Yeah, its a tricky subject but I don't think anyone has the right to stop
anyone else from making a 'likeness' of anything. I think making threats is
their only course of action. In the case of the Daytona track, if it went to
court they may not have won - but the threat was enough to stop the author.
My feeling is that if you build a 3D model, then you own the rights to that
model even if its a dead-ringer for someone elses real world object. And if
you call it say: "My track based on Daytona" and allow people to use it,
then nobody has any legal grounds to stop you.
If you take photography as an example it gets interesting. I could go out
and take photos of a Ferrari on the street and then put them on my web site
to share. I could allow people to download them as desktop wallpaper or
other personal use. I could call them 'Ferrari Photos' and nobody could stop
me. In fact if Ferrari put those photos on their web site I could threaten
THEM with breach of copyright. Photographers always own the copyright of
their photos no matter what the subject is - even if someone else
comissioned them.
So lets make our models. We can't let these corporate stuffed shirts spoil
our fun :)
> > I've been following the WSC/RL debate with interest and it occurs to me
> that
> > the West Brothers may have a slightly different strategy in mind to what
> is
> > indicated on their website.
> > I think they have already built the sim engine (4 years of WSC
> development)
> > but are attempting to find a new way to sell it without having to sign
> with
> > publishers/distributers AND without having to gain licenses. They want
to
> > retain control of their software - which I think they should be
applauded
> > for.
> > Of course by pitching it to real race teams they tap into a new
specialist
> > market for their software. Particularly amateur and low budget racing
> teams
> > who may not have the funds for the expensive engineering/modelling
> software
> > and hardware.
> > More importantly however, they definitely want to tap in to the sim
> editing
> > community's ability to 'value-add' to a sim. In fact I think they hope
the
> > sim editing community will make the majority of the expansion packs
(free
> > mods) for the RL engine for a number of reasons:
> > 1. It will bypass the problems and costs of obtaining licencses for
> tracks,
> > cars, championships, etc. They can concentrate on the really specialist
> > expansion packs like damage modelling, and pit stops, (not to mention
> > patches) while the community builds licence free cars and tracks.
> > 2. As the sim community gets involved in extending RL, it will also act
as
> > an advertising system (similar to viral marketing).
> > 3. It will continually increase the VALUE of the RL sim engine to the
end
> > user without the Wests doing any more work. Look at GPL, SCGT, F12001
> etc. -
> > all the add-ons and mods certainly increased sales for those games. One
> > drawback of this is that those mods may actually decrease sales of
> > subsequent releases because the quality of the older sim has increased
> > dramatically. In the case of Racing Legends they intend to capitalise on
> > this mechanism because they will continue to sell the original sim
engine.
> > It all sounds like it could work for the Wests, and could be great for
sim
> > racing enthusiasts - but I'm still bugged by this thought. If the open
> > source concept can produce Linux, Xplane and Racer then surely we can't
be
> > too far from producing an open source, ultimate motor racing sim similar
> in
> > concept to Racing Legends. And if both the commercial Racing Legends and
> an
> > open source 'ultimate sim' do arrive, which one will get the most
support
> > from the sim racing/editing community?...