Rogean and Nilbog are Breaking the Law!

[loramin]

No, I don't mean by re-creating an old game ... I mean by making modifications to the EQ Emulator source code, and not publishing those modifications.

Backstory: Project 1999 (AFAIK) is based off the EQ Emulator project, https://github.com/EQEmu/Server. As you can see at that link, that project has chosen the (absolutely terrible) GPL3 license to open source their code: https://github.com/EQEmu/Server/blob/master/LICENSE

That (again, terrible) license ... well I won't quote its legalese, but if you look at a summary of it on https://tldrlegal.com/license/gnu-general-public-license-v3-(gpl-3), you'll see:

You may copy, distribute and modify the software as long as you track changes/dates in source files. Any modifications to or software including (via compiler) GPL-licensed code must also be made available under the GPL along with build & install instructions.

In other words, unless P99 has ripped literally every last line of EQ Emulator code out ... because EQ Emulator picked Richard Stallman's (awful) GPL3 as their license ... P99 is legally required to publish their modifications to the EQ Emulator software.

Two important notes: 1) I am not a lawyer, just a copyright law hobbyist, and 2) the GPL does not in any way cover the database; they have no obligation to open source that.

But still ... thoughts?

P.S. For what it's worth I'm not a fan of this: I'd like to keep the game's secrets ... secret. But the GPL3 is, by design, unforgiving. If you use GPL3 source code in any way, even on a server, you are legally obligated to share modifications to that code (unlike the much saner GPL2).

[Toxigen]

blah blah blah

just enjoy the server

[Whale biologist]

Cure the violation just like Team Biden cured those ballots!

[Jibartik]

Is OP trying to use some legal threat to shut down the server unless they release the source code?

[Jimjam]

I get that you are going for click baity with the title but it’s a bit close to staff bashy...

Personally i agree with your footnote and would be happy to stick to a ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ type gentleman’s agreement regarding the source.

Sure would be helpful to have for bug reporting reasons ... but also (for better or worse) seeing past the matrix min max reasons ...

[Jibartik]

OP it sounds like what you're talking about is a doomsday machine.

[Homesteaded]

Tried looking for this on the wiki, but it wasn't there. Perhaps OP should create a wikipage.

[Jibartik]

I setup a thread on the daybreak forums

wvw.daybreakthreads.cat/AttentionDaybreak!!!THEFTofIPinProgress/SHUTDOWNP99-notSharingCode-IllegallyUsingSoftware

[loramin]

I get that you are going for click baity with the title but it’s a bit close to staff bashy...

Personally i agree with your footnote and would be happy to stick to a ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ type gentleman’s agreement regarding the source.

Sure would be helpful to have for bug reporting reasons ... but also (for better or worse) seeing past the matrix min max reasons ...

I guess the title was click baity, but it's also accurate. The legal terms of the GPL3 are very clear, and R&N are not respecting them. Therefore they are breaking (copyright) law.

[Homesteaded]

I guess the title was click baity, but it's also accurate. The legal terms of the GPL3 are very clear, and R&N are not respecting them. Therefore they are breaking (copyright) law.

Autism intensifies.

[Tewaz]

What has this forum become?

[Skarne]

At least we know for sure that Loramin is unbiased!

[loramin]

Ok, since the law doesn't seem to be swaying people, let's look at the logic behind it.

A bunch of programmers on the EQ Emulator project wrote a lot of code, to let people enjoy this great game of EverQuest. It was a lot of work. They said to the world "hey world, you can use all our work, for free! The only price is that you have to share what you add."

Rogean and Nilbog came along and said "thanks for all that free work, we'll totally use it on our project ... but fuck you, we're not sharing, we're just taking your code illegally".

Does that bother anyone else?

[Jibartik]

😵



PWzxQnzTksk

[Whale biologist]

It's not a criminal violation, you just don't get the copyright protection if you don't adhere to the license terms. So you couldn't sue under their aegis if it was stolen, etc.

Hope this helps.

[Jibartik]

What has this forum become?

it's a microcosm of how people work.

first people do things

then people do other things

then people accuse people of things

this becomes a problem so they try to change things

then people dont want to change things and so they start fighting

then they all destroy everything that they had because people are animals.

[Tunabros]

man SHUT THE FUCK UP LORAMIN

HOLY MOLY

[Jibartik]

we all know rog will come in with some daddy dom reason why this is already a well discussed and solved issue I guarantee loramin knows it too :p

https://i.imgur.com/w5yU3SX.png

[loramin]

we all know rog will come in with some daddy dom reason why this is already a well discussed and solved issue I guarantee loramin knows it too :p


Honestly I would like nothing more than for Rogean to say "we publish our source code here". It's what any responsible programmer would do.

[starkind]

Is gplv3 law.

How do u know.

They're probably just only using the API from the netstack. And APIs and law still aren't even settled? Idk.

Anyway. As an OG nerd... Loramin is being a bit hyperbolic.. and just wants the games super secret dice rolls published. To p99s credit, that sauce does feel different from live, or stock EMU.

[Tunabros]

no one gives a shit

you don't even play on p99 anymore

[loramin]

Is gplv3 law.

How do u know.

They're probably just only using the API from the netstack. And APIs and law still aren't even settled? Idk.

Anyway. As an OG nerd... Loramin is being a bit hyperbolic.. and just wants the games super secret dice rolls published. To p99s credit, that sauce does feel different from live, or stock EMU.

GPL3 is a very well-settled license. And it doesn't matter if P99 has replaced 99.9% of the stock EQEmulator code (though I doubt they have): if they use any of that code, they agreed (legally-speaking) the moment they used it to share their code.

[Nibblewitz]

Municipalities are choosing not to prosecute actual theft. Good luck with this one.

[realsubtle]

Why dont you become the Angry crying Soyface man about it?

[Tunabros]

rogean doesn't like loramin


also loramin has a habit of randomly banning people from the wiki and

talking weird shit on the forums that no one cares about

[starkind]

Loramin on a crusade to burn the world down and autisticly bot/box on TAkP or PEQtheGrandCreation.

Very hateful! :😈

[Danth]

Considering who runs EQ-Emulator I don't think P1999 has to worry overmuch.

[loramin]

Loramin on a crusade to burn the world down and autisticly bot/box on TAkP or PEQtheGrandCreation.

Very hateful! :��

On the contrary, this would help every other EQ Emu.

Look, we like to pretend Rogean and Nilbog spun this place out of whole cloth, but they didn't: they're standing on the shoulders of giants (ie. the EQ Emulator devs).

Now I know those people are faceless, but I'm talking about people just like R&N here: people so passionate about EverQuest that they spend years of their life writing code to try to simulate the original servers. R&N came along, took what they offered, and (legally speaking) spat in their face.

But if R&N complied with their legal obligation, TakP, PEQ, etc. could all incorporate improvements that R&N have made into their servers. In other words, it would do exactly what the GPL3 was designed to do: ensure that any improvements made by one user get shared to others so that all benefit.

R&N are quite literally standing in the way of improving the very servers you mentioned by not sharing their code as required by GPL3.

[loramin]

Considering who runs EQ-Emulator I don't think P1999 has to worry overmuch.

Doesn't matter. Once you license something GPL3, even if the original license holder wants to change the license, and grant you an exclusive right to not publish ... they can't.

The moment they put that license on their source code repository it was out of their hands, legally speaking: that code has been released under that license.

[Tunabros]

can you just enjoy something that was made so people like us can play for free

why are you bitching about it

[loramin]

can you just enjoy something that was made so people like us can play for free

why are you bitching about it

Do you feel anything for the developers who made it possible for you to play here? Do you think their wishes (after spending years writing code for zero pay) should be respected? Or should P99 break the law to directly go against their wishes?

[Danth]

The moment they put that license on their source code repository it was out of their hands, legally speaking: that code has been released under that license.

You're skipping the practical side: Who's going to sue? Copyright law isn't criminal and the government isn't going to do it on its own. They might technically be in violation but if nobody cares they can violate 'till the end of days and it doesn't matter. That was the same reason P99 existed at all prior to 2015: Letter of the law aside, the owners of the EQ IP never cared enough to make a fuss over it. Copyright law is funny like that and in many cases it very much boils down in a defacto sense to, "It's only illegal if someone cares." Again, I remind you of who controls EQ-Emulator.

Danth

[Skarne]

I don’t think anything will happen unless someone tells the folks who wrote the original code and points out that…you know what never mind I don’t give a shit.

[Jibartik]

Who are you defending here? Me? Stop then.

[Tewaz]

You're 100% right. We are animals.

[loramin]

You're skipping the practical side: Who's going to sue? Copyright law isn't criminal and the government isn't going to do it on its own. They might technically be in violation but if nobody cares they can violate 'till the end of days and it doesn't matter. That was the same reason P99 existed at all prior to 2015: Letter of the law aside, the owners of the EQ IP never cared enough to make a fuss over it. Copyright law is funny like that and in many cases it very much boils down in a defacto sense to, "It's only illegal if someone cares." Again, I remind you of who controls EQ-Emulator.

Danth

Anyone who wants access to P99 source code could complain. Any other emulated server for instance, as they might want to benefit from P99's work, just as P99 benefited from EQ Emulator's work (again, the entire point of GPL3).

But it could be anyone, even you or me, because the GPL3 license provides a community benefit (ie. the EQ Emulator people gave their source code to the community under a license, so the entire community suffers if that license is violated).

And there's an entire site setup to handle such complaints: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-violation.en.html. Potentially the Free Software Foundation might even get involved and provide free legal aid.

(Now, once a complaint is made I believe they'll first try to get the rights holder to pursue it, and if the rights holder doesn't want to that might gum up the works a bit ... again, I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know those details. But the point is, once you open source a creative work, you can't "take it back", so even if the EQ Emu people truly said "We think the GPL3 was a mistake, sorry R&N" it wouldn't matter, legally.)

[Danth]

We'll see. I note you haven't posted this same objection on TAKP's site even though it doesn't publish its changes either (it says it will "some day," but that's not good enough for compliance) so you're taking aim at P99 specifically for some reason. What motivated you to "turn heel?" We've seen motivated community members do that before, usually due to feeling slighted in some way or another. Reminds me of people practically spamming Sony/Daybreak about P99's existence prior to the 2015 agreement. Feel free to fill me in via PM if you don't care for some of the usual jokers around here sticking their noses in.

Danth

[Gustoo]

You guys are hilarious.

This post stems from a different thread and OP just felt like it warranted its own thread, and made the mistake of using a clickbait title that got you guys hackles up right off the bat.

I take it for granted that loramin is a committed p99 guy considering countless hours tuning up the wiki to the benefit of everyone here.

[starkind]

Doesn't matter. Once you license something GPL3, even if the original license holder wants to change the license, and grant you an exclusive right to not publish ... they can't.

The moment they put that license on their source code repository it was out of their hands, legally speaking: that code has been released under that license.

What if I told you that only matters if they redistributed the server for a fee. Since they aren't for profit and it's in house they can do whatever they want.

1. They aren't redistributing closed source modification.
2. The project is "science" tm. We just have the benefit of being allowed to connect.
3. No one is profiting.

Entirely legal even for me to experiment, tinker, refine my own quake 1 server source and allow people to connect even if it was closed source. As long as I didn't charge for connections. Or sell or give that code to anyone.

P99 is completely legal and no one is compelled by GpLv3 under these circumstances to release anything.

It's not like GpL3 telescope control software where they are selling it for use with other tracking motors or as part of an OS that can control telescopes. Or distributing bins of the code.

Totally legal in the former, rather than the latter.

Case closed.

Get a life and go macroquest 20 bots on another scumbox.

[TheConsortium]

Gilbert Gottfried and TAKP .. a cameo from Gilbert business related is ~$1000 hheheh

[starkind]

You guys are hilarious.

This post stems from a different thread and OP just felt like it warranted its own thread, and made the mistake of using a clickbait title that got you guys hackles up right off the bat.

I take it for granted that loramin is a committed p99 guy considering countless hours tuning up the wiki to the benefit of everyone here.

OT is a deathworld.

Don't post here unless you're Xixchil.

[starkind]

Also for cheaters, the source is invaluable. Bad idea if these servers want to keep any semblance of human PCs without complete automation of the client's.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

These kinds of licenses are only really relevant when you are trying to SELL the code you have modified and redistributed for real money. Since P99 is free, RMT is banned, and donations are supposedly only going to maintaining the servers, there really isn't any legal action to be done here.

If on the other hand P99 suddenly became subscription based (let's say with Daybreak's blessing to remove that complication), then the EQEMU guys may ask for the license to be enforced under penalty of legal action.

As far as I am aware there are no EQEMU servers operating with a fee, so the developers of EQEMU don't really care about what people are doing with it.

And remember the EQEMU and all related servers are operating in a grey area anyway, since they do not have any rights to be using the Everquest IP, it's code, etc. The only reason why the entire EQEMU hasn't been shut down is because the owners of the Everquest IP haven't cared enough to go after them.

[loramin]

We'll see. I note you haven't posted this same objection on TAKP's site even though it doesn't publish its changes either (it says it will "some day," but that's not good enough for compliance) so you're taking aim at P99 specifically for some reason. What motivated you to "turn heel?" We've seen motivated community members do that before, usually due to feeling slighted in some way or another. Reminds me of people practically spamming Sony/Daybreak about P99's existence prior to the 2015 agreement. Feel free to fill me in via PM if you don't care for some of the usual jokers around here sticking their noses in.

Danth

Honestly, I just learned of P99's violation recently, and then Takp just now when you told me. But the same principle applies equally to both.

[Gatordash]

Honestly, I just learned of P99's violation recently, and then Takp just now when you told me. But the same principle applies equally to both.

I was under the impression p99 and Takp did share some of that stuff with each other. Maybe I'm wrong, but if they are then that seems to be in the spirit of your law Loramin.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Yeah thinking about it a bit more, the licensing for EQEMU is basically moot, because I doubt they would ever want to take legal action against someone. This is because they would be profiting off of the Everquest IP basically. At that point whomever owns the Everquest IP would probably end up going after EQEMU in turn for illegally making money off of the Everquest IP.

Moral of the story is, don't worry about the legality of something like P99, because EQEMU is basically illegal to begin with lol. We are just lucky that the Everquest IP owners do not mind EQEMU existing.

[Jibartik]

Honestly, I just learned of P99's violation recently, and then Takp just now when you told me. But the same principle applies equally to both.

GxM3wstBcD4

[loramin]

Yeah thinking about it a bit more, the licensing for EQEMU is basically moot, because I doubt they would ever want to take legal action against someone. This is because they would be profiting off of the Everquest IP basically. At that point whomever owns the Everquest IP would probably end up going after EQEMU in turn for illegally making money off of the Everquest IP.

Moral of the story is, don't worry about the legality of something like P99, because EQEMU is basically illegal to begin with lol. We are just lucky that the Everquest IP owners do not mind EQEMU existing.

It's not about profiting, it's about code-sharing. The GPL says nothing about "if you don't make money you can ignore it".

[loramin]

We'll see. I note you haven't posted this same objection on TAKP's site even though it doesn't publish its changes either (it says it will "some day," but that's not good enough for compliance) so you're taking aim at P99 specifically for some reason. What motivated you to "turn heel?" We've seen motivated community members do that before, usually due to feeling slighted in some way or another. Reminds me of people practically spamming Sony/Daybreak about P99's existence prior to the 2015 agreement. Feel free to fill me in via PM if you don't care for some of the usual jokers around here sticking their noses in.

Danth

After more research it does look like it is ultimately up to the copyright holder to enforce, so it really comes down to "does the EQ Emulator project want to enforce the license they selected?"

[starkind]

It's not about profiting, it's about code-sharing. The GPL says nothing about "if you don't make money you can ignore it".

You side stepped my use case scenarios.

Go look at BSDs netcode and Microsofts spats. Or SuSE/Debian and get back 2 me.

The older generation intel/Nvidia Linux drivers are also interesting.

TLDR: Loramin doesn't understand GNU/gpl or why at all big companies even pay lip service to it or even allow stuff like this and is getting uppity mad with threads title or the false assertion Rogean has to publish code which is his own personal project.

You failed hard at being illuminazi.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

It's not about profiting, it's about code-sharing. The GPL says nothing about "if you don't make money you can ignore it".

How do you think the EQEMU guys would force P99 to comply with their license? They would have to take legal action (which costs money), and they would expect to receive compensation in return to cover the legal fees and any damages.

Unless the owners of EQEMU like losing money on pointless lawsuits, they would never take action.

The reason why making money is normally the biggest factor in this kind of legal situation is because when you sue the person who is illegally profiting off of your code, you can get the money they got in profits as damage compensation. You also punish them for breaking the license.

If the person breaking the license has no money, you will just end up wasting money on the lawsuit. When you are making money off of the code, you can be at least reasonably certain they still have some of it. Of course they may end up spending it all on cocaine and hookers, but that is a different story:)

[TheConsortium]

ive sued someone myself and im not a lawyer... its just more boring than everquest

also stupid to do illegal things when you could prove you didn't do those things

and especially dumb to do it and piss of other nerds

[loramin]

How do you think the EQEMU guys would force P99 to comply with their license? They would have to take legal action (which costs money), and they would expect to receive compensation in return to cover the legal fees and any damages.

Unless the owners of EQEMU like losing money on pointless lawsuits, they would never take action.

The reason why making money is normally the biggest factor in this kind of legal situation is because when you sue the person who is illegally profiting off of your code, you can get the money they got in profits as damage compensation. You also punish them for breaking the license.

If the person breaking the license has no money, you will just end up wasting money on the lawsuit. When you are making money off of the code, you can be at least reasonably certain they still have some of it. Of course they may end up spending it all on cocaine and hookers, but that is a different story:)

First off, I think you're massively underestimating the power of shame. For all we know R&N aren't doing any of this on purpose, they just never read the EQ Emulator license. I doubt that, but their position is obviously more nuanced, and simply having the rights holder ask them to fix their mistake may well be enough to make them remedy things.

But hypothetically speaking, if they truly were assholes who felt the rules don't apply to them, that they can freely use someone else's source code/work and ignore their legal obligation to share their commits afterward ... even after that rights holder asks them to correct the violation ... as I already mentioned there are organizations that provide free legal assistance.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

First off, I think you're massively underestimating the power of shame. For all we know R&N aren't doing any of this on purpose, they just never read the EQ Emulator license. Simply having the rights holder ask could well be enough to remedy things.

But hypothetically speaking, if they truly were assholes who felt the rules don't apply to them, that they can freely use someone else's source code/work and ignore their legal obligation to share their commits afterward ... even after that rights holder asks them to correct the violation ... as I already mentioned there are organizations that provide free legal assistance.

I am not underestimating the power of shame. The problem is you seem to assume people just sue other people to shame them. In MOST cases, legal suites involving intellectual property come down to illegally generating profits off of someone else's work, or causing a loss in profits due to the illegal generation of competition by copying your intellectual property.

Sure, there may be assholes out there that like to sue people for pleasure, at the cost of legal fees and time, but that is not normal.

Big companies (like the owners of the Everquest IP) could go after EQEMU even if they are not making money because they are illegally using their code/IP, and that is taking away players that could be playing on the live servers. That is a case where the owners of the Everquest IP are fine with losing money on the lawsuit because the number of players NOT playing the Daybreak servers is costing them a good chunk of money. By shutting down EQEMU, they discourage other people from making another EQEMU, and ideally get the players back into their servers, thus making up for the loss in profit.

The EQEMU dev's have literally nothing to gain from suing P99 because nobody is making money here. The P99 dev's are not even claiming the EQEMU code is their own. There is nothing to fix via legal action.

[Homesteaded]

My understanding is the code they received initially is not recognizable after altering it to p99 needs.

So the code they have now isn’t from emu. I’m sure they’ve given credit to that community. This whole premise is strange and stinks of extreme boredom.

[loramin]

The EQEMU dev's have literally nothing to gain from suing P99.

Only the one thing they asked for in exchange for their code: P99's commits.

[loramin]

My understanding is the code they received initially is not recognizable after altering it to p99 needs.

So the code they have now isn’t from emu. I’m sure they’ve given credit to that community. This whole premise is strange and stinks of extreme boredom.

Again, if they've truly eliminated all EQ Emulator code from their server, they're in the clear (although maybe it's a little gray if they originally used EQ Emulator code).

My understanding, and the basis of this thread ... which (again) Nilbog could pop in and correct at any moment ... was that P99 is still an EQ Emulator project. In programming terms it's a "fork" of the original project.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Only the one thing they asked for in exchange for their code: P99's commits.

You simply do not understand the purpose of these licenses. They are not explicitly demanding other peoples code, you are taking the sentence too literally.

If you use open source code under a GPL3 license and re-distribute it for free, giving the proper credit to the creators, you will NEVER be sued. Period.

The reason for this license is to discourage people from taking the code, claiming it as their own, and using it in a product that makes money.

If you want to make money off of an open source project, the GPL3 license comes into play to keep you honest by showing you are using their code, and allowing other people to use it.

[Shac]

so we all agree p99 shouldn't share code to honor the license or that they don't have to because the license means nothing?

[loramin]

You simply do not understand the purpose of these licenses. They are not explicitly demanding other peoples code, you are taking the sentence too literally.

If you use open source code under a GPL3 license and re-distribute it for free, giving the proper credit to the creators, you will NEVER be sued. Period.

The reason for this license is to discourage people from taking the code, claiming it as their own, and using it in a product that makes money.

If you want to make money off of an open source project, the GPL3 license comes into play to keep you honest by showing you are using their code, and allowing other people to use it.

I agree that in practice it'd be far less likely for anyone to pursue any legal action when there's no money involved ... but, again, P99 receives donations.

Also (again), there's lots of ways things can play out that don't require lawsuits.

[loramin]

so we all agree p99 shouldn't share code to honor the license or that they don't have to because the license means nothing?

I thought everyone here was a young doctor AND a young lawyer? ;) The young lawyering in this thread is sad.

But seriously, these licenses are not some crazy disputed legal question: they are very well established in the software world. At work I've had to conduct audits of the packages we use, checking every license to make sure our company was in compliance ... and this was at a small startup! And as an aside, no company I've worked for has ever used GPL3 software, precisely because of this requirement.

The fact that it's not a corporation violating the law is the only unique thing here.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

I agree that in practice it'd be far less likely for anyone to pursue any legal action when there's no money involved ... but, again, P99 receives donations.

At the end of the day the bigger point you are missing is both EQEMU and P99 are technically illegal to begin with. So it doesn't really matter what EQEMU's "licensing" entails. The only reason why EQEMU still exists is because the Everquest IP holders have made it clear that they currently have no intention to take legal action. That doesn't mean EQEMU and P99 are suddenly legal, it just means they will not be taken action against for now.

I do not actually believe the EQEMU dev's COULD take legal action against anybody who uses their code for Everquest emulation, because that requires you to illegally use Everquest's IP, client code, etc.

The only case where I could see the EQEMU dev's having a case to begin with is if someone took their code, used it in something completely unrelated to Everquest, and claimed it as their own. Then at least you probably won't have to deal with the Everquest side of things. But P99 isn't doing that.

[Shac]

doesnt the link provided above to the license itself, direct people who want to pursue action, free legal support?

[DeathsSilkyMist]

doesnt the link provided above to the license itself, direct people who want to pursue action, free legal support?

Free is not equal to good:) Yes, maybe you can get free legal representation, but I don't see much of a case to begin with, as there are no damages.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

"Free" also depends on how the lawyers make money. For example, in personal injury cases you do not pay legal fees unless you win the case. So that doesn't mean "completely free", it means "free unless you win". That means if you DON'T have a case, lawyers will probably not take the case, as they have no chance of winning, which means getting back the money it cost them to pursue your case.

[Shac]

if there is no case, and the lawyer isn't good enough to know it, isn't it a perfect representation for this type of attack on licensing requirements?

[Gustoo]

I don't think that the way these emu servers work is "illegal" it requires users to purchase the game software and bla bla i dunno?

[Jibartik]

The young lawyering in this thread is sad.

Well, you're the only one lawyering here, and it is sad, but fyi everyone else is just telling you to shutup.

[loramin]

At the end of the day the bigger point you are missing is both EQEMU and P99 are technically illegal to begin with. So it doesn't really matter what EQEMU's "licensing" entails. The only reason why EQEMU still exists is because the Everquest IP holders have made it clear that they currently have no intention to take legal action. That doesn't mean EQEMU and P99 are suddenly legal, it just means they will not be taken action against for now.

I do not actually believe the EQEMU dev's COULD take legal action against anybody who uses their code for Everquest emulation, because that requires you to illegally use Everquest's IP, client code, etc.

The only case where I could see the EQEMU dev's having a case to begin with is if someone took their code, used it in something completely unrelated to Everquest, and claimed it as their own. Then at least you probably won't have to deal with the Everquest side of things. But P99 isn't doing that.

It's not like they are operating on Tor or something. They are running an legit enough operation to take Paypal donations.

[Jibartik]

It's not like they are operating on Tor or something. They are running an legit enough operation to take Paypal donations.

That doesn't mean anything though, you like constantly do this.

You're like, Well I decree by taking donations that it is a legitimate business!

Its like one thing does not mean the other, it just means there is a donate button there.

You can have a donate button on a dog fighting website.

[Shac]

p99 should be a standalone game to avoid any licensing issues

[Whale biologist]

Buddy if you clickthrough my EULA one time I own all your code in perpetuity until the end of time.

This is well settled law!

[loramin]

That doesn't mean anything though, you like constantly do this.

You're like, Well I decree by taking donations that it is a legitimate business!

Its like one thing does not mean the other, it just means there is a donate button there.

You can have a donate button on a dog fighting website.

Was I not responding to someone who "just decreed" that all legal action against P99 was futile because they weren't legal? They're allowed to do that but I'm not allowed to respond?

[DeathsSilkyMist]

It's not like they are operating on Tor or something. They are running an legit enough operation to take Paypal donations.

They are not making money off of the Everquest IP. Why do you think RMT is banned? Once RMT starts happening, that is a BIG no no because the P99 dev's are directly making money off of Everquest. Donations are in a different category unless there is proof you are committing fraud. That is why charities are able to accept money without going through the same legal processes as businesses. The donations are only there to keep the server going, the P99 dev's are not allowed to use the money for anything else.

[loramin]

They are not making money off of the Everquest IP. Why do you think RMT is banned? Once RMT starts happening, that is a BIG no no because the P99 dev's are directly making money off of Everquest. Donations are in a different category unless there is proof you are committing fraud. That is why charities are able to accept money without going through the same legal processes as businesses. The donations are only there to keep the server going, the P99 dev's are not allowed to use the money for anything else.

This has nothing to do with the EverQuest IP. It's (literally) about the EQ Emulator IP. SOE is a company, EQ Emulator is an open source project.

[Shac]

can't devs still be making money off RMT but say they're against it in public?

who is to know Bundoggle a newly created level 1 human mage with 10000k for $5 wasn't just spun up by a dev?

really instead of the source code, we need dev logs and bank accounts to actively monitor this RMT stance they claim to have.

[Jibartik]

Was I not responding to someone who "just decreed" that all legal action against P99 was futile because they weren't legal? They're allowed to do that but I'm not allowed to respond?

You're allowed to respond but this response of yours is:

1. Accusatory (of an actual crime)
2. not researched
3. damaging to the integrity of this entire project
4. likely incorrect
5. a big guess
6. could shut this down because rumors are the only threat to this project
7. this is a mod all mods are given carblanch to do anything by the license holder of the brand and......
8. ........the only thing that would shut a mod down is bad word of mouth of shady practices

If I was in charge you'd be in jail with abacaba for this blatent hostile attack against p99 and staff bashing thread, accusing them of crimes.

but I am a little evil dark elf.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

This has nothing to do with the EverQuest IP. It's literally about the EQ Emulator IP.

You are LITERALLY playing Everquest. Do you not realize everything in the Everquest client is NOT owned by the P99 devs? It is owned by the company that owns the Everquest IP. You cannot have an Everquest emulator without that lol.

Normally it is illegal to take someone else's product and re-distribute it as your own. That is why P99 is a pretty unique case, most emulators get shut down.

[Jibartik]

I hope disney buys everquest and deletes all reccord of the wiki :o

[Jibartik]

6. could shut this down because rumors are the only threat to this project

I like that I say thsi then go around posting that hitler is alive and driving a space car made of baby bones to the white house every morning.

:cool:

(im full of shit loramin)

[Shac]

the wiki is the only good part of p99, open information for all to see, records of who made the updates or changes, version control.

everything loramin wants the devs to uphold it seems. wiki99 vs p99��️

[loramin]

You are LITERALLY playing Everquest. Do you not realize everything in the Everquest client is NOT owned by the P99 devs? It is owned by the company that owns the Everquest IP. You cannot have an Everquest emulator without that lol.

Normally it is illegal to take someone else's product and re-distribute it as your own. That is why P99 is a pretty unique case, most emulators get shut down.


You're very wrong about that. There are tons of 100% legal emulators all over the Internet, and Nintendo, Sega, etc. can't do squat about them. They can pursue people who spread the ROMs, but emulators (which don't copy any original code are) absolutely are legal, because by definition their code isn't anyone else's, it's brand new.

EQ Emulator as a project faces zero realistic legal threat from SOE. It's only people using the client, the copyrighted assets within it, or the trademarks (eg. the term EverQuest) ... ie. P99 ... who potentially face risk (risk they alleviated with the agreement).

[loramin]

the wiki is the only good part of p99, open information for all to see, records of who made the updates or changes, version control.

everything loramin wants the devs to uphold it seems. wiki99 vs p99��️

Seriously, I'm in favor of the devs keeping details private here. I've said as much in many posts prior to this.

But I'm MORE in favor of respecting the law and the wishes of developers whose code you use. This is what I do for a living (or at least I used to; now I teach it), and if someone ripped off my work I'd be pissed. If they don't have an agreement with the EQEmulator people, and they use EQEmulator code, that's what R&N are doing.

Look, no one held Rogean and Nilbog at gunpoint and forced them to use someone else's code: that was a choice they made.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

You're very wrong about that. There are tons of 100% legal emulators all over the Internet, and Nintendo, Sega, etc. can't do squat about them. They can pursue people who spread the ROMs, but emulators (which don't copy any original code are) absolutely legal, because by definition their code isn't anyone else's, it's brand new.

EQ Emulator as a project faces zero realistic legal threat from SOE. It's only people using the client, the copyrighted assets within it, or the trademarks (eg. the term EverQuest) ... ie. P99 ... who potentially face risk (risk they alleviated with the agreement).

You are wrong. If they couldn't take legal action against P99, the dev's wouldn't have needed to get Daybreak's consent to continue. They wouldn't need to ban RMT, and they wouldn't need to accept donations, they could just charge people money.

Most of those "100% legal" emulators are not legal, Sega just has no interest in pursuing legal action. There is a difference.

[Danth]

It's (literally) about the EQ Emulator IP.

Am I out of the loop with respect to who controls EQ-Emulator? When I first started on here, Rogean controlled EQ-EMU and also took interest in P1999. Has Rogean stepped down from control of EQ-EMU? If not, it seems unlikely he would be inclined to sue himself. I admit I do not pay close attention so correct me if I am out of date.

Danth

[loramin]

Am I out of the loop with respect to who controls EQ-Emulator? When I first started on here, Rogean controlled EQ-EMU and also took interest in P1999. Has Rogean stepped down from control of EQ-EMU? If not, it seems unlikely he would be inclined to sue himself. I admit I do not pay close attention so correct me if I am out of date.

Danth

Honestly I thought it was a project with many contributors, and I didn't know who the BDFL (if any) was. If it truly is Rogean then you're right, he's not at any risk :D

(NOTE: The project lists 72 contributors: that's 72 people's code that P99 is potentially using, while ignoring the one thing those 72 people requested ... even IF Rogean is the founding and/or controlling member.)

[Jibartik]

ou're very wrong about that. There are tons of 100% legal emulators all over the Internet, and Nintendo, Sega, etc. can't do squat about them

bro the young lawyer is way off about this.

you cannot make mods of nintendo games go find me some roms right now.

The only reason any mod can exist is out of good faith.

Good faith you are threatening pretty hard with these accusations that involve courts and legality which are the only thing that can threaten good faith (and my baby hitler coments so im one to talk) but Ill quit if you quit.

[Shac]

if everyone knows the work they used to develop their flavor of eqemu, then what is the real issue. it's not like they're stealing anything, they're just developing ontop?

[loramin]

bro the young lawyer is way off about this.

you cannot make mods of nintendo games go find me some roms right now.

The only reason any mod can exist is out of good faith.

I was talking about emulators, not mods. The two are completely different legally.

Mods, by definition, involve working with copyrighted code (the source code you are modifying). Emulators just simulate the original thing they emulate: they aren't actually that original thing.

(Again, I'm speaking about a class of emulator: one that does not use the original source code. EQ Emu qualifies, as no one even has the original source code to copy. An emulator that does use original code obviously wouldn't count.)

[Shac]

it's like if I order a pizza from Pizza Hut.

then I add a can of soup on top, everyones like ehh it's pizza hut, wtf is this beans on too?

and I'll be like it's not pizza hut anymore it's my version, enjoy. and they all eat it, and go ew i hate this flavor of pizza i am going to tell pizza hut to not sell you any pizzas as you dishonor the very nature of our young hut. then I just tell them gl, they're under gplu3v25 and they don't really care about the version i make to their pizza.

case closed

[Whale biologist]

bro the young lawyer is way off about this.

you cannot make mods of nintendo games go find me some roms right now.

The only reason any mod can exist is out of good faith.



ALTTP randomizer, FF6 T-Edition, Radical Dreamers?

[starkind]

Seriously, I'm in favor of the devs keeping details private here. I've said as much in many posts prior to this.

But I'm MORE in favor of respecting the law and the wishes of developers whose code you use. This is what I do for a living, and if someone ripped off my work I'd be pissed. If they don't have an agreement with the EQEmulator people, and they use EQEmulator code, that's what R&N are doing.
Yeah except just saying so or not so and ignoring the facts or making up your own doesn't make it so which is exactly the agenda for this thread.

Tbh. The reality is that the world needs a game in the same veign as brads vision before the pixel lust. Muddflation. Raiders. And hardcore addicts ruined it with expansion after expansion. A new game without the terrible troubled redundant writing that plagues everquest. Without the triteness, political correctness and populism of wow and its clones. Done by hobbyists and homebrew table top gamers not interested in a massive return on investment or population growth. A game meant to show case a world. And challenge its inhabitants.

Oroborousing and attacking p99 and Rogean so you can just continue to clone and copy asexually doesn't achieve any of that. And just degrades the DNA of EQs greatness.

[Shac]

contra was a sick nintendo game for gameboy anyone play that 1? link illegal copyrighted games here, so I can play that one

[DeathsSilkyMist]

ALTTP randomizer, FF6 T-Edition, Radical Dreamers?

I think people are getting confused about emulators, mods, etc. Making a counterstrike mod with all custom assets, code, etc. would not be illegal, for example. You couldn't SELL the mod for money, because that would be using the game's IP to sell your own stuff, but you could release the mod for free. Those examples you mentioned are mods that are free, and they do not include the original game, so there is no issue.

The problem with something like an Everquest emulator is Everquest is a "games as a service" style game. This changes the way the IP holder looks at emulators. This is because an active emulated server is basically "stealing" potential customers away from their business, because another entity has provided a free version of their game.

That is why the P99 dev team should be heavily praised for maintaining a good relationship with the Everquest IP holders, and making sure they were not making a profit off of the game. That is why they stick solely to donations intended to keep the server hardware going, and they ban RMT. Honestly P99 is practically a miracle.

EDIT: This is why I was saying it's a weird area to begin with when it comes to the EQEMU. Yes, the EQEMU code by itself is made by the EQEMU dev's (to my knowledge), but it is currently being used in P99 for emulating a "games as a service" game. So I am honestly not sure how the EQEMU dev's could bring a legal case (and make money) without also entangling themselves in the Everquest IP side. As I said before, if someone simply took the EQEMU code and used it for something not related to Everquest, then the EQEMU dev's could potentially go after them, as it doesn't involve Everquest anymore. However, even then I am not 100% sure how the law works with a server emulator, as the EQEMU code is basically a reconstruction of the Everquest server code using packet sniffing. So technically the EQEMU code is being developed based on someone else's code, which is not open source. That is where it gets really weird.

[starkind]

I was thinking of doing a cool homebrew Gameboy style steam game in the veign of 1 EQ class and its epic cosmological journey from giant rats to planar riff Raffery for starter funds. Worried I'd get bought out or leepfrogged if toooo successful tho.

Would be pretty cool tho ��

[Jibartik]

If I draw mickey mouse with a dick on it Disney can force me to take it down.

[Vivitron]

No, I don't mean by re-creating an old game ... I mean by making modifications to the EQ Emulator source code, and not publishing those modifications.

Backstory: Project 1999 (AFAIK) is based off the EQ Emulator project, https://github.com/EQEmu/Server. As you can see at that link, that project has chosen the (absolutely terrible) GPL3 license to open source their code: https://github.com/EQEmu/Server/blob/master/LICENSE

That (again, terrible) license ... well I won't quote its legalese, but if you look at a summary of it on https://tldrlegal.com/license/gnu-general-public-license-v3-(gpl-3), you'll see:



In other words, unless P99 has ripped literally every last line of EQ Emulator code out ... because EQ Emulator picked Richard Stallman's (awful) GPL3 as their license ... P99 is legally required to publish their modifications to the EQ Emulator software.

Two important notes: 1) I am not a lawyer, just a copyright law hobbyist, and 2) the GPL does not in any way cover the database; they have no obligation to open source that.

But still ... thoughts?

P.S. For what it's worth I'm not a fan of this: I'd like to keep the game's secrets ... secret. But the GPL3 is, by design, unforgiving. If you use GPL3 source code in any way, even on a server, you are legally obligated to share modifications to that code (unlike the much saner GPL2).

You're confusing the GPL V3 with the AGPL. If you google the differences between these three licenses you'll see that tldrlegal botched its summary of the GPL V3.

[loramin]

You're confusing the GPL V3 with the AGPL. If you google the differences between these three licenses you'll see that tldrlegal botched its summary of the GPL V3.

Yeah, actually I've been googling (and talking to an eq emu dev) and realized I made that mistake. I'd been told that GPL3 was toxic even to server apps (and that we needed to avoid it on the job ... for a server app), but now I have no idea why. Only AGPL closes the "server loophole".

I offer my sincere apologies for inadvertently slandering Rogean and Nilbog with my poor young lawyering. I clearly should have done more research first. :(

I am of course very thankful for everything they do here ... but even more so that they put up with idiots like me. Again, I'm very sorry for my poor judgment.

[Aussie]

I'll bite - I think alot of people in this thread need a history lesson.

P99 was formed well before the EQEmulator Project was published to Github, or the project was licensed to GPL3.

The code was originally distributed via eqemulator.net under creative commons.

[Shac]

yeah but which creative commons?

[Trexller]

uh am I really the only one who knows that Rogean owns EQEMU

its his email for the donations, he's an admin on eqemu

and nilbog is probably akkadius

[Naethyn]

GPL doesn't prevent anyone from modifying licensed code and offering it as whatever service it provides. They are breaking no license here.

[Jibartik]

yeah but what about my micky mouse pics.

[Swish]

I didn't read the first 10 pages but the servers are still up so gg OP.

[Tunabros]

Do you feel anything for the developers who made it possible for you to play here? Do you think their wishes (after spending years writing code for zero pay) should be respected? Or should P99 break the law to directly go against their wishes?

no one cares enough to sue p99

not sure why you're trying to take down a server you spent so much time writing stupid wiki articles on and finding bugs

[Trexller]

no one cares enough to sue p99

not sure why you're trying to take down a server you spent so much time writing stupid wiki articles on and finding bugs

no server means no wiki means loramin can have his life back

nilbog has loramin chained up in the basement and he has to earn food/toilet privileges by wiki update quotas

[Chortles Snortles]

i bet loramin feels pretty silly right now

[Trexller]

i bet loramin feels pretty silly right now

probably, he's chained up in nilbog's basement trying to figure out exactly where grapes are not sold, but should be

[Penish]

Ok, since the law doesn't seem to be swaying people, let's look at the logic behind it.

A bunch of programmers on the EQ Emulator project wrote a lot of code, to let people enjoy this great game of EverQuest. It was a lot of work. They said to the world "hey world, you can use all our work, for free! The only price is that you have to share what you add."

Rogean and Nilbog came along and said "thanks for all that free work, we'll totally use it on our project ... but fuck you, we're not sharing, we're just taking your code illegally".

Does that bother anyone else?

i agree with loramin, they have the intellectual property of literally thousands of people

[Tunabros]

who cares lol

I had fun on p99 and I probably will continue to have fun

[Torven]

The license doesn't stop the code authors from waiving the requirement to share derivative code in the first place even if it applied in this case. (although with so many authors in this case, that could be hard to get consensus but I doubt they care)

The codebases have diverged so much by now that it's often hard to impossible to merge stuff anyway. You'd usually be better off writing from scratch after being given the mechanics details or it would have to be heavily modified at least. They also emulate different eras and clients, so many of the changes are not relevant to EQEmu's main fork anyway. On top of that, coders often like to do things 'their way' and wouldn't want to merge and would rather write it themselves. It's not a simple matter of P99 giving code over and EQEmu suddenly being better. Different projects have different priorities.

TAKP was open source for a year after we launched and it caused serious problems which would have resulted in developers leaving had we remained open. Trust me, be glad P99 is closed for the time being.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

The license doesn't stop the code authors from waiving the requirement to share derivative code in the first place even if it applied in this case. (although with so many authors in this case, that could be hard to get consensus but I doubt they care)

The codebases have diverged so much by now that it's often hard to impossible to merge stuff anyway. You'd usually be better off writing from scratch after being given the mechanics details or it would have to be heavily modified at least. They also emulate different eras and clients, so many of the changes are not relevant to EQEmu's main fork anyway. On top of that, coders often like to do things 'their way' and wouldn't want to merge and would rather write it themselves. It's not a simple matter of P99 giving code over and EQEmu suddenly being better. Different projects have different priorities.

TAKP was open source for a year after we launched and it caused serious problems which would have resulted in developers leaving had we remained open. Trust me, be glad P99 is closed for the time being.

This. Sadly code is not as portable as most people think. The EQEMU is built to operate for a specific Everquest era, which isn't P99's eras. P99 is also built to cater to P99, which has it's own custom ideas that are not classic. This means a lot of the custom code in P99 isn't directly relevant to the EQEMU anyway, because it is doing things like modifying how spell interrupts work. The spell interrupt code already exists in the EQEMU, so unless the original authors REALLY want Kunark/Velious style spell interrupts with P99 flavor in EQEMU, the code isn't useful.

If there are some general bug fixes/improvements in P99 that could be applied to EQEMU, who is to say the devs of P99 haven't shared that already with the EQEMU devs?

[loramin]

i bet loramin feels pretty silly right now

For once ... I truly do :(

I made a mistake, or actually two. The minor one was misunderstanding a software license, and the much bigger one was making a big clickbaity thread about it instead of trying to discuss it without all the drama.

Again, I sincerely apologize for both. All I can hope is that the people I besmirched got some amusement out of laughing at this thread.

[Jibartik]

Don't worry about apologizing we're all just people, just take this as a learning experience next time everyone is yelling at you :o

JFK ended the federal support of mental hospitals and started the epidemic we live in today.

[loramin]

Don't worry about apologizing we're all just people, just take this as a learning experience next time everyone is yelling at you :o

JFK ended the federal support of mental hospitals and started the epidemic we live in today.

Thank you Jib, that post made me me smile.

But I still feel bad, and will for awhile ... as I should. R&N certainly didn't deserve this thread.

[Jibartik]

You should feel bad JFK was playing us all for fools! :p

https://i.imgur.com/i2qzNnI.png

[starkind]

https://i.imgur.com/U32kNw7.png

[Chortles Snortles]

sips a $50 coffee in ur direction

[Chloroform]

pity reply

[Kiithsa]

This thread confirms what I already knew. Loramin genuinely cares about this project enough to put himself out there, open to scrutiny. Also willing to admit when he is wrong. No respect lost.

GG, Loramin

[Jibartik]

I am glad we can all agree, JFK ended the federal support of mental hospitals and started the epidemic we live in today.

[Jimjam]

For once ... I truly do :(

I made a mistake, or actually two. The minor one was misunderstanding a software license, and the much bigger one was making a big clickbaity thread about it instead of trying to discuss it without all the drama.

Again, I sincerely apologize for both. All I can hope is that the people I besmirched got some amusement out of laughing at this thread.

You coulda styled it out with claims of Devil’s Advocate or ‘just a prank, bro’. Respect to you that you took ownership.

Worthwhile topic for discussions sake anyway.

[Gustoo]

You should feel bad JFK was playing us all for fools! :p

https://i.imgur.com/i2qzNnI.png

Lol

[Torven]

There is some sharing going on; the projects just don't want much code from each other, if any. Mackal has access to TAKP source and he can lift whatever he wants from it. He preferred to implement combat mechanics in his own way into EQEmu and our forks are too different to copy and paste regardless. TAKP founders Rob and Cavedude are long-time PEQ/EQEmu devs. Haynar works on P99 and TAKP and there has been a small amount of sharing there. I publicly outline a lot of my research on EQEmu's forum as a way to preserve it. The research is usually the hard part anyway.

The databases and quest scripts would be more desirable than the code. P99 uses Perl and TAKP ripped out Perl and converted all scripts to Lua, so they couldn't share scripts without porting them to another language even if they wanted to share; not to mention all the NPC IDs being different. I also added numerous new API functions and fixed broken ones so EQEmu would have to add those if they used our scripts and I assume they added their own functions as well. It's just not a matter of copy and paste. Project EQ has already adopted some of our content work and I always assumed they would lift a lot more once we fully reopened again; but even NPC stats are problematic as we have added numerous new database fields and changed the way some behave.

[Jimjam]

So you’re saying TAKP is Roblox?

[Jibartik]

https://i.imgur.com/zbCOoxq.gif

[cd288]

Isn’t the person who first appropriated the code technically making it available against the law as well since it’s not their IP? Kind of tough to misappropriate the code/IP of someone who technically doesn’t have legal rights to it in the first place.

[unsunghero]

Has anyone posted this yet? Didn’t want to read through 13 pages

[JayDee]

Capital punishment clearly in order