OOP, PDFS & COPYRIGHT ©

Zhu Bajie

Member
Please note that all Games Workshop products are still in copyright, and they have never released PDFs of their Warhammer rulesets, White Dwarf (or other Periodicals) thereby all PDFs circulating on the internet are illegally distributed copies.

RISK OF LITIGATION
Games Workshop PLC has a reputation for aggressively defending its trademarks and copyrights, and has threatened sites such as Board Game Geek and RPG.net, forcing them to remove fan-made products else face costly legal battles. They do seem to turn a blind eye to fan-made army-list PDFs, but this is purely at their discretion. By discussing obtaining illegal copies of out of print materials on this board, we run the risk of drawing undue and unwanted legal attention to ourselves.

SUBSTANDARD COPIES
Many of the PDFs circulating on the internet are incomplete - much information of interest to the Oldhammer community - adverts for miniatures, for example - have been edited out of some magazines, and sometimes full-page artwork is missing. There is no substitute for an actual copy. Most materials can be bought from the second-hand market for less than their contemporary counterparts.

DAMAGE TO COLLECTORS MARKET
While this is difficult to prove, flooding the market with cheap (or free) versions of out-of-print materials will decrease demand for original product. This will devalue your collection over time. Would you recast the Citadel Giant in resin and send it to someone? Moreover once recast miniatures have a habit of proliferating, you might recast a figure for your own army, thinking it's fine as it is personal use, but when you sell your collection, it's passed on to someone who is non-the-wiser.

LIMITATION
We cannot control what you do in private or on your own blogs. However, I would encourage anyone to read the copyright laws in their own countries, read up on Games Workshop PLC. and their defenses of their copyright specifically with recourse to their actions to other websites (BGG) and also the current (as of 2013) Chapterhouse case. Another indicative case is that of Wizards of the Coast vs. 8 file-sharers in 2009.

TL:grin:R
Don't discuss file-sharing or recasting openly on the board. Thank you.
 

Just John

Moderator
I think we had discussion at the start of the forum and it was decided that the public areas of the forum would remain free of links to illegal copies of copyrighted material. A lot more people have joined since then so it might be an idea to sticky this to the front page and make it policy.
 

Skarsnik

Member
What's the general view on members (or moderators) sharing stuff like this on the oldhammer facebook group?

Separate things so they can do what they like? Or are the two linked closely enough that we are 'representing' the forums when we post on the fcebook group too?

I have a strong view on this, but I think we've shown before that as a group we can find an amicable solution to most things, so I'll let the discussion commence....
 
Skarsnik & Old Lead":14dso8tv said:
What's the general view on members (or moderators) sharing stuff like this on the oldhammer facebook group?

Separate things so they can do what they like? Or are the two linked closely enough that we are 'representing' the forums when we post on the fcebook group too?

I have a strong view on this, but I think we've shown before that as a group we can find an amicable solution to most things, so I'll let the discussion commence....

I recently posted a link to my public dropbox on the Facebook group at the suggestion of a fellow Oldhammerer who thought it might be of use to other enthusiasts. If anyone there, or here, have a problem with it, I'll go back and remove the link. I'm not looking to rock any boats or stir any pots.
 

Just John

Moderator
I don't know that the two sites are linked that much really - apart from a crossover of people. Its n interesting question though. I would think that the best policy would be not to do anything in public that could get the community in trouble.
 

Chico

Member
It's 2 separate groups it just has a crossover of people (But then again most forums/groups share some crossovers). As far as I'm aware its fine to post links there and have both requested and shared links on it. Same way as people's personal Blogs this forum has no effect on them and vice visa.
 

Orlygg

Member
Zhu Bajie":1yth2tf2 said:
Please note that all Games Workshop products are still in copyright, and they have never released PDFs of their rulesets, thereby all PDFs circulating on the internet are illegally distributed copies.

RISK OF LITIGATION
Games Workshop PLC has a reputation for aggressively defending its trademarks and copyrights, and has threatened sites such as Board Game Geek and RPG.net, forcing them to remove fan-made products else face costly legal battles. They do seem to turn a blind eye to fan-made army-list PDFs, but this is purely at their discretion. By discussing obtaining illegal copies of out of print materials on this board, we run the risk of drawing undue and unwanted legal attention to ourselves.

SUBSTANDARD COPIES
Many of the PDFs circulating on the internet are incomplete - much information of interest to the Oldhammer community - adverts for miniatures, for example - have been edited out of some magazines, and sometimes full-page artwork is missing. There is no substitute for an actual copy. Most materials can be bought from the second-hand market for less than their contemporary counterparts.

DAMAGE TO COLLECTORS MARKET
While this is difficult to prove, flooding the market with cheap (or free) versions of out-of-print materials will decrease demand for original product. This will devalue your collection over time. Would you recast the Citadel Giant in resin and send it to someone? Moreover once recast miniatures have a habit of proliferating, you might recast a figure for your own army, thinking it's fine as it is personal use, but when you sell your collection, it's passed on to someone who is non-the-wiser.

LIMITATION
We cannot control what you do in private or on your own blogs. However, I would encourage anyone to read the copyright laws in their own countries, read up on Games Workshop PLC. and their defenses of their copyright specifically with recourse to their actions to other websites (BGG) and also the current (as of 2013) Chapterhouse case. Another indicative case is that of Wizards of the Coast vs. 8 file-sharers in 2009.

TL:grin:R
Don't discuss file-sharing or recasting openly on the board. Thank you.

In light of recent events, this issue cannot simply be enforced on the forum without the enitre community debating the issue. No matter your opinion on the issue, membership has grown to such an extent that forum policy needs to be decided by the community, not admin, not mods and certainly not individual members.

We should vote on this issue so a clear precedent is made on filesharing once and for all.
 

Zhu Bajie

Member
This isn't a matter for discussion at all.

It's illegal. End of.

Sorry. Just to qualify that, only myself and Steve are at material risk from any legal action that may (or may not) be undertaken, my name is on the domain, and Steves name is on the hosting, so we're tracable. For me this is non-negotiable. If you want to promote illegal activity, please do it elsewhere.
 

ardyer

Member
Zhu Bajie":19nwcgmi said:
This isn't a matter for discussion at all.

It's illegal. End of.

Sorry. Just to qualify that, only myself and Steve are at material risk from any legal action that may (or may not) be undertaken, my name is on the domain, and Steves name is on the hosting, so we're tracable. For me this is non-negotiable. If you want to promote illegal activity, please do it elsewhere.

I've got to agree with this. We wouldn't put it up to a community vote to see if we could sell heroin on the boards. Whether we like the laws or not, our governments made this decision for us.
 
Zhu Bajie":1sg8pqpz said:
This isn't a matter for discussion at all.

It's illegal. End of.

Sorry. Just to qualify that, only myself and Steve are at material risk from any legal action that may (or may not) be undertaken, my name is on the domain, and Steves name is on the hosting, so we're tracable. For me this is non-negotiable. If you want to promote illegal activity, please do it elsewhere.

I can't argue with that. Realistically we all know that stuff is out there, and given all the chat surrounding groups like this, its easy to find. But I would certainly be uncomfortable about hosting e.g. PDFs of GW rulebooks on this forum's web space. And to be perfectly honest, I don't think we would need to...
 

ardyer

Member
illuminatus":3iax8bkk said:
ardyer":3iax8bkk said:
Whether we like the laws or not, our governments made this decision for us.
I prefer to speak the truth in such matters: Whether we like the laws or not, our governments will send their paid enforcers to steal our stuff or worse still, kidnap us and imprison us against our will where terrible things will be done to us if we don't do what they want.

You're one of those "glass is half full" kind of guys aren't you? :lol:
 

Anonymous

Guest
Zhu Bajie":3l8rp6sa said:
Please note that all Games Workshop products are still in copyright, and they have never released PDFs of their rulesets, thereby all PDFs circulating on the internet are illegally distributed copies.
Not true. Games Workshop's website hosts the Mighty Empires rulebook, including rules for using it with the third edition of WFB.

Also, the company in question some years back published few of their boardgames (Horus Heresy and like) as free pdf-files, including the scanned counter sheets.

(By the way, if one searches Hasbro's website for HeroQuest, one can download from there the official Kellar's Keep Quest book.)
 
Also, all the Mordheim stuff is freely available on the GW site:

m1330012_Mord_Rulebook_part_1_-_rules.pdf (1.94 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... _rules.pdf

m1330016_Mord_Rulebook_part_2_-_warbands.pdf (1.41 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... rbands.pdf

m1330018_Mord_Rulebook_part_3_-_campaigns.pdf (1.57 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... paigns.pdf

m1330019_Mord_Ulli_and_Marquand.pdf (0.95 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... rquand.pdf

m1330026_Mord_Errata.pdf (0.11 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... Errata.pdf

m1330028_Mord_Empire_in_Flames.pdf (1.22 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... Flames.pdf

m1330030_Mord_Empire_in_Flames_part_2.pdf (1.42 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... part_2.pdf

m1330032_Mord_Roster.pdf (0.17 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... Roster.pdf

m1330035_Mord_Roster_part_2.pdf (1.04 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... part_2.pdf

m1330037_Mord_Playsheet.pdf (0.52 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... ysheet.pdf

m1330041_Mord_Taking_the_Streets.pdf (0.63 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... treets.pdf

Mord_Dwarf_Treasure_Hunters.pdf (0.68 MB)
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_Cus ... unters.pdf
 

Zhu Bajie

Member
StarSoldier":230e0ltt said:
Zhu Bajie":230e0ltt said:
Please note that all Games Workshop products are still in copyright, and they have never released PDFs of their rulesets, thereby all PDFs circulating on the internet are illegally distributed copies.
Not true. Games Workshop's website hosts the Mighty Empires rulebook, including rules for using it with the third edition of WFB.

Also, the company in question some years back published few of their boardgames (Horus Heresy and like) as free pdf-files, including the scanned counter sheets.

(By the way, if one searches Hasbro's website for HeroQuest, one can download from there the official Kellar's Keep Quest book.)

Thanks for the heads up.

Ammended wording to : and they have never released PDFs of their Warhammer rulesets, thereby all PDFs circulating on the internet are illegally distributed copies.

Which remains true.
 
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