Indie Lineage 2 Servers Shut Down

Gamasutra reports on efforts by NCSoft and the FBI to shut down independently-run Lineage 2 servers. The servers, run by an outfit called 'L2Extreme' were making a profit off of the unauthorized MMOG operation. Gamasutra had the chance to talk with FBI agent Thompson from Austin office. From the article: "Regarding the Lineage II server code, Thompson explained that it was 'really not determined' who had originally made it available, but the L2Extreme creators were 'certainly someone who was using [NCSoft's proprietary code] — that is at least part of the investigation.'"

Comments

I just felt a disturbance in the force

[elrous0]

...as if a million South Koreans cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

-Eric

Re:Ars and UO

[RasputinAXP]

I know that it's silly to assume that /.'ers have read the article, but had you clicked on the damned link, you'd have seen that he admitted it:

Jason Chambless is the original creator of L2Extreme. He played beta testing retail and one day found out that the Lineage II server files had been leaked. He liked the game so much, he then decided to use one of his spare computers to host the game.

So...admission of guilt is proof, n'est-ce pas?

Indie?

[the_demiurge]

These guys weren't so much independent game developers as guys who happened to get the leaked source code for the Lineage 2 servers.

Re:What the ??

[tlhIngan]

Maybe I am clueless, but that seems a little high... Even if the claimed 500k registered L2Extreme users downloaded the client each 1 time, that would mean it costs them close to $2 to upload the file each time.

It's more like besides the initial download, all the little incremental downloads as well (patches, updates, etc), which were hosted by NCSoft.

It's more akin to some website linking against photos you host on your website - you're stuck with the bills, and they profit. Of course, why NCSoft couldn't push an update, I don't know.

I find the Ars Technica article informative.

It's partially NCSoft's fault...

[psychrono]

The reason being, and I know I'm not the only one that thinks this, is because NCSoft did NOT maintain their servers, with botters and hackers running rampant throughout their servers, even to this day and because of this, many of the 'legit' players left the retail servers for these private servers. I have played on a handful of private servers, and I was simply amazed how much effort these people put in to stop cheating, botting, etc. Sure, they weren't 100% successful, but if they can maintain a server of higher quality than a retail server (which costs to play monthly, whereas free servers accept donations, but are not required by any means), then that says something about the way NCSoft is maintaining their service, in my opinion anyways.

It's also worth noting that not just koreans play this game... there is a huge populace of spanish speaking, european, as well as north american people that play this game, especially on these 'indie' servers.

Re:Ars and UO

[Thalagyrt]

I've seen the files myself, worked with Jason a few years ago just for kicks - bored college student. They're definitely leaked, and completely illegal to use. There are whole forums dedicated to it, known in the L2 server scene as L2Off. I personally run a L2 server using an emulator, L2J, which uses no copyrighted files or whatnot and is not illegal. It is, however, a violation of the TOS to connect to it with the official client, but that just means that they can deny you play on the retail servers. Breach of a TOS is not a legal issue. Using the emulator is completely different from using stolen files - which is what Jason did. He and the other guy that ran it with him were pulling in thousands of dollars a month in donations, and the whole way it was run was very very corrupt. Nevermind the legal issues, the rest of the stuff they did was screwed up as well. I could go on and on but I see no point. I do know that personally when I saw the L2X site taken down last week I was happy as hell, they finally got what they deserved.

Re:Why Say "Indie"?

[radarjd]

That's not theft. It's copyright infringement. Illegal yes, but not theft. Theft is depriving someone of property they own. IP is not property that can be owned; you can only hold the rights to distribute it.

This has always been a curious argument to me. All property is like a bundle of rights. For example, you can lease your land to someone else. That person does not have all the rights to the land, but they do possess some rights, even against the true owner.

Or, let's say you have a car. You can sell that car to someone, that is, sell all the rights you possess to that car to someone. You can also transfer something less than all the rights you possess. For example, you could allow someone use of the car for a particular fee, or for a particular period of time.

A copyright is similarly a piece of property. The thing the copyright protects is not tangible, to be sure, but the copyright itself is most certainly property. You can sell it, or you can transfer certain rights that it encompasses.

If you're arguing over nominclature, the word "theft" can be a legally specific term defined in a certain way in a state's criminal code, but that is hardly dispositive of the issue. It might also be "criminal conversion" or "larceny".

In any case, copyright infringement does indeed involve depriving someone of a right granted by law, and that is the exclusive right to copy, distribute, perform, etc. that work (http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/ usc_sec_17_00000106----000-.html). If someone besides the copyright holder performs one of those actions, the copyright holder is deprived of the exclusive right. There are, of course, defenses to violation of that right, just as there are defenses to theft. It does not make it less of a property right.