In Europe it's simple
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| jezuch Dec 05, 2007 4:49 PM EDT |
Under European tradition of law you can only sell financial rights to your work, but retain so-called "moral rights" (which you can't ever lose). So if you see that your work is being used "inapropriately", you have the right to stop it. Even if you "sold" it. At least that's how I remember it :) [And BTW, this law is not called "copyright" here, but more like "authorship right", at least in Poland, don't know about other countries] |
| dinotrac Dec 05, 2007 6:28 PM EDT |
There is a "moral rights" concept in American copyright as well, but I'm not aware that it has ever been applied to software. Doesn't mean it hasn't -- I don't keep up real well. |
| azerthoth Dec 05, 2007 6:43 PM EDT |
/me really wishes dino wouldn't use the word moral in reference to the US legal system. |
| Sander_Marechal Dec 05, 2007 10:32 PM EDT |
Not all countries in Europe have it. The Netherlands do not IIRC. But Germany does. Which was a real problem recently. Those non-transferable authorship rights caused a pretty cool hobby movie to be banned from publication. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7010484.stm |
| dinotrac Dec 06, 2007 4:59 AM EDT |
Sander - The key part of that story is this: >A misunderstanding meant that filming on Damnatus continued after Games Workshop had asked Mr Vu and his colleagues to stop. Sounds like somebody said, "Ha! Just try and stop us," and got taken up on the challenge. I'm confused about the moral rights issue insofar as they preclude assignment of rights to show the movie and wonder if that is just a smokescreen. It seems clear that the authors can license their rights. Basic lesson : If you're going to make a movie based on somebody else's material, make sure they're ok with it first. By ok, I mean in writing with i's dotted and t's crossed. |
| Sander_Marechal Dec 06, 2007 5:09 AM EDT |
@dino: You should read the Damnatus forums. Games Workshop was perfectly happy to allow Damnatus to be released, even though they initially said no. One condition: All rights had to be signed over to Games Workshop. Problem: In germany, some rights (the "moral" rights a.k.a. creator/author rights discussed earlier in this thread) cannot be signed over under German law. So now Damnatus is finished but cannot be released. |
| dinotrac Dec 06, 2007 6:38 AM EDT |
>In germany, some rights (the "moral" rights a.k.a. creator/author rights discussed earlier in this thread) cannot be signed over under German law. So now Damnatus is finished but cannot be released. Makes no sense at all. Things get published and things get signed over all the time in Germany and elsewhere. Sounds like pretense to me. By that, I mean this: Hey!!! We don't want to encourage things like this movie, but we don't want to look like complete jerks, either. So...let's lean on the author's moral rights. or... We don't want this movie released. What we really want to do is to destroy it and everything associated with it OR we want to use parts of it in ways that the authors would never like. Wait...moral rights prevent us from destroying it, etc... |
| jdixon Dec 06, 2007 6:50 AM EDT |
... OR we want to use parts of it in ways that the authors would never like. Wait...moral rights prevent us from destroying it, etc... Bingo. At least to this uninformed outside observer. |
| Sander_Marechal Dec 06, 2007 6:50 AM EDT |
Dino, read this ars technica story. It's a bit clearer: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071107-when-fan-art-m...Quoting:Games Workshop is concerned that it could lose control of the Warhammer 40000 IP if it allows Damnatus to be distributed. The creators of the film have offered to assign the copyrights for the movie to Games Workshop so that the company won't have to give up any Warhammer rights in order to permit showing of the film. In a recent interview with the BBC, GW licensing head Andy Jones said that the company cannot accommodate the amateur filmmakers under those terms, because German copyright law doesn't make it possible for content creators to cede certain rights. See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authors'_rights |
| jezuch Dec 06, 2007 1:55 PM EDT |
Quoting:Games Workshop is concerned that it could lose control of the Warhammer 40000 IP if it allows Damnatus to be distributed. Stupid question: how? |
| Sander_Marechal Dec 07, 2007 12:05 AM EDT |
Quoting:Stupid question: how? No idea. The only thing that I can come up with is that if Games Workshop wants to do something immoral with the movie or the original characters from the movie, the authors could say "no". Whatever immoral means in this context. |
| dinotrac Dec 07, 2007 7:28 AM EDT |
German law does seem to be a bit difficult to deal with, but I still have trouble understanding the problem. GW cannot lose rights to their own stuff. The makers of the movie, even if they create characters and items of their own, cannot simply appropriate the part that belongs to GW -- or, apparently, the people who make up GW -- because, if things are what they seem, GW can't own any rights. Seems to me the GW folks already own the portion of rights that directly relates to their game. The movie makers had no power to lift that without a license grant. The part not belonging to GW is the part specific to the movie and not lifted from the games. For the life of me, I can't imagine what form of moral rights poses a problem for license that specific content for the purpose of distributing and promoting a film. I smell a smokescreen. |
| Sander_Marechal Dec 08, 2007 12:44 AM EDT |
IMHO not as much a smokescreen as a misunderstanding of the law and what I like to refer to as "IP greed". I can think of quite a few ways to neuter the german "author's right" clause. For example, the Damnatus creators and GW could have signed a contract, stipulating that the Damnatus authors will not enforce their author's right against GW on penalty of a large sum of money and/or all related costs.Quoting:The part not belonging to GW is the part specific to the movie and not lifted from the games. For the life of me, I can't imagine what form of moral rights poses a problem for license that specific content for the purpose of distributing and promoting a film. Not for the purpose of distributing and promoting the film. But GW could have wanted to use the storyline and characters from the movie in some other way. That portion is impacted by the "author's rights". To give a hyperbole example: What if GW wanted to make a porn version of the film, starring the same characters? The Damnatus authors could shut it down using their German Author's Rights. It's about what other things GW can do with the IP from the movie. |
| dinotrac Dec 08, 2007 5:45 AM EDT |
> But GW could have wanted to use the storyline and characters from the movie in some other way. But it's real hard to feel sympathy for that. Storyline and characters lifted from somebody else's work? Let them license it. That's permitted, even in Germany. |
| jdixon Dec 08, 2007 11:49 AM EDT |
> But GW could have wanted to use the storyline and characters from the movie in some other way. So, because GW can't use someone else's work in any way they want, they won't let them use GW's work at all. Yeah, that sounds fair, doesn't it? |
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