Hard Light Productions Forums
Hosted Projects - Standalone => The Babylon Project => Topic started by: PSI-KILLER on July 22, 2005, 04:57:44 pm
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I just saw this off firstones and did not know if anyone knew. Is that even legal to sell?
Zathras4PM
Ebay Fraudster
Hi, if anyone who helped design the game is reading this, someone is selling the game YOU designed on ebay.co.uk. The ID of this scumbag is Deepalpha1.
I hate to see someone profiteering from other people's hard endeavours so if you can do anything about this do it before someone else falls for it!!
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Link (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3606&item=8206235631&rd=1)
This could quite easily qualify as profiting from the sale of the SCP which is prohibited under the terms of the Open source license the SCP has.
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Well, it should be a simple idea of contacting him and telling him to take it down? Or asking ebay?
Shouldn't it?
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What the?? :no: :mad:
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Wow... just wow. Thanks for telling the team.
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:mad:
He seems to be the sort of a guy I would love to burn on a stake...
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He's got about three auctions going. :sigh:
Two (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3606&item=8206235624&rd=1)
And, the third one. (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3606&item=8206235614&rd=1)
That one has been bidded on. Twice. Around 4 hours to go from this posting time.
Wonder if those fools know you can just download it?
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There are 14 auctions at the moment.
8206235631, 8206235631, 8206235614, 8206918354, 8206919280, 8206919295, 8206235635, 8206235644, 8206235652, 8206235660, 8206235668, 8206235677, 8206235685, 8206235691
I have informed eBay of copyright and IP violations. Unfortunately it would seem like some of the auctions will end before eBay staff can take action, as there are only a few hours remaining.
Because I wanted a message away as soon as possible, I did not have much time to think about the message's content, but this is what I sent:
User deepalpha1 have auctioned multiple "Babylon 5 Space Combat Game" items in eBay. This game in question is in reality "The Babylon Project". The Babylon Project is a free game that uses game engine of FreeSpace 2 by Volition Incorporated.
1. I am project leader of The Babylon Project staff. The staff is very displeased to see someone profiting from our hard work.
Project homepage: http://www.3dactionplanet.com/hlp/hosted/babylon/
2. The game engine's source code has been publicly available for years, "FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project" staff has spent those years improving the original game engine. Their staff is also very displeased to see someone profiting from their hard work. Developers of Volition Incorporated provided the community with source code of the game engine, with a condition that nobody will ever make profit out of it. This has been violated with those auctions.
Project homepage: http://scp.indiegames.us/news.php
3. Since this user called deepalpha1 has violated "The Babylon Project" staff, "FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project" staff, Warner Bros (owns Babylon 5 license) and Volition Inc. and Interplay (the two own rights to the game engine) rights. Thus, we demand that those auctions are immediately removed.
Thank you.
Hopefully it will be enough to make eBay staff to take action.
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I think if ever Interplay, Volition or Warner get to know about this, that ..... person has a few lawsuits on him.
And if you ask me, he/she deserves it.
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I can't imagine many Babylon 5 fans falling for this. So I'm not particularly concerned. Contacting ebay management is probably a waste of time too (live8). On the other hand if there's some way of warning people on the ebay site (I don't know, I don't use ebay) then please do so.
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I think most or all B5 fans know that there has never been an official flight simulator launched, as the only one went down in flames when Interplay cut costs or whatever.
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eBay has not replied within their promised 48 hours timeframe. Which kinda leads me to believe that they don't give a ****, which again can put us in a difficult position if companies who own B5 licenses in some form notices those auctions.
I hereby ask that everyone report "Babylon 5 Space Combat Game" items to the eBay staff as being illegal. If a few reports won't get eBay's attention, maybe numbers will.
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I have already. And I shall again when the time comes.
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Originally posted by Mr. Fury
eBay has not replied within their promised 48 hours timeframe. Which kinda leads me to believe that they don't give a ****, which again can put us in a difficult position if companies who own B5 licenses in some form notices those auctions.
Not surprising. Some time ago some idiot was selling prints of Star Trek 3d artwork on eBay. All of the prints were either scans of official Paramount artwork or stolen from all over the net. Complaint was made to eBay, but they did nothing. I'm not sure if Paramount interfered later on.
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I have to register to report something, but not to look at it.
**** that.
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I've submited a complaint under the "Unathorized Copies" clause. Hopefully it will get more response. Might I suggest letting the people who have so far purchased copies know that they have been duped?
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I have posted news about this incident to our homepage...
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He/She didn't even pick a decent screen shot.
edit:reported to ebay, for what it's worth
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Have you guys considered registering an account to nullify the auctions by just bidding $10,000 five minutes before the auction ends and letting the scumbag pay the fees?
This'd be especially evil if you got two accounts to do it, so his credit card would automatically get billed the final value fee on the 10k he'll never see... which should be something like $250 :D
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Does anyone know about how warner, volition and interplay react to such things?
If you can be sure, that you and the SCP won't be shut down, you could go to them and let them take this ******* down.
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hello i am new to the forum, this article compelled me to write. i think it is distugusting that people are trying to profit from the hard free work these guys do. i suggest the following, set up a bogus email account and bid $1000000 on all the auctions
he will get the idea after a while that you will block any attempted sales, if he complains to email you can forward them the complaint you wrote
just my £0.02 worth
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Wow... never thought I'd see something like this happen.
I suppose you guys can take pride that your mod is so good that someone is actually trying to profit from it. That said, I hope you nail the guy as it's rather sad that he's done this.
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Hey. I'm new to the forums (great job BTW, and I'm making a small Shadow War mission pack).
Anyway, I'm an assistant at an Intellectual Property Law Firm, and while I'm NOT A LAWYER (that is important) I can draft a proper Cease and Desist letter to deepalpha1 if you would like.
EDIT: Directing me to copies of the SCP and TBP licenses would be helpfull.
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I appreciate the offer but personally I would be against taking such action since WB would be perfectly within their rights to send such a letter to us. I would rather have faith in the intelligence of the average Babylon 5 fan not to fall for this. Let us leave this for now. If the guy starts making an obvious profit we will reassess the situation.
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Originally posted by Occams_Razor
Anyway, I'm an assistant at an Intellectual Property Law Firm, and while I'm NOT A LAWYER (that is important) I can draft a proper Cease and Desist letter to deepalpha1 if you would like.
EDIT: Directing me to copies of the SCP and TBP licenses would be helpfull.
Hi there :)
What IPAndrews posted is true. TBP and SCP are both developed by fans, who own no licenses to either B5 or FS2. Thus engaging in any law-issue would be our fall.
We have well stayed clear from getting any profit from TBP, including Gamespy's offer to put TBP as a subscription-only download for a limited time and magazine cover CD offers.
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Originally posted by Mr. Fury
We have well stayed clear from getting any profit from TBP, including Gamespy's offer to put TBP as a subscription-only download for a limited time and magazine cover CD offers.
Wow, really? Never knew that, well, I think that was the point.
Ontopic:
I would like to give him Dibblers Finest sausages...
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Originally posted by Mr. Fury
Gamespy's offer to put TBP as a subscription-only download for a limited time and magazine cover CD offers.
:eek2: Wow. I didn't know that.
:) Wow. I guess some normal people also think your work is good.
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Have you thought of notifying the appropiate licence holders and bring their attention to this..... Coz at the moment they are cracking down really hard on licence infringements...... Would it not be better for yourselves to inform these people of what has happened ande let the deal with problem seeing it is their licences that have been abused. And show that you are more than hard done by with this than they are.
Not that I know what I am talking about, but for the benefit of TBP.... So they know you are not to blame for one persons m****r f*****g b******t actions. So would it not be better just to cover yourselves, so that you can just concerntrate on continuing the awsome and immense hard work you have put into this truly brilliant project. Instead of having to worry about all this c**p.
If anything once they have seen this site they might even advertise it for you.... so everyone in the B5 community world wide knows about it and thats it is FREE...... OK I'm only dreaming but what a nice thought :)
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If such an action would be taken, I'm afraid they would not let us continue this project unchecked. If they can't profit from us, then they most likely would force the project to be closed down.
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This topic caused me to register an account also.
First, I am.....very....annoyed at this. I suggest spamming the ebay sites as others have suggested.
I hate it when this type of stuff occurs, I really do.
-Toe
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The Freespace 2 code license simply states:
Copyright (C) Volition, Inc. 1999. All rights reserved.
All source code herein is the property of Volition, Inc. You may not sell or otherwise commercially exploit the source or things you created based on the source.
At first glance this is surprisingly similar to the GNU GPL (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html#GPL), at least superficially. I've been wondering about talking with someone to more fully contemplate the ramifications of this.
While copyright law does not prohibit donations made to the developers of an otherwise freely available product based on copyrighted material (see for example http://www.exeterstudio.com/), this eBay stunt clearly falls into the category of trying to "commercially exploit a product created based on the source".
I don't know of any licenses (or lack thereof) mandated by WB or JMS for use of Babylon 5 material.
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I agree with you toe. Really pisses me off when some dickhead tries to make a few bucks illegally like this. Like the Dork who tried to sell Subway sandwich tickets. Now I cant get any free subs anymore. :mad:
I hope this project continues, I really enjoyed Raider Wars and Im looking forward to playing more.
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Just though I'd let you know the seller has stopped selling these items, assume e-bay must have contacted him
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Originally posted by Prophet
Wow. I guess some normal people also think your work is good.
Me, I don`t think its good, as a matter of fact I know its good.
:D ;)
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I'm glad this seems to have worked out without incident.
I don't want to start a legal discussion (Since I make a living like that, and don't need to do it on my own time) but the SCP license really is nothing like the GPL. For one thing, from what I can find, it's only two lines :confused:
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Hopefully there won't be any aftermath and this incident is good as closed. I don't know if eBay contacted the seller or what happened, but the important thing is that those auctions are now gone, hopefully permanently.
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I got a response fromt eh letter I sent monday night (15 mins after teh notice was posted here I was about to go to work but tracked down how to contact ebay uk. So I sent them a letter as someoen pset with the action of the person making the auction.)
The response I got was form letter variety... (posted below)
Sorry if I mistated anyting but 1.) I was upset, 2.) wanted to make them aware of this ASAP, 3.) was speaking only for myself and not as a representative of the B5 team, just someone who would be VERY put off if this had happened to my team.
Thank you for your report.
We would like to let you know that we have received your email and we
will thoroughly investigate the information you have provided.
Please keep in mind that the reasons for actions taken or not taken on
a
specific listing are confidential and between eBay and the seller. We
will not be able to keep you informed of any developments for legal
reasons, but we assure you that we will thoroughly examine this
information. We will take the appropriate action for each individual
case, which may involve removing an item or simply issuing a warning.
If you believe an item is potentially infringing and it was not removed
by eBay, we encourage you to contact the rights owner and inform them
of
the alleged infringement. Rights owners may request the removal of
listings they feel infringe upon their rights through eBay's Verified
Rights Owner (VeRO) Programme.
If you would like to see information provided by the rights owners
about
items that may infringe their rights including how to contact them,
please visit our list of VeRO Programme participant About Me pages.
http://pages.ebay.com/help/community/vero-aboutme.html
If you are a rights owner and would like more information regarding the
VeRO Programme, please visit:
http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/community/vero-program.html
Please do not respond to this email. If you reply to this message we
will not receive your email. All communications regarding Rules and
Safety should be sent to the link provided below:
http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/contact_inline/index.html
We appreciate your concerns, and we thank you for helping to keep
ebay.co.uk a safe and enjoyable trading community.
Best wishes,
The ebay.co.uk Community Watch Team
______________
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All thats missing is "This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds".
Anyway, at least they took somekind of action...
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That's their standard boilerplate.
The fun part about the VERO is that the rights owner controls the takedown process, which is automatic. You click the button, you claim the thing infringes your rights, it's automatically taken down without any action from eBay. I've seen numerous ransom schemes and anti-competitive actions taken using this program, including one where a poker chip store drove another out of business by deleting all their auctions with VERO.
Someone should get a VERO account and just kill these auctions on sight whenever they pop up.
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Originally posted by Mr. Fury
Hi there :)
What IPAndrews posted is true. TBP and SCP are both developed by fans, who own no licenses to either B5 or FS2. Thus engaging in any law-issue would be our fall.
We have well stayed clear from getting any profit from TBP, including Gamespy's offer to put TBP as a subscription-only download for a limited time and magazine cover CD offers.
Have you considered contacting the buyers and letting them know that the seller is a scumbag who's doing various bad things involving SCP, TBP, and their mother's favorite sheep? Would it even be legal to "encourage" the buyer not to give the scumbag money?
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I poked around, but it looks like you need an account to post a message/report, and I have no intention of giving out personal information without the intention of buying something.
But I agree with everyone pointing out that this is a Bad Thing(TM) - obviously I hope that this isn't someone on either project, because it's totally contrary to how the SCP & TBP have operated in the past, and actually endangers the existence of both somewhat - generally the only reason mods of this sort are allowed to exist by companies is because they don't threaten their profits.
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I can't belive that any member of TBP or SCP would do that.
Nobody who put so much work and care into those projects could possibly be such a dumb asswhole, even if it wouldn't endanger the very existance of SCP and TBP, which, from what I heard, is the case if ever the licence owners get to know about this.
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what the ****?! someone find that ******* and shoot him! :mad:
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Sorry to tell you people, but the d*ckhead is at it again.
Ebay item number 8208812022
I reported the guy. Just note that he is making most of his money just on the postage fees.
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Unfortunately, it looks like at least one person fell for this guy's crap. If you look in his feedback, somebody actually gave him positive feedback on one of the sales. I was tempted to send the buyer an e-mail to let him know how foolish he'd been.
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*sigh*
Those who have ebay.co.uk user accounts, can warn buyers at their leisure. I guess there's really nothing more that can be done about this.
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Oh Zarathud, where art thou?
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Psst...Zarathus...
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Zathras...
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Blah. Not like I could remember the spelling having only seen it twice...
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I sent both people who purchased CDs from him messages telling them that they had been ripped off and giving them the URL of this thread for information.
And thanking them for their interest in our game :D
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Originally posted by Kazan
giving them the URL of this thread for information.
Thats good. It should be good for them the see our Zathars discussion... :doubt:
But it really sucks to pay for something that you get for free... Though I have to say that TBP is good enought to be worht a lot of credits. It's just that... you can get it for free... and that guy is selling it.
He should have a lightning bolt up his ass. :devil:
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or a Thunderbolt... :nervous:
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Or a heavy plasma bolt. Yeah, I would go for plasma.
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Meh, dice 'em with a Shadow slicer beam. :p
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I think (hope) the guys' been kicked off by eBay, as he's listed as no longer registered. It's sad to see your work being taken advantage of like that, even if it is a vindication of the quality (£2.99? Cheapskates!)
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I was looking on the first link and it said that deepalpha1 was removed. they did do somthing. I hope they take his money and give it back to the guys that got ripped of.:) :) :) :cool: :cool: :yes: :yes: :wakka:
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anyone get any response back from Ebay yet?
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Did we ever hear anything back from e-bay? or even an apology?
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The guy knew he was ripping people off so I doubt he's going to come out a give everyone an apology. It seems ebay took care of it awhile ago, according to the post dates...