Scratch

Well, this legislation isnt active yet so no.

It will probably not pass. If it does, I would.

schusteralex2 wrote:

ZeldaGames wrote:

I have made a game and uploaded a demo of it to scratch. It is a Zelda game and I do not know wheter I am allowed to keep it online of wether I have to remove it because of SOPA and PIPA. Please post any replys and comments below.

ZeldaGames 2012

You might even be censored because of copyrighted material in your name...

Uh, no. That's basically saying "it's illegal to say the name of anything copyrighted". Which means you wouldn't be able to say the word "Scratch" etc..

LS97 wrote:

SOPA means the host is responsible for anything uploaded... not the uploader. This is the big revolution that would kill many user-based sites!

^This.

Being that Scratch is an education-based site, the assumption is that use if copyrighted content falls under the Fair Use clause. However, some companies do not see it that way and sometimes send DCMA notices to the Scratcvh Team take projects down (such as the time when Namco-Bandai demanded for the removal of a kid's Pac-Man project).

DCMA is actually rather dangerous now already - it forcefully removes infringing copyrighted content without at first consulting the supposed offending party, kind of like a "remove now, sue later" mentality. Given that not many companies bother to follow up on them, the use of DCMA gives anyone the authority to remove supposed copyrighted content without at first giving the uploader a chance to speak.

If SOPA and PIPA are to pass, what it means is that, instead of a DCMA notice, all a company has to do is send a notice to the government to have a website shut down if they think a website contains infringing content. This puts a lot of uploading-based websites such as Scratch, deviantART, Facebook, Flickr, and many others at risk of being inaccessible.

-> In a nutshell: you won't be able to remove a project because of SOPA and PIPA, because they'll shut the website down in the first place.

Maybe, but only if SOPA passes. It's OK to keep it on the website.

Last edited by Dinoclor (2012-01-18 21:18:33)

Down With Sopa And Pipa!

S.O.P.A and P.I.P.A was cancelled so i don't think so

RedRocker227 wrote:

Uh, no. That's basically saying "it's illegal to say the name of anything copyrighted". Which means you wouldn't be able to say the word "Scratch" etc..

This is probably not of any practical importance here, but I teach about social issues in computing and one of them is intellectual property so I'm going to pick a nit...

Trademarks are a different category from copyrighted material.  You are free to use a trademark wherever you like, if you are using it to refer to the trademarked product.  "I think Coke stinks": legal.  "Here's your Coke" while handing your customer a Pepsi: illegal.

So you can use the word "Scratch" anywhere you like, without permission from the Scratch Team, provided that it's actually Scratch you're talking about (not, for example, someone's modded version of Scratch -- although "BYOB is a modded version of Scratch" is okay because it wouldn't confuse the two).

When I was a kid you could add cherry syrup to a Coke and call it a "cherry Coke" but now the Coca-Cola company makes a product called "Cherry Coke" that they trademarked, so you can't any more.