
... I've bought the DotT / Sam & Max 2 in 1 pack; it doesn't work, because the .exe files are so old and can't cope with modern hardware. LucasArts provide patches, which work, sort of...
I've also bought the Monkey Island 1, 2 and 3 pack, and the result with 1 and 2 is the same. Doesn't work out of the box, works, sort of, once you get the patch. The patch at least gets the game running, but the sound is decidedly dodgy. I don't even want to think about what happens to WinXP users...
But now there is ScummVM. All these games run better than they did in the first place, they run on machines and OSes that LucasArts never bothered with, and they run perfectly.
What LucasArts should do with ScummVM is write the authors a great big thank-you letter and start bundling it with all their old games. There's no reason why they shouldn't. Trying to shut down a project that's doing for free what you should have done a long time ago is just plain silly.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
My point was not that it does not become public domain, but that there is no explicit legal requirement for the release of the material to the public.
That is to say, when (if) Disney's Copyright on Micky Mouse expires, there is no legal requirement that they hand over their Micky Mouse archives (or a copy thereof) to some sort of public institution. If you happen to HAVE a copy - sure, go ahead and copy it. But getting your hands on it may not be such a simple matter.
Abandonware is a case in point. Many games available on Abandonware sites do not exist somewhere in corporate archives, because the game companies simply went under -- there was no sale of assets, not buy-out by a bigger company. Just a quite whimper. Even though there was a threat (to society) of that information being lost forever ... there was no attempt or requirement to make it public.
Talking about software specifically, where is there any implication or requirement for (say) the source code to be made public? Simple, there isn't. No more than an author could be expected to make his/her notes public when Copyright expires (okay, this would be posthumous anyway).
So here you have the basis of the problem: Copyright is a LEGAL measure to prevent you from distributing something; but when Copyright expires you have no LEGAL resource to FORCE distribution. If the (elapsed) owner simply doesn't make a copy available, you can't force him to.
i-name =twylite [http://public.xdi.org/=twylite], see idcommons.net
Simple excuse. I'm Australian. Mate!
/. is responsible for the bad injokes used within this message.
(And my excuse for other Australians is that I'm Tasmanian.)
((And my excuse for Tasmanians is that... oh never mind, it's probably from YOUR side of the family anyway)).
- James 'Ender' Brown
Lead Developer, ScummVM
Disclaimer: Neither ScummVM nor
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