A discussion on the other board about whether or not CF character descriptions constitute "Intellectual Property" and are subject to IP law has gotten me thinking.

Who owns the rights to CF character likenesses, by which I guess I mean descriptions and roles? My assumption would be that it's either the person who wrote them or whatever sort of corporation protects CF.

I'm not actively "concerned" about this, more just curious.

If there's no ownership defined, anyone sufficiently motivated could populate dozens of fantasy novels, games, etc. with totally fleshed-out, awesome characters, just by browsing the PBFs. Now that I think about it, I don't think I'd be opposed to that.

Wait. Maybe I would be opposed to it if one of my characters were introduced as a Jar-Jar Binks type in Stevers S. Steverson's bestselling series "Fields of Carrion."

and technically that includes any roles you enter, descriptions, and so on.

As for someone taking something and running with it for a fantasy game/novel, generally if CF was credited properly we'd probably love it, because it couldn't help but drive people to try us out.

As for it being introduced as a Jar-Jar type char, well, that shouldn't happen to you if your character wasn't that sort of character, right?

That makes good sense, but ToS seems to imply differently. Specifically section 22 that covers copyright. Unless I misunderstand something. The direct line "If you believe that *your* work has been copied..."

Seems to apply at least co-ownership of materials, if not full ownership by the author.

Not trying to be argumentative. I appreciate CF's appreciation of the collective intellectual property etc. Just interested in clarification and ToS agreements in particular interest me recently due to work related tasks.

>That makes good sense, but ToS seems to imply differently.
>Specifically section 22 that covers copyright. Unless I
>misunderstand something. The direct line "If you believe that
>*your* work has been copied..."
>
>Seems to apply at least co-ownership of materials, if not full
>ownership by the author.
>
>Not trying to be argumentative. I appreciate CF's appreciation
>of the collective intellectual property etc. Just interested
>in clarification and ToS agreements in particular interest me
>recently due to work related tasks.

Pretty sure that section is specifically for the proctection of other peoples copy rights for material that might appear within the game without their consent.

Works such as descriptions, roles, notes, or other user created works would seem to fall under section 8 as "Public content posted to Carrion Fields", and thus all rights would be given to CF at the point the work was submitted.

That gives CF the right to USE my/your works. It doesn't give them ownership of it.

EDIT 2: Which I assume is what protect them from copyright infringement every time someone looks at your character heh.

EDIT: Feel free to clarify the verbiage if I'm wrong. Certainly seems to be what it says imo.

I see your point on ownership but I don't think it matters since by posting you cede the right to them to do anything they want with what is posted without asking additional permission, providing payment or any other limiting conditions. At least that is how I read section 8 part b.

but big difference between:

A. I write a work, give it to John, and tell John "Use it how you want for YOUR purposes."

and

B. I write a work, give it to public domain.

At least in my eyes it is.

>>As for it being introduced as a Jar-Jar type char, well, that shouldn't happen to you if your character wasn't that sort of character, right?

Now he's going to have Twist, God of Magic (who farts constantly) in "Fields of Carrion" premiering Summer 2013 on HBO.

Move over Tim and Eric.

Nor agreed to any terms of service. I don't really care about the copyright, but that doesn't mean it is legally yours to have.

Theoretically I might grant you some sort of license, but that doesn't mean the copyright belongs to you. Either way I don't believe using a service without any notification of terms constitutes agreement to those terms. I honestly didn't know there was a TOS until it was mentioned in this thread.

I am not a lawyer of any type, but I think it is always a bad idea to assert legal rights you may or may not actually have. Especially since I think that perhaps you are confusing whatever voodoo you have to sign to be an IMM and what a player actually "agrees" to.

It also appears to be some standard boilerplate which isn't particularly applicable to CF, but more toward the forums or something. Some weird language in there.

For instance: Carrion Fields grants you a personal, non-transferable and non-exclusive right and license to use the object code of its Software on a single computer.

I would like my copy of the CF object code please?

Editted to add: The helpfile states the TOS is here: http://www.carrionfields.org/terms.html when it is actually here: http://www.carrionfields.com/tos.php

Also your privacy policy doesn't exist in the specified place.

Editted again a bunch after reading it more thoroughly.

I thought about it for two seconds.

You inputted a collection of text into CF, knowing that information is stored on CF's computers. How is that NOT voluntarily handing over your work? How is that information NOT theirs, now that it is stored on their computers? You gave up any rights you had to it once you hit the "enter" key. I'd say that qualifies as consent - it's not like they hacked your hard drive.

Although, admittedly, I -would- like to see the TOS put IN-GAME and for people to have to agree to it every time they roll a character. A behavior agreement would be nice, too (even though it's redundant to the rules, forcing people to read a code of conduct every time they rolled would be a great reminder.)

What you describe is no different than a blog posting or using a hosting company for your website. Just because you give it to them to store on their server doesn't make it theirs in terms of copyright.

It certainly qualifies as consent to let CF use it as they choose, as Twist mentioned below, but it doesn't transfer copyright ownership to them.

Any content submitted to CF is free for CF to use for whatever purpose.

Ownership would still be the author's if it deals with a character (desc, role, etc.).

If it is content submitted on a more permanent basis (suggested item stats/descs, Lyceum contributions, that sort of thing) it becomes the property of CF, due to it being added to an area file by someone who has signed the CF documents.

Thanks for clarification.

http://www.plagiarismchecker.com/plagiarism-vs-copyright.php

https://www.cu.edu/irm/stds/copyright/quicksum.html

In terms of character descriptions, it belongs to the writer. I haven't seen anything that dictates all descriptions written for the game become property of CF or something, but I suppose that could exist.

Areas and such I'd bet is covered in the red tape associated with becoming an immortal. Curious on that for sure.