Practical IP Law for Indie Developers 301: Plain Scary Edition
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- Опубліковано 13 тра 2018
- In this 2018 GDC session, lawyer Christopher Reid gives indie developers a practical understanding of copyright, trademarks, and other intellectual property relevant to game development, and explains how these types of IP work, why indies should care, how they can protect themselves, and what practical tools they have when there's a dispute. This talk helps developers understand copyright infringement, fair use, protecting game and company names, let's plays, and more.
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Post-conference correction to one of my Q&A answers: Trademarks registered in the supplemental register ARE entitled to use the ® symbol. Sorry about the error folks!
No problem, thank you for the great talk! Have a nice day !
One thing I would've touched on, as it's bitten a few Studios / Publishers I've been with in the past is "International Registration" … as all too often you'll check local Trademarks / Registration (for example I regularly check UK / EU, as that's where I'm based) but you'll tend to overlook or forget say NA, JP, Oceanic, etc.
As it's common practise to simply release to "All Regions" at once., it's more important to do this ASAP (at least look into it) unlike 20 years ago where we're handle it on a Region-by-Region Basis with each Localisation.
I'd also make a note of how to tackle things like Devlogs, Patreon (Or Crowdfund Campaigns), etc. as you're releasing a lot information that unless you get to market quickly can essentially be sniped. (Overwatch / Paladins is a good example) … Early Access / Preview Access, might seem like a good approach to grow funding to help complete a project *but* it places you in a bit of a Grey Area where you can be Legally Trolled (especially in certain Regions, such-as Germany); where despite being first to Market, because you're not Legally Acknowledging "Release" but instead are providing a Paid Access to a "Development" Build (i.e. Pre-Retail) then someone providing an Asset Flip Clone that Infringes / Beats you to Marking; regardless if their version is a broken mess in worse shape than yours, that they officially state it's "Released" is what can often matter.
Don't assume that Judges will actually know or be well versed enough to side with you... but also remember even *IF* you do win that case, you might have to also admit that Early Access is Retail (at least in your case) to succeed in said Case., this in-turn means it opens you up being beholden to Consumer Rights on your Investment Capital; which is a minefield in of itself.
Great point - the very tight time limit didn't let me get into any non-US matters, but you're right. If budget permits, tackling all likely jurisdictions for TM registration is usually a good idea.
@@chrisreidlaw2526 maby do a video about the ouside of us? :D Btw Awsome videos of you :)
Very informative conference, and I really like the your "flow" and the way you highlight certain concepts. I'm just a bit disappointed you don't have a UA-cam channel with more in-depth videos or covering more topics haha, would love to hear and learn more about Law in the video game industry
Excellent talk. Easily the clearest explanation of these kinds of laws that I've ever heard.
Very informative, one of the best talks on game IP. Thank you so much!
He’s so good.
oh my god this guy is a riot, this is exactly my type of humor. Also he's basically on-point so time to link this around.
Game devs, an important thing - when it comes to copyright, PICK YOUR BATTLES. Going on a pissy offended artist crusade brought on by jokes, parodies, and negative reviews will only damage you and your work further. Remember Tommy Wiseau's war with the Nostalgia Critic.
What about lewdity?
very informative, but I can't help but feel sad when I hear the guy say "This is helpful, because it allows us to sue people for a lot of money" even if it's just meant to be used as a tool to warn people.
It shouldn't be possible for devs to put a patent on something like the minigames that used to appear during loading screens, limiting other's creativity for fear of people without it.
Wow that sounds ridiculous, someone patent that feature? EA and Activision have patented psychological effects to make people spend money on micrtransaction/premium currency, but patenting games in loading screen is also equally as shitty. Doesn't seem right to me man :(
Alvin Cast SEGA patented and enforced having arrows pointing towards where to drive.. artistic choices shouldn’t be patented, and game mechanics are a form of artistic representation..
@@HueghMungus It ran out a few years ago. We're all good now.
What most people actually do is just aim and shoot a big, fat, DMCA complaint at it.
Chasing people and suing for damages is usually not something you do, because:
- Most of the time, they haven't made a lot of money with it.
- The times they _have_ made a lot of money with it, they're usually in China or other "copy havens" were copyright law is sendomly enforced, and it makes no sense to fight it.
No guy from Michigan is going to make millions on your idea, unless they're incredibly stupid and are actually seeking trouble. They've either made a few thousand dollars with some crappy phone app, in which case you should take them down and call it a day, or they're Chinese, in which case you are fucked and you're better off just trying to remove it from Western stores as much as you can.
@@DudeWatIsThis funny how your comment reminded me of this topic now that Warner put a patent on the nemesis system, probably one of the most innovating features seen in recent years and the only saving grace of the games it's in, and we're not allowed to build on it until 2035 at least.
Hopefully we find a way to circumvent the definition given in the patent, but in a way, the fact this was allowed to happen means it will happen again.
Great super informative talk with a beautiful presentation.. easy to understand and follow
Great talk!
Amazing lecture!
Would be interested for the same kind of things but for Europe (and even elsewhere).
It's mostly the same, at least where it counts (copyright, trademark and trade secrets).
Thanks for your talk! So useful for a newbie like me. You explain very well complex thing!
Great vid!
First off thanks for giving a great talk, lots of relevant advice put in a way that is easy to understand. I have one question for you: If I use works in the public domain or with a CC0 license (sound effects, images, 3d materials) and alter them (give a 3d model I've created a CC0 material, alter a sound effect in audacity) can I claim copyright on the altered work or does it stay in the public domain?
Thanks for watching! I'd have to review the specifics of the current CC0 license to know what your obligations are regarding edits. Regarding the public domain, assuming all the original material really was in the public domain, than something you create from that would be your own, protect-able work of original authorship (assuming it was altered enough to really count as a separate work. This is why you can have a bunch of different takes on, say, Pride & Prejudice, and you are not allowed to just distribute free copies of the BBC series, even though the underlying book is in the public domain (the series is not).
@@chrisreidlaw2526, That makes sense. It didn't occur to me that movies based on books in the public domain are akin to the work I'm asking about. Thanks for the response!
CC0 allows you to own the derivative works. It waives all original rights.
Any other creative commons license requires at least attribution. CCA can be used for whatever you want so long as you attribute. You can even sell derivatives or make your own edits. You can also re-license the edits in a different way so long as it preserves that attribution. There are also non-commercial varients which are very limited.
Share-alike is weird. With art, any edits also have to be made available under the same license. (So someone else could rip that edited asset legally.)
With code that mandates the game be open source. You also have to note that somewhere. (License in a text file + the general credits/attribution.)
But you can sell products using them, or access to the edit.
it works like public domain.
good stuff
Great talk, liked the clarification of some of those myths on fair use.
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it.
What if i own a logo
then i wanted to use the same logo but with different coloring or make it stretched or edited little bit, do i have to register the new one? even tho i may use both logos.
This really depends on what exactly you filed with the PTO in the first place. For design (logo) marks, you have the option, or not, of claiming color as a feature of the mark. Generally, you'd start by not having color, since that means you can have protection for that mark no matter what color scheme you're using with it. I would think that if the marks are only slightly distorted it would not be an issue, but at the end of the day, such a question would only come up in the case of some TM dispute - so you'd be trying to sue someone who used a slightly stretched version of your logo, and they would argue it was different enough. The thing is, the standard here is not like patent ("does this exactly match the thing that was registered as protected" but rather "likelihood of confusion" [by consumers]. All sorts of small factors can affect this in the course of a lawsuit, but there's a decent amount of common sense you can use at least as a first pass. If the other logo would confuse someone as to whether it was supposed to be from the same company/source, then there's likely a problem.
@Chris Reid Law,
How safe are the indie game companies that develop JRPG monster catchers that are similar to Pokemon, like Nexomon or Micromon, in terms of world exploration and specific game mechanics? I wanted to make one of these kinds of games, because they seem like fun, but I may be a little bit concerned about later being charged with infringement ,due to the "too similar" gray area. I know you said that game mechanics can't be copyrighted, but are there any other pitfalls I'm not looking at here, or should this be okay as long as I use different graphics, music, story, and slightly different gimmicks?
In this particular instance, it doesn't really matter whether you would prevail in court - you're never going to make it to the end of the case because you'll run out of money. Your safety, such as it is, would be in a) not being successful enough to be worth suing, and b) making the case as difficult as possible to make for Pokemon/Nintendo by being as distinct as you can manage. Remember, they don't have a patent on catching creatures - they do have trademark rights to 'Pokemon' and copyright to all the assets. I expect having the name of 'Anything-mon' to be too close - your only chance of surviving a lawsuit would be to have it dismissed by the judge outright as groundless with no hope of success, and the argument that 'anything-mon' is potentially confusing clearly has a chance of succeeding. Not ripping off their assets is obvious. You can make a pokemon clone and be relatively safe if you don't use their assets or rip them off in some way trying to be clever *and* don't trade on the similarity of the name.
Enjoyed the trilogy
Interesting. Can you patent mathematical equations / algorithms? For example for compression or encryption? I heard Hello Games almost got into trouble for admitting to use an algorithm for procedurally generating NMS creatures, designed by some professor in Belgium or whatever.
The answer gets very complicated, and it differs per jurisdiction. And even in the US, where we do permit software patents, how strong they are changes as the caselaw evolves.
Chris Reid Law
Ah it's you. Thanks for the reply and great talk, saved and shared.
tldr; The guy thought they had stolen his idea, they sat down and talked about what HG's design was, and they both decided there was no issue. It was only an issue in the media.
It should absolutely not be patentable
This channel deserves more recognition.
I thought all game devs were aware of GDC?
This is so complicated. 😞😫😥🤯😨
2022: Practical Law for Indie Developers 401: Absolute Nightmare Edition
Are celebrity names protected too? People having same names is very common. What happens if you say there's a fictional character that has the same name as a celebrity?
It may have been answered later but I have a terrible memory so I'm asking mid vid. by sale in regards to copyright do you mean putting the game up for sale, or a sale taking place? I know stupid question but my inner pedant made me ask this. Also, great video! you have 9 followers currently and no content Christopher...get a Chanel started!
Okay, this is answered at the end of the video. around 30:00
If only I had the time to manage a channel, alas. Also, GDC technically owns the recording, as they do with all GDC talks. I assume you mean Trademark, not copyright in regards to your question? "Use in commerce" is a tricky concept, but basically it means whatever the PTO says it means (they are the ones deciding in the context of an application - though in a lawsuit a court would also be considering this if it was relevant to the dispute). Generally, the good or service needs to be available (in its complete form) to the public "in commerce". Since some services/goods are "free" in the traditional sense (ad supported, for example), this doesn't HAVE to be a $ sale. Also, you generally won't get around the requirement by being clever or cheeky and putting something unfinished up just to reserve a priority date. Same goes for "selling" 4 copies of something to a friend. There is plenty of info on what they consider "use in commerce" on the PTO site if you search: www.uspto.gov
What I can't find any where is how do I prove I own a game? I'm afraid to release anything because I want to release a lot of games I have done over the years but can't afford to register them all. I would love to just dump them on steam but if someone else said they own them I have zero evidence to present.
and what is about the tetris mechanic?
Good question. The short answer is that the actual copyright jurisprudence on video game cases (there aren't a huge number of decided cases) is pretty messy. Basically judges are pretty bad at copyright to begin with, and when you throw in a medium they don't understand, the results are inconsistent. I definitely didn't have time to get anywhere near the level of detail required to talk about how that case came to be, sorry!
11:03 - Directly the part debunking common Fair Use myths.
The thing missing from this talk was about false DMCAs as it has become a trend when a developer is not happy with a bad review
TechYK yeah. This is a horrible trend.
Not even just developers. I've seen it happen to, say, the Drunken Peasants over a random video or two they simply made fun of. Crippled their channel for a while. And that only makes the butthurt people who filed them look worse.
a lawyer isn't going to admit that the system fundamentally exists to filter power upward toward the monied
In a way he did cover it. He said that if someone does streaming/let's plays and your cool with it, but later you decide you're not cool with it, you can file a DMCA at that point. Essentially you can DMCA at any time without notice unless you've specifically licensed the content creator. Some developers provide a license for streamers so they can be sure this doesn't happen.
Fairy Seraphim
Drunken Peasants died when 75% of the original cast left. I haven't watched since, what happened recently or how was the channel crippled?
This reminds of that buffoon, what was her name Brenda Grose? The one who tried to sue other developers for using a fucking frying pan.
BTW, really interesting topic. Always wanted to find out more about copyright, trademark, and these little symbols that represent all those rules and regulations (law in general).
Woohoo! At long last the "Plain Scary Edition!"
Pixel Prophecy After 3 years
After 3 years? Isn't it from 2018?
Christopher’s first talk on the topic was in 2016 and titled "Not Scary Edition" ► www.gdcvault.com/play/1023404/Practical-Law-101-For-Indie
The idea of escalating the scariness of the title in each subsequent talk came from a joke someone made in the comments to my first talk in 2016. Once I did "Moderately Scary Edition" I figured I had to complete the journey! If I'm honest, contracts are probably equal in scariness to IP for game devs :)
Looking forward to "Practical Criminal Law 401 for Indie Developers: Absolutely Terrifying Edition"
ha ha ha........... nice.
Can anyone recommend a contract. I need a character and I will hire an artist but I need to own the legal rights .
It's depressing that in American law the threat of going to court is 99% about getting crushed by legal fees and maybe 1% about whats actually legal or illegal. Larger companies routinely intimidate smaller companies, and that's just plain wrong.
This conference is a buzzkill for me, because I am a poor developer and I can't afford a simple trademark for my game and scared about somebody would take the name rights for my game and sue for me. :(
19:36 Says, that when you start to sell your game, you have the basic name rights but can somebody still buy the rights or you can limit them with your basic rights? I also heard that if you name your game with made-up words like "antarghh" or something, you have more basic name rights for the game name. Is that true?
Yeah, that trademark bit seriously bummed me out too. Whats to stop a trademark troll from poaching my name and selling a pong clone on the app store to sue me.
@@baki9191 First off: *IANAL*. With that out of the way... Since dates matter, if you sold first, your claim should be stronger. Thus your specific example of ™ trolling is probably not too likely in practice. It does mean that you should keep the specific name/branding you intend to use as your trade secret and not reveal it until around the release window(of course for marketing reasons you'll have to reveal it before release itself though).
@@Megalomaniakaal That... really needs a better acronym.
as for subject yes. if your going to do a kick starter or anything like that, register first.
Lol at the start, "PUBG and fortnite can coexist" Bluehole just sued Epic over it
Indeed. I will be very curious to see where this goes and what they hope to get out of the inevitable settlement (very few such cases ever go to trial - see, eg. EA v Zynga regarding The Sims Social). A copyright infringement case of this sort (alleging that the overall games infringe, rather than some specific asset or code) is very hard to prove. I wouldn't be surprised if there are a lot of other business-related calculations behind the filing. Litigation is very expensive on this scale, so if they are suing, there was likely a business calculation behind what they hope to achieve.
Yeah, I can't figure out what could be in it for Bluehole though. Seems like just a losing battle. Maybe they wanna scare off smaller developers from even trying to make a similar battle-royale? "Hey, we'll even sue Epic Games, so be careful"
I don't know htough.
It's good that he's educating people. However, DMCA takedowns can be easily abused.
A prominent example is when the developer Digital Homicide tried to sue to Jim Sterling for millions, simply because they did not like his opinion.
I wish the speaker had touched on this topic in particular, because I heard no mention of content use in works of critique.
it was covered in one of his previous talks (as much as 20 mins allows)
9:35 hah, nice joke.
This guy sounds like the lawyer from Silicon Valley(HBO show).
Unsurprisingly, he's my favorite character on the show :)
14:00 So if I quickly finish my game before some other (who hasn't protection through copyright) I can "steal" their trademark? Then attack them for using the same as my released game?
That's awful.
edit: ok, it's cleared up further. :P
I believe you may be mixing up copyright (the content of the game) with trademark (the title of the game). If someone files an (ultimately successful( trademark application first, or releases a game first with the same name as another game, then yes, they have the ability to enforce against the person who came second. This is why doing research and searching well ahead of time is important. Developers can avoid being surprised at the last minute if they plan ahead and (if the name is really important to them) file a registration. This talk was US-Law specific, though SOME of the principles are similar in other jurisdictions (but there are also important differences in, say, the EU).
OK thx for the clearing up. :)
One technique: Do something too good for the common casual.
Make a game so advanced or so good in it's elements that you can't match it. Like Undertale or a 3D platformer.
Make something distinctive and unique to the point where your game is no longer associated with just the genre. You must do enough good stuff good enough for anyone to say FUCK IT!
*Copyright is useless*
Kinda shitty to say "DMCA can be used to send a message"... I hope you aren't purposefully claiming that DMCA notices should be purposefully sent out to silence those you disagree with? Considering you specifically mentioned PewDiePie, I think you are. Keep in mind that there WAS a license publically available, where they said anyone could stream their games. They just decided because of their personal opinions, they didn't have to agree to that license anymore. Didn't have time to mention that during your talk though, huh?
The way Sean Vanaman of Campo Santo simply issued a strike was unprofessional. Like Felix said, they should've contacted him personally with their concerns and ask that he take the videos down.
Your argument is absolute garbage. You're trying to sensationalize something just for the sake of promoting your agenda that everyone should be able to stream everything. I believe it was very clear to everyone watching, especially yourself, that the mentioning of the content creator was used to illustrate the power of copyright law despite the intent of the infringer. Everything in this video was very informative and helpful, and you're shitty for trying to twist something under a microscope to fit your agenda.
@@ChamplooMusashi Bullshit - his grievance is legitimate. It may not be illegal but, it's pretty disturbing and scummy to allow some people to do things and not others, based solely on political controversy. Rules should be used to set standards that are equally applied - not selective enforcement. A world where the media you're allowed to reference or create derivative works from (I guess that's what streaming would be?) is based on political grandstanding is pretty shitty. Also, they're a game company; this association of _EVERYTHING_ with politics is getting ridiculous. Somebody streaming themselves playing your game shouldn't be seen as a tacit endorsement of their political views. The case w/ Felix was perfect because they were more than happy for him to play their game until they decided to wade into the culture wars and he became persona non grata. If game devs are going to dictate who can or can't stream their games based on political expediency, they should label the box with their beliefs so we can avoid buying it if we feel we may disagree and want to avoid them trying to arbitrarily shut us down. Also, as the consumer, don't you have the right to show yourself using the product? Does someone photographing themselves while driving a Camaro mean their political views are endorsed by Chevy?
@@nextlifeonearth Exactly, DMCA IS NOT supposed to be used as a cudgel to enforce ideology and punish "wrongthink" - it's supposed to protect rights holders from having 3rd parties posting pirated content and or profiting of piracy. I don't know where the legal definition lies on the issue of people playing games to make content and whether or not that's considered derivative but, what happened in this situation is why people HATE the reporting mechanism. Like I mentioned in the other post, if someone has a channel where they become well known for speaking in their car - does GM or Honda now get to approve your speech because using their product in your video is derivative?
God do I ever hate the term 'intellectual property'.
It completely guts and bastardises both the foundational concepts behind copyright, AND the notion of what 'property' actually is.
Now what happened with Pewdiepie was despicable, but think for a second.
If you write a book should i be able to just print and sell my own copies without even giving credit to you ?
That would be a world completely without any high quality creative work because why bother if someone else is going to earn money from it ?
Not the entire world revolves around UA-camrs.
"This is not legal advice" *proceeds to give legal advice*
Dude why you just skip pass the most important patent part. A game without a patent isn't a real game ffs. Don't cheesily skip pass it ffs.
Could you list 3 games with their respective patents?
Great talk !