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Ask Slashdot: Where Can I Buy Legal Game ROMs?
PktLoss writes "I'm interested in building an arcade machine, following the footsteps of Cmdr Taco among many others. Not being all that interested in piracy, I need to find somewhere to buy games. StarROMs used to be the kind of thing I was looking for, though with an incredibly short catalog. The MAME people have a few available for free (non-commercial), but this isn't going to sate my needs. There's an entire cottage industry supporting this goal. People are ready to sell me plans, kits, buttons, joy sticks, glass marquees, and entire machines. That's fantastic, but where can I get the games? I refuse to believe that this entire industry is built on piracy."
This raises an interesting legal question. If I have a copy of a missing TV show episode, what claim would the copyright owner have if they don't have a copy? If I distribute it I'm violating the copyright. But I'm not taking anything from the owner because they can't do the same. The whole point of copyright is to preserve the right to distribute for the owners. In particular, it's NOT to prevent old episodes from being watched so that people will watch new episodes. Copyright is only for protecting that work, not other works using the same trademarks or characters.
The idea of abandonment comes up because some of us rightly point out that this concept exists for real property. So when we see people try to conflate creative works with real property, we bring this idea into the discussion. Media moguls want all of the upside of property as a natural right but none of the possible downsides of it of course.
So things like taxes and squatting are left for the rest of us to consider.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.