1809 replies to this topic

[Bombast]

slide, on 13 August 2017 - 07:46 PM, said:

Ie forgetting about Hasbro's out of court settlement for a minute, if a ruling was found against HG in that case could that then be used as a ammunition by HBS/PGI in this case?

It would depend on what the ruling actually was. If it was that the design didn't violate HG's copyright, than no - Another company not violating the law doesn't help HBS, PGI or anyone else.

If the ruling was that HG didn't own copyrights on ALL the models, then yes. It could have been used.

Edited by Bombast, 13 August 2017 - 08:45 PM.

[slide]

Thanks Bombast.

[Valdarion Silarius]

Freebrth, on 13 August 2017 - 12:53 PM, said:

except PGI is not using the unseen ... they are using reseen mechs.

- I can only wish they would pull out the old original 14 unseen, especially the ones from Macross, I mean, if they are gonna get sued for something that doesn't even look like the real originals (from the HG copy write ~ Macross), why not...

Have faith and stay positive. I got the idea about it to a special someone and it is very possible that Alex might still do it. Alot of us are not fans of the Project Phoenix reseens, but I think it is possible that Alex might honor the old unseen art as inspiration while making a completely redesigned "unseen" mech for MW:O (that won't look like garbage). It's not hard to do especially when you have source material from other artists for some of our favorite mechs.

[AzureRathalos]

CMDR Sunset Shimmer, on 13 August 2017 - 05:22 PM, said:

Actually, read up on the Games Workshop lawsuit... there's actually some solid reasons he's suing them [and Games Workshop has self incriminated themselves in the past regarding their insanely high markup, and have flat out said they want a monolopy on tabletop war gaming... so they haven't done themselves any favors.]

That lawsuit is an interesting one.

GW does have a number of questionable policies (interestingly enough, a number of them have been removed along with the "Old Guard" stagnating the company), but if you look at the history of the person suing (mismanaged game stores, losing money all over the place), it looks more like a cashgrab than anything.

[Karl Streiger]

I think its interesting that this page https://www.change.o...e-western-world
went from below 500 supporters to now over 600 in the last weeks.
Does it change anything? Not at all but its impressive for such a small niche

[Valdarion Silarius]

Karl Streiger, on 13 August 2017 - 10:28 PM, said:

I think its interesting that this page https://www.change.o...e-western-world
went from below 500 supporters to now over 600 in the last weeks.
Does it change anything? Not at all but its impressive for such a small niche

I signed it. I feel really bad for the Macross fans that aren't in Japan that have to suffer because of Harmony Gold.

[Anjian]

Arnold The Governator, on 13 August 2017 - 10:39 PM, said:

I signed it. I feel really bad for the Macross fans that aren't in Japan that have to suffer because of Harmony Gold.

Signed and shared to my social media account.

[Adridos]

Dee Eight, on 13 August 2017 - 04:16 PM, said:

Robotech is a original creation of Harmony Gold and thus yes they do hold the copyrights for it, just as Battle of the Planets is a creation of Sandy Frank Entertainment. While both used original japanese anime series for their animation, there was heavy editing involved to make them suitable for the USA television audience. BotP removed graphic violence, profanity, nudity and transgenderism while Robotech removed everything above but the transgenderism (as they left the bit about Yellow Dancer, aka the cross-dressing Lancer in the new generation chapter which was derived from Genesis Climber MOSPEADA, not to mention all the bits about the invid being essentially genderless, the zentradi being genetically engineered clones with segregated genders, etc). The stories were changed in both cases, character names, having english voice actors dub the footage to fit the new plot scripts for each episode, etc. BotP had all new animation done to fill in the space of all the stuff they cut, involving the 7-zark-7 robot giving narration from "center neptune".

That doesn't sound right.
Are you telling us that, as far as law is concerned, each and every abridged series is owned by the people who have modified the underlying series to create the abridged one? Because that sounds like a truly horrible idea in a million ways. Harmony Gold never did anything more than your usual abridged series.

BRB, going to make an abridge of SDF and get to be a copyright owner of the Macross designs!

[Dee Eight]

Adridos, on 14 August 2017 - 12:51 AM, said:

That doesn't sound right.
Are you telling us that, as far as law is concerned, each and every abridged series is owned by the people who have modified the underlying series to create the abridged one? Because that sounds like a truly horrible idea in a million ways. Harmony Gold never did anything more than your usual abridged series.

BRB, going to make an abridge of SDF and get to be a copyright owner of the Macross designs!

They have a copyright on Robotech, the story, character names, plot lines, and how its edited together.

[Adridos]

Dee Eight, on 14 August 2017 - 02:56 AM, said:

They have a copyright on Robotech, the story, character names, plot lines, and how its edited together.

So much I can accept, but it still makes all the footage, the designs (both character and mechanical ones), the music and so on not a part of their property. Following those grounds, they still can't sue anyone for using the designs themselves since they are not theirs in the first place.

[Pariah Devalis]

Anjian, on 13 August 2017 - 11:14 PM, said:

Signed and shared to my social media account.

Ditto.

[Requiemking]

Adridos, on 14 August 2017 - 04:22 AM, said:

So much I can accept, but it still makes all the footage, the designs (both character and mechanical ones), the music and so on not a part of their property. Following those grounds, they still can't sue anyone for using the designs themselves since they are not theirs in the first place.

Yup, sounds about right. If anyone were to have issues with the Unseen, it would be Revell, since they own the international rights to the Macross mechs. However, since we have heard nothing from them on the subject, I think they are ok with it.

[Valdarion Silarius]

Requiemking, on 14 August 2017 - 11:34 AM, said:

Yup, sounds about right. If anyone were to have issues with the Unseen, it would be Revell, since they own the international rights to the Macross mechs. However, since we have heard nothing from them on the subject, I think they are ok with it.

The truth is we don't know, and Russ is not very likely to come out about the subject from what I was told. I think they want to keep it behind closed doors for now, but I did get the message across to them about how we want the unseen and made a few suggestions with some artwork (Not made by me since I'm not an artist). I will tell you that they are aware of Gas Guzzler's poll with some of the top leading mechs in some weight categories being unseen. I just hope that they deliver them.

[SamMaster]

Everyone's favorite copyright attorney just posted about this, and he is a Battletech player!

[Requiemking]

SamMaster, on 16 August 2017 - 06:42 PM, said:

Everyone's favorite copyright attorney just posted about this, and he is a Battletech player!

I watched and I actually commented. I pointed out how at least two of the images that HG presented from the MWO store front were edited, the Warhammer(which was vertically stretched) and the Phoenix Hawk(which had the right fore arm removed, presumably to hide the double-barrelled laser mounts).

Edited by Requiemking, 16 August 2017 - 07:34 PM.

[Alan Davion]

SamMaster, on 16 August 2017 - 06:42 PM, said:

Everyone's favorite copyright attorney just posted about this, and he is a Battletech player!

I love how Leonard towards the end of the video started talking about the actual context of "what's copyrightable" when it comes to the elements of a mechs design. By HG's logic, using the Warhammer/Tomahawk as an example, any mech with a missile or other weapons pod on the right shoulder would "infringe" on their copyright. By that logic, something like Dream Pod 9's Heavy Gear game would infringe on HG's stuff cause some of the Heavy Gear robots have missile pods on their right shoulders.

I hope HG gets laughed out of court and prevented from pulling this kind of shite ever again.

[Shadowomega1]

Alan Davion, on 16 August 2017 - 08:04 PM, said:

I love how Leonard towards the end of the video started talking about the actual context of "what's copyrightable" when it comes to the elements of a mechs design. By HG's logic, using the Warhammer/Tomahawk as an example, any mech with a missile or other weapons pod on the right shoulder would "infringe" on their copyright. By that logic, something like Dream Pod 9's Heavy Gear game would infringe on HG's stuff cause some of the Heavy Gear robots have missile pods on their right shoulders.

I hope HG gets laughed out of court and prevented from pulling this kind of shite ever again.

Not to mention the Tau Battle suits from Warhammer 40k that have shoulder mounted missile packs that look a lot like the old Warhammer/Tomahawk Missile Pack, while having a boxy humanoid torso.

Spoiler

Oh and the numerous Gundams from the Gundam franchise that do that as well.

Maybe HG should sue the arms manufactures for making weapons that look like their material.

Edited by Shadowomega1, 16 August 2017 - 08:45 PM.

[Valdarion Silarius]

SamMaster, on 16 August 2017 - 06:42 PM, said:

Everyone's favorite copyright attorney just posted about this, and he is a Battletech player!

I didn't get the part where he said that he was a Battletech player (as in the table top), but I did hear him say that he was a backer of the Battletech kick starter.

He did point out something interesting in how this whole court case will have to determine what "parts" of a mech are going to be deemed "copyright-able" which again reinstates what Bud Crue and I said about this whole court case. It is extremely weak and laughable if you think about it. How the flying heck can you determine what "parts" of a mech can be sued that infringes on artwork that you supposedly "co-own" overseas? Then what's next, are they going to go after every mech in media that has humanoid hands and legs?

Like what Bud Crue said, I can see a settlement on this case but I really hope it doesn't boil down to that. Harmony Gold will not stop harassing any future IP's with these mindless lawsuits. On one hand, I want my pet mech in game before the end of this year (and would be even willing to accept the reseen rendition if it was redone properly by Alex). Maybe that is possible by a settlement. On the other hand, I just want this whole unseen fiasco to end but will have to patiently wait until September of 2018 if they decide to drag it out that long. That also puts all of the other 'unseen' mechs on the back burner until then.

[Pariah Devalis]

One of the things that always surprised me with HG is that, while they will threaten litigation whenever the Warhammer shows up... they don't do anything with the Hellbringer. Which shares many of the same design elements. What's up with that?

[Alan Davion]

Pariah Devalis, on 17 August 2017 - 08:42 AM, said:

One of the things that always surprised me with HG is that, while they will threaten litigation whenever the Warhammer shows up... they don't do anything with the Hellbringer. Which shares many of the same design elements. What's up with that?

Probably cause it's not similar enough.

Yes it has the missile pod and flood light on its shoulders, but the majority of the body is substantively different, especially the arms. The Hellbringer doesn't have long-a$$ cannon arms like the Warhammer/Tomahawk does.

It goes back to what Leonard French said about "what design elements of a mech can or cannot be copyrighted". Harmony Gold are throwing a fit over the Warhammer because it is, in some respects, almost exactly the same as the Tomahawk Destroid.

The real question is what, exactly, are they throwing a fit over? Because there are considerable differences between the two mechs that HG are conveniently glossing over in the hope that it helps prove their case of infringement.