nobody is saint, but why existence and well-being of MRC should be compromised with things that can be easily found elsewhere ?

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Besides, as for the companies you mentioned, I wouldn't count on it that they won't care anymore.

Please don't mistake this as a plea for links to 'warez' on MRC, because this is not intended to be so, but:

Would there be any way to find that out?

One one hand, one might argue:

"If they care so much about their products, artistic rights, trademarks etcetera, then why don't they release remakes on newer systems, no 'cameos' for known player or NPC characters, is there not even one reference to those on developers' websites, and so on..."

While you could safely state that:

"Games / concepts / sagas like Ys, Xak, Metal Gear are still being commercially distributed by their respective owners so they WILL care about piracy concerning old versions..."

As I'm -admittedly- a total commercial nitwit, I just wonder, hey, they made their profit back then, sold a lot of copies, what's there to gain for them now?

Do you see what I mean?

I wish to emphasize that I do understand the policy around here.

It's a great non-argument to say that the original developers wouldn't care anymore or anything like that. As soon as there is something that makes clear the developers DO still care, e.g. re-releases through services like WOOMB and EGG, many people start crying that they suck because they're in it for the money.

Face it, the only thing is that MSX users are not saints, but humans: they just don't want to pay if they don't have to. There's no moral issue involved in this. And as far as there is, I think the copyrights are very proper: they give the creator the right to decide what to do with his or her creation. How unfair is that?

So for a renowned developer, any possible legal action could stem from 2 concepts?

* Protection of creation/artistry itself (don't make a crappy pr0n version of Street Fighter without official permission)

* Protection of missed profits for your work (don't copy/distribute original games, nor should you earn money with that or given home-made SF pr0n)

Those two are both possible, indeed.

Well, you are a musician, you should be able to imagine how you feel when you have made some great songs with your band, so great that people are willing to pay for CD's or concerts, but at some point in time some other dudes decide they like your music as well and start playing it - for free. Wouldn't you be pissed?

One can talk long and short about copyrights, intentions of Japanese softwarehouses, Woomb, Egg, D4, whatever..

..it all comes down to 4 simple words: "no warezlinks on MRC"

Don't forget about the T-Shirts, Rikusu.

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Don't forget about the T-Shirts, Rikusu.

T-shirts with the text "no warezlinks on MRC" ??
Will the text be on the front or on the back ??

Ofcourse I was talking about t-shirt bootlegging.

What about protecting IP owners, that are ripped off by immoral programmers?

Let me give you a few examples of the top of my head: Operation Wolf "remake", BombJack, all the illegal SEGA 8-bit to MSX ports, Slotman's Prince of Persia ripoff?

How is that suddenly acceptable and not a problem with copyright?

I think that's obvious. Some actions are -clearly- copyright violations (warez downloads). There's no need for interpretation of copyright laws or anything. Remakes (which are obviously not 100% the same as the original) -can- violate copyrights, but this is hardly ever 100% clear. In the 'big world' disputes about that are usually settled before a court. At least it's not the same product that's being offered, which makes it different as well. At least when it concerns retro games, a remake can hardly beat "the real thing". It is therefore also obvious that a remake wouldn't do as much harm to the original product as a 100% illegal copy would.

What may be clear, however, is that it's not up to us to judge whether a remake does or doesn't constitute a copyright violation, whereas a copyright violation is a given thing when offering warez downloads.

As you probably know, remakes are much more tolerated by developers than illegal copies. It shouldn't be too hard to see the difference between those two.

Interesting point of view. But I was under impression that rights owners are actually more concerned with criminals using properties (gameplay idea, graphics, music) to make profit.

I only remember one case of copyright holder sort of being unhappy with MSX fans. Supposedly (according to Guyver800, who is hardly trustworthy) Aiky didn't like MSX1 Guru Logic.

I think that may change now, with the advent of WiiWare, Xbox Live, PSN and so on...

Ideally it would be nice if MRC policy was consistent on copyright violations. If something is fishy, get rid of it.

Anyone with half brain can search for "goodmsx" or "msx tosec". What we really do need, is something that funet.fi/pub/msx was, but without any warez, just the proper scene stuff.

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I only remember one case of copyright holder sort of being unhappy with MSX fans. Supposedly (according to Guyver800, who is hardly trustworthy) Aiky didn't like MSX1 Guru Logic.

Aiky wanted to do a new/commercial release of GLC. A freeware version could commercially interfere with that, so yea, Aiky wanted that version to go..

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Anyone with half brain can search for "goodmsx" or "msx tosec". What we really do need, is something that funet.fi/pub/msx was, but without any warez, just the proper scene stuff.

Our downloads section has proper scene stuff..

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Our downloads section has proper scene stuff..

The same discussion over and over again .... The MRC crew is as always bit stubborn in acknowledging the friction between not allowed warez discussions in the forum and themselves reporting on the frontpage with news on copyright infringing remakes of games and music and such. No clear line here at all, according the policies that should not be done by MRC.

For example: BlueMSX comes with warez (all those system roms) so the MRC cannot report on BlueMSX or even mention the BlueMSX site and has to remove all forum links to that site since it contains a large collection of illegal warez! But no, thats frontpage news!

But to add to this repetition: there may be proper scene stuff in the downloads section, but it is covered by the MRC policies who are declaring too much freedom with the submitted material. The recent defeat by MRC in the continuing TNI versus MRC war, is a pitiful example how rigid opinions and legal disputes in such unimportant, hobby related, issues, how ridiculous this can become.

Come on guys, this IS a hobby and money can not be made on the MSX scene by entities likeMRC and/or Bazix (I still dont know when Snout or Rikusu is a Bazix or MRC spokesman to repeat an old discussion without a clear outcome).

No sound business man cares about this small MSX community and programs running on MSX hardware (real or emulated), the games companies look at new ways like the WII for making money on their old material. They surely laugh at the MSX websites dutifully acknowledging MSX copyrights after the threats and pressure by representatives of the MSX licensing holders.

But asking the MRC to allow links to warez is not my point, it is about their hypocrite attitude not obeying their own policies!