I read the complaint, as well as the Judgment. I don't mean for this to distract from discussion, but it is an ad hominem: you argue with very little intellectual empathy. "Did you read the complaint" and "You don't really seem to know or understand anything about IP law" show that you pretend those who disagree with you are idiots. That leaves you to make very weak arguments, as you've done here.
The fact that the defendants were guilty of counterfeiting Magic cards was the theme of the judgment. In that record, "counterfeit", or variants, appears three times, including following each appearance (only 2) of copyright or intellectual property violation, as the specific ("including, without limitation") intellectual property violation for which the defendants are enjoined against. So it's pretty apparent that, contrary to your claim, this court does find grounds in some law (in copyright law, by its citation in the jurisdiction section of the claim) for anti-counterfeiting rulings.
That the laws involved are copyright laws is irrelevant. It is plainly known that U.S. law does regard counterfeitting as a seperate offense from general infringement of a copyright. In the government website linked, counterfeiting is defined, essentially, to be the use of a label, on a copyright infringed work, that appears to be from the true copyright holder, but is not. Hence my description that counterfeiters "defraud their own customers along with all those might who accept the counterfeit as real". Note that counterfeiting is an additional offense on top of copyright violation, making the overall act of counterfeiting a more effective charge for the purpose of disincentiving counterfeiting.
Monetary loss or the value of the cards or whatnot doesn't have anything to do with your copyright. Even IP not worth anything is covered by copyright (a short story or poem I write up has no value, but copyright law protects it).
This is irrelevant to my point. Loss of monetary value is (presumably) the only concern Wizards should address by hiring lawyers to sue people for copyright infringement. My case here is that, relative to this concern, they only need to sue for the special offense of counterfeiting. Wizards' monetary interest in their copyright of Magic cards is to control the supply of cards playable in DCI sanctioned events. People pay significant amounts for copies (that would otherwise go, directly or indirectly, to Wizards) for no other reason. Wizards doesn't sell images of cards. It sells cards and packs. (It also sells play-mats, dice, and similar items, but that's irrelevant to cases like this magicdraftsim one, which doesn't use its website to compete in those markets, either). My point is that counterfeiting is the only way to interfere substantially (enough to justify a lawsuit) in Wizards' monetary position in the copyright of a card. So if they threaten a lawsuit to shut down a site that hosts unauthorized (non-fair-use) images of cards, they get nothing out of it (since they don't sell digital images of cards), but they restrict potential customer interest in their products (as described in this thread by other posters). In short, this action is unnecessary and bad for the game.
I read the complaint, as well as the Judgment. I don't mean for this to distract from discussion, but it is an ad hominem: you argue with very little intellectual empathy. "Did you read the complaint" and "You don't really seem to know or understand anything about IP law" show that you pretend those who disagree with you are idiots. That leaves you to make very weak arguments, as you've done here.
Your arguments so far (not including this post) didn't seem to have any basis in the actual law. I don't believe you're an idiot, I believed you were ignorant. There's a difference.
You started going off about counterfeiting and stuff, and yes, of course, making counterfeit goods is covered under the law. I didn't know there was a specific clause about it, but that clause is still covered under counterfeit law. I honestly thought you were talking about laws against counterfeit -money-...
This is irrelevant to my point. Loss of monetary value is (presumably) the only concern Wizards should address by hiring lawyers to sue people for copyright infringement. My case here is that, relative to this concern, they only need to sue for the special offense of counterfeiting. Wizards' monetary interest in their copyright of Magic cards is to control the supply of cards playable in DCI sanctioned events. People pay significant amounts for copies (that would otherwise go, directly or indirectly, to Wizards) for no other reason. Wizards doesn't sell images of cards. It sells cards and packs. (It also sells play-mats, dice, and similar items, but that's irrelevant to cases like this magicdraftsim one, which doesn't use its website to compete in those markets, either). My point is that counterfeiting is the only way to interfere substantially (enough to justify a lawsuit) in Wizards' monetary position in the copyright of a card. So if they threaten a lawsuit to shut down a site that hosts unauthorized (non-fair-use) images of cards, they get nothing out of it (since they don't sell digital images of cards), but they restrict potential customer interest in their products (as described in this thread by other posters). In short, this action is unnecessary and bad for the game.
Here's where we were getting into trouble - you were arguing it wasn't within their rights to take these actions. Or at least I thought you were. "I don't think they should do this" is an opinion, and it's a completely valid one.
I don't agree, though. I don't think you should need a monetary incentive to take action against someone violating your copyright. And even if you did, I can see them making an argument on how the site did cost them money.
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Your arguments so far (not including this post) didn't seem to have any basis in the actual law. I don't believe you're an idiot, I believed you were ignorant. There's a difference.
To be perfectly clear about what happened, I think you believed I was ignorant, while feigning knowledge of a subject. That's a fairly serious charge of intellectual dishonesty, and I thought that you made it lightly.
Here's where we were getting into trouble - you were arguing it wasn't within their rights to take these actions. Or at least I thought you were. "I don't think they should do this" is an opinion, and it's a completely valid one.
To the extent that I'm worried about Wizards overstepping their rights, it's that they may be selectively enforcing their copyrights as a way to use court power to enforce an interest they do not have a right to have enforced. Notably, selective enforcement of laws has been cited as a way to achieve racist goals without passing laws that are directly unconstitutional by the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment. For example, you could make wearing white after labor day illegal, but only arrest Canadian Americans for breaking this law. Similarly, since Wizards is supposedly threatening legal action against this site for posting of copyrighted images in a draft simulator, but not other similar sites, they may be selectively enforcing that copyright to achieve some other goal they do not have the right to use their copyright to enforce. As an obvious example, they might have taken action against magicdraftsim because they don't like the color of skin of the website's owner. Courts would not be required to uphold the copyright, if Wizards were using it in this selective way. Much more is true: they'd be required not to uphold such selective use of the copyright.
I don't agree, though. I don't think you should need a monetary incentive to take action against someone violating your copyright. And even if you did, I can see them making an argument on how the site did cost them money.
My concern is about what's good for the game (of competitive Magic), under the consideration that Wizards supports the game, and Hasbro pays their salaries with an expectation of deriving profits from Magic. By this standard, Wizards should not sue for petty reasons, and should (typically) only sue to discourage behavior that actually loses them money. Most generically, Wizards' role in the game is to make the investments (in game design, event organization, and player relations) that allow competitive Magic to happen. They can only do that (as a unit of a publicly traded company) if those investments turn profits. So, relative to the goal of maintaining the health of competitive Magic, Wizards should only sue if it makes the game more profitable. They should not sue for those reasons (you noted) that an individual might sue over copyright violation of an unsellable intellectual work. As you say, there might be arguments that Wizards has a monetary interest in this case, but I doubt it.
For those who have said, "Why did they shut this site down and not these other sites?", for all we know, it could be the tip of the iceberg. It's likely that WOTC has taken similar action against other sites as well but it is of the discretion of the site to either shut down or ignore any kind of strongly worded letter from WOTC. You won't see all of these sites just shut down on the same day as if secret agents are forcing their way in and confiscating servers.
At this point, we don't know who else has received a similar request to stop and whether they will decide to take action or simply ignore the request and see if WOTC takes it to the next level. When you factor in that some of these apps are hosted on servers that are not in the U.S., this complicates things and may make it impossible to shut down some of these sites.
To the extent that I'm worried about Wizards overstepping their rights, it's that they may be selectively enforcing their copyrights as a way to use court power to enforce an interest they do not have a right to have enforced. Notably, selective enforcement of laws has been cited as a way to achieve racist goals without passing laws that are directly unconstitutional by the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment. For example, you could make wearing white after labor day illegal, but only arrest Canadian Americans for breaking this law. Similarly, since Wizards is supposedly threatening legal action against this site for posting of copyrighted images in a draft simulator, but not other similar sites, they may be selectively enforcing that copyright to achieve some other goal they do not have the right to use their copyright to enforce. As an obvious example, they might have taken action against magicdraftsim because they don't like the color of skin of the website's owner. Courts would not be required to uphold the copyright, if Wizards were using it in this selective way. Much more is true: they'd be required not to uphold such selective use of the copyright.
I don't understand what sort of ulterior motives Wizards could possibly have here. They do have the right to choose who and who not to pursue copyright claims against. I don't see how selectively enforcing the claim here could possibly break any sort of discrimination laws or extend their rights beyond what they already have.
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I don't understand what sort of ulterior motives Wizards could possibly have here. They do have the right to choose who and who not to pursue copyright claims against. I don't see how selectively enforcing the claim here could possibly break any sort of discrimination laws or extend their rights beyond what they already have.
Selective enforcement could break discrimination laws and extend the power of their copyright in exactly the way I described. More likely, they have some valid business interest that is not enforceable through copyright law, and they're choosing to enforce it so. For example, Wizards loses money if third party businesses in the MtG community are mean to their customers. They might have a stronger tendency to sue websites with bad customer relations (or those with bad relationships with Wizards' staff) in order to improve player experiences. Although that is a valid business goal, it's not something a court should allow them to do via copyright law. It might be tough to tell that such a thing is happening, but if Wizards threatens a lawsuit against one website, and not others, for the same activity, it strongly indicates that they are not truly seeking protection of the copyright, but legal enforcement of some other interest. As jrussell316 says, though, we don't necessarily know that this is a case of selective and inconsistent enforcement.
Quote from Shendue »
I see a lot of people saying that it's not just unsurprising, but even MANDATORY that WOTC protects his copyrighted property by forcing the sites who use copyrighted material to close.
In the case of trademarks, they need to enforce their rights consistently over time. They can let minor cases slide, but if they don't seek enforcement against major acts of trademark infringement, they can lose their trademark under the non-use principle. The relevant Wikipedia section on trademarks makes this clear:
Quote from Wikipedia »
In the case of a trademark registration, failure to actively use the mark in the lawful course of trade, or to enforce the registration in the event of infringement, may also expose the registration itself to become liable for an application for the removal from the register after a certain period of time on the grounds of "non-use".
I see a lot of people saying that it's not just unsurprising, but even MANDATORY that WOTC protects his copyrighted property by forcing the sites who use copyrighted material to close.
They are thinking of trademarks, not copyrights. Trademarks must be vigorously protected, or they can be lost.
People confuse copyrights and trademarks all the time. They're not the same thing.
Selective enforcement could break discrimination laws and extend the power of their copyright in exactly the way I described. More likely, they have some valid business interest that is not enforceable through copyright law, and they're choosing to enforce it so. For example, Wizards loses money if third party businesses in the MtG community are mean to their customers. They might have a stronger tendency to sue websites with bad customer relations (or those with bad relationships with Wizards' staff) in order to improve player experiences. Although that is a valid business goal, it's not something a court should allow them to do via copyright law. It might be tough to tell that such a thing is happening, but if Wizards threatens a lawsuit against one website, and not others, for the same activity, it strongly indicates that they are not truly seeking protection of the copyright, but legal enforcement of some other interest. As jrussell316 says, though, we don't necessarily know that this is a case of selective and inconsistent enforcement.
I don't think so. I'll agree it can lead to some underhanded tactics, but if they have a valid avenue of attack against (say) 5 people, and they only bring it against one person because that person owns a company they want to buy out, or says bad things about the product, or slept with Peter Adkison's sister, or whatever, I'm okay with it. That doesn't break any laws, and as long as you don't break any laws, you can run your business any way you like.
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WotC is well within their rights to pursue copyright infringement against whoever they want that is infringing on their intellectual property. Selective enforcement is not only allowed, but encouraged in copyright law, it is what allows someone to license their rights to someone else, either for an agreed upon sum of money or none at all.
WotC made a decision that they thought magicdraftsim somehow impeded their business interests. Maybe they are wrong that online free draft sims were costing them money, but they are within their rights to be wrong about that or to not care one way or the other. Wizards isn't stupid, they know that fan sites drive interest in their product. Without sites like mtgsalvation, casual interest would dwindle, they just made a calculated decision that a free alternative to their pay service (MTGO, or buying packs to draft) wasn't in their interest anymore. I wouldn't read into it any further.
ed: The trademark discussion is completely irrelevant. Even if they somehow lost their trademark by failing to pursue it, it wouldn't compromise their rights under copyright. These are two completely separate doctrines, and trademark was not what was being implicated here, even if they decided to tack it on in a complaint.
This happened before, though it sounds like the guy who made the site decided not to bother fixing it again. Last time he had to change it to that weird wizards had as originally had it a picture of jtms.
WotC is well within their rights to pursue copyright infringement against whoever they want that is infringing on their intellectual property. Selective enforcement is not only allowed, but encouraged in copyright law, it is what allows someone to license their rights to someone else, either for an agreed upon sum of money or none at all.
If they seek criminal penalties, this is false. All criminal law (in the U.S.) is bound by the 14th amendment to be enforced consistently. That doesn't mean it has to be enforced in all cases of infringement. It does mean that legal authorities can only use the breaking of the law itself (the presence of copyright infringement) and legitimate enforcement concerns (prosecuting cases that are easier to prosecute) as criteria for when to enforce a law. This includes enforcing laws based on civilian complaints, if those complaints are shown to lead to selective enforcement for illegitimate reasons.
In response to your example, the existence of licensing agreements does not constitute selective enforcement. A licensed distributor of copyrighted material is not an unauthorized distributor, so they simply aren't breaking copyright law. Lack of enforcement against them does not mean the law is being applied discriminatorily. Lack of enforcement of minor violations also is not selective enforcement. It's a legitimate limitation on the ability to enforce the law.
Anyways, none of this discussion can be proven or disproven to be applicable to this case, because magicdraftsim is not in copyright violation. They (presumably) received a written warning, and they adhered to that warning. So we're unlikely to see whether Wizards was being unrightfully discriminatory in their threats of legal action against copyright violators.
I didn't read much of the legality issue you guy are fighting about, but from what ive gathered the site was free and you couldn't play with the "deck" you drafted. Whats next? Wizards sending letters to people doing cube drafts in their house? I mean thats packs people could be buying just like this right?
Now Im not the guy using all the apps they shut down or the site they took down. Coming from an unbiased view Wizards is shooting themselves in the feet over and over again. From their taking down android apps (and still to this day im not sure they put their official app out yet) without replacement, to not putting mtgo on apple whatever. Wizards should keep to making cards, not apps and not tools for the game. If they need to shut something down they should have a decently designed replacement with the features they just killed.
Wizards has an official forum, whats to keep them from shutting down MTGS since its obviously competing with that? Theres thousands of card images here.
This may be a civil case, but copyright violation is a federal crime. Typically, property owners (of any kind) are given a degree of discretion over whether the relevant criminal prosecutor while press charges (although the prosecutor is required not to act on, withhold legal action based on discriminatory standards of the property owner). Like I said, though, every legal claim about this case is a moot point, as the website in question has actually complied with a notice of copyright notice (assuming, as always, that this is why they are down). Even so, the potential for criminal charges existed, and that might have been part of why magicdraftsim chose to comply with the hypothetical notice.
Having reasoned fully through my initial reaction, though, I have to admit that it seems unlikely that Wizards is intentionally seeking illegal selective enforcement of copyright law. The threat of (what would be selective) criminal enforcement may be part of magicdraftsim's reasoning, and that is an unfortunate expansion of the power granted to copyright holders; but it isn't Wizards' fault -- it's the fault of others who have abused copyright law in the past.
And MTGS default links to a non-gatherer website, which must be taking views from gatherer, so why not take that down too? And hell SCG has every card image ever, articles, along with making a TON of money from it, what about taking them down? Those singles are lost pack sales too, aren't they?
Wizards is on a slippery slope with each site the kill they pick up speed. Wheres the line? Is it going to be just the mothership because they are "losing money" at every corner?
Wizards has an official forum, whats to keep them from shutting down MTGS since its obviously competing with that? Theres thousands of card images here.
Most of the images used here are probably fair use (for criticism/commentary). And even best case scenario all they could do is force the site to not use the card images.
And MTGS default links to a non-gatherer website, which must be taking views from gatherer, so why not take that down too? And hell SCG has every card image ever, articles, along with making a TON of money from it, what about taking them down? Those singles are lost pack sales too, aren't they?
SCG's use is clearly fair use - they need to show the card to show what they're selling. I'm not really sure where magiccards.info stands legally, but I'm nearly certain Wizards is aware of it and thus far doesn't care.
Most of the images used here are probably fair use (for criticism/commentary). And even best case scenario all they could do is force the site to not use the card images.
Indeed im not saying this site is on their list but attempting to figure their line in the sand for what to take down. A few more extreme examples are in there, but valid. If Wizards keeps up the "war" against anything and everything they are competing with how long til MTGS or SCG gets seen as a threat?
This is silly. There was no reason for WotC to take down this incredibly useful website. I get pumped for drafts and practice before hand using it. In no way does a practice draft against bots replace real life drafting against other people.
While WotC is within their rights to take it down, this was still inappropriate and silly. WotC might as well take down dozens of other sites for similar reasons if they are going to be this petty.
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In response to me defeating the town in a Perfect Scum Victory in Avatar Mafia:
Everyone knows that good luck and good game are such insincere terms that any man who does not connect his right hook with the offender's jaw on the very utterance of such a phrase is no man I would consider as such.
"A funny fact is that a few days ago, people there was wondering how so few people was posting in the oficcial boards. Answer is obv: no one likes to express in a place totally censored and manipulated just to be a propaganda element."
Im just waiting for Wizards to shut MTGS down because these forums are competing with their own.
Looking at the criteria for fair use:
Commercial vs nonprofit/education? Have you read the comments in this thread? Everyone uses it to prepare for events, get acquainted with a format etc.
Would that really pass as "educational," though?
The amount of the copyrighted material used? Sure, they had almost every card, but at what resolution? Everything was scaled down 16+ times.
I seriously doubt the image quality would come into play.
Damages to them? Which would be... Oh right they don't offer anything like this themselves.
Doesn't matter, because they could offer something like that. (And technically, they do offer a draft simulator. It's just that it's awful and only for M12.)
Sure, it's bad PR but there's not much of a legal case against Wizards in this case.
Indeed, again i never used the site but feel wizards taking down tools without a replacement over and over is just pissing all over the communities that use them. Again, wheres the line? Is this forum suddenly competing since they cant moderate here. Just another black eye.
I read the complaint, as well as the Judgment. I don't mean for this to distract from discussion, but it is an ad hominem: you argue with very little intellectual empathy. "Did you read the complaint" and "You don't really seem to know or understand anything about IP law" show that you pretend those who disagree with you are idiots. That leaves you to make very weak arguments, as you've done here.
The fact that the defendants were guilty of counterfeiting Magic cards was the theme of the judgment. In that record, "counterfeit", or variants, appears three times, including following each appearance (only 2) of copyright or intellectual property violation, as the specific ("including, without limitation") intellectual property violation for which the defendants are enjoined against. So it's pretty apparent that, contrary to your claim, this court does find grounds in some law (in copyright law, by its citation in the jurisdiction section of the claim) for anti-counterfeiting rulings.
That the laws involved are copyright laws is irrelevant. It is plainly known that U.S. law does regard counterfeitting as a seperate offense from general infringement of a copyright. In the government website linked, counterfeiting is defined, essentially, to be the use of a label, on a copyright infringed work, that appears to be from the true copyright holder, but is not. Hence my description that counterfeiters "defraud their own customers along with all those might who accept the counterfeit as real". Note that counterfeiting is an additional offense on top of copyright violation, making the overall act of counterfeiting a more effective charge for the purpose of disincentiving counterfeiting.
This is irrelevant to my point. Loss of monetary value is (presumably) the only concern Wizards should address by hiring lawyers to sue people for copyright infringement. My case here is that, relative to this concern, they only need to sue for the special offense of counterfeiting. Wizards' monetary interest in their copyright of Magic cards is to control the supply of cards playable in DCI sanctioned events. People pay significant amounts for copies (that would otherwise go, directly or indirectly, to Wizards) for no other reason. Wizards doesn't sell images of cards. It sells cards and packs. (It also sells play-mats, dice, and similar items, but that's irrelevant to cases like this magicdraftsim one, which doesn't use its website to compete in those markets, either). My point is that counterfeiting is the only way to interfere substantially (enough to justify a lawsuit) in Wizards' monetary position in the copyright of a card. So if they threaten a lawsuit to shut down a site that hosts unauthorized (non-fair-use) images of cards, they get nothing out of it (since they don't sell digital images of cards), but they restrict potential customer interest in their products (as described in this thread by other posters). In short, this action is unnecessary and bad for the game.
Your arguments so far (not including this post) didn't seem to have any basis in the actual law. I don't believe you're an idiot, I believed you were ignorant. There's a difference.
You started going off about counterfeiting and stuff, and yes, of course, making counterfeit goods is covered under the law. I didn't know there was a specific clause about it, but that clause is still covered under counterfeit law. I honestly thought you were talking about laws against counterfeit -money-...
Here's where we were getting into trouble - you were arguing it wasn't within their rights to take these actions. Or at least I thought you were. "I don't think they should do this" is an opinion, and it's a completely valid one.
I don't agree, though. I don't think you should need a monetary incentive to take action against someone violating your copyright. And even if you did, I can see them making an argument on how the site did cost them money.
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To be perfectly clear about what happened, I think you believed I was ignorant, while feigning knowledge of a subject. That's a fairly serious charge of intellectual dishonesty, and I thought that you made it lightly.
To the extent that I'm worried about Wizards overstepping their rights, it's that they may be selectively enforcing their copyrights as a way to use court power to enforce an interest they do not have a right to have enforced. Notably, selective enforcement of laws has been cited as a way to achieve racist goals without passing laws that are directly unconstitutional by the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment. For example, you could make wearing white after labor day illegal, but only arrest Canadian Americans for breaking this law. Similarly, since Wizards is supposedly threatening legal action against this site for posting of copyrighted images in a draft simulator, but not other similar sites, they may be selectively enforcing that copyright to achieve some other goal they do not have the right to use their copyright to enforce. As an obvious example, they might have taken action against magicdraftsim because they don't like the color of skin of the website's owner. Courts would not be required to uphold the copyright, if Wizards were using it in this selective way. Much more is true: they'd be required not to uphold such selective use of the copyright.
My concern is about what's good for the game (of competitive Magic), under the consideration that Wizards supports the game, and Hasbro pays their salaries with an expectation of deriving profits from Magic. By this standard, Wizards should not sue for petty reasons, and should (typically) only sue to discourage behavior that actually loses them money. Most generically, Wizards' role in the game is to make the investments (in game design, event organization, and player relations) that allow competitive Magic to happen. They can only do that (as a unit of a publicly traded company) if those investments turn profits. So, relative to the goal of maintaining the health of competitive Magic, Wizards should only sue if it makes the game more profitable. They should not sue for those reasons (you noted) that an individual might sue over copyright violation of an unsellable intellectual work. As you say, there might be arguments that Wizards has a monetary interest in this case, but I doubt it.
At this point, we don't know who else has received a similar request to stop and whether they will decide to take action or simply ignore the request and see if WOTC takes it to the next level. When you factor in that some of these apps are hosted on servers that are not in the U.S., this complicates things and may make it impossible to shut down some of these sites.
I don't understand what sort of ulterior motives Wizards could possibly have here. They do have the right to choose who and who not to pursue copyright claims against. I don't see how selectively enforcing the claim here could possibly break any sort of discrimination laws or extend their rights beyond what they already have.
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Selective enforcement could break discrimination laws and extend the power of their copyright in exactly the way I described. More likely, they have some valid business interest that is not enforceable through copyright law, and they're choosing to enforce it so. For example, Wizards loses money if third party businesses in the MtG community are mean to their customers. They might have a stronger tendency to sue websites with bad customer relations (or those with bad relationships with Wizards' staff) in order to improve player experiences. Although that is a valid business goal, it's not something a court should allow them to do via copyright law. It might be tough to tell that such a thing is happening, but if Wizards threatens a lawsuit against one website, and not others, for the same activity, it strongly indicates that they are not truly seeking protection of the copyright, but legal enforcement of some other interest. As jrussell316 says, though, we don't necessarily know that this is a case of selective and inconsistent enforcement.
In the case of trademarks, they need to enforce their rights consistently over time. They can let minor cases slide, but if they don't seek enforcement against major acts of trademark infringement, they can lose their trademark under the non-use principle. The relevant Wikipedia section on trademarks makes this clear:
They are thinking of trademarks, not copyrights. Trademarks must be vigorously protected, or they can be lost.
People confuse copyrights and trademarks all the time. They're not the same thing.
I don't think so. I'll agree it can lead to some underhanded tactics, but if they have a valid avenue of attack against (say) 5 people, and they only bring it against one person because that person owns a company they want to buy out, or says bad things about the product, or slept with Peter Adkison's sister, or whatever, I'm okay with it. That doesn't break any laws, and as long as you don't break any laws, you can run your business any way you like.
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WotC made a decision that they thought magicdraftsim somehow impeded their business interests. Maybe they are wrong that online free draft sims were costing them money, but they are within their rights to be wrong about that or to not care one way or the other. Wizards isn't stupid, they know that fan sites drive interest in their product. Without sites like mtgsalvation, casual interest would dwindle, they just made a calculated decision that a free alternative to their pay service (MTGO, or buying packs to draft) wasn't in their interest anymore. I wouldn't read into it any further.
ed: The trademark discussion is completely irrelevant. Even if they somehow lost their trademark by failing to pursue it, it wouldn't compromise their rights under copyright. These are two completely separate doctrines, and trademark was not what was being implicated here, even if they decided to tack it on in a complaint.
If they seek criminal penalties, this is false. All criminal law (in the U.S.) is bound by the 14th amendment to be enforced consistently. That doesn't mean it has to be enforced in all cases of infringement. It does mean that legal authorities can only use the breaking of the law itself (the presence of copyright infringement) and legitimate enforcement concerns (prosecuting cases that are easier to prosecute) as criteria for when to enforce a law. This includes enforcing laws based on civilian complaints, if those complaints are shown to lead to selective enforcement for illegitimate reasons.
In response to your example, the existence of licensing agreements does not constitute selective enforcement. A licensed distributor of copyrighted material is not an unauthorized distributor, so they simply aren't breaking copyright law. Lack of enforcement against them does not mean the law is being applied discriminatorily. Lack of enforcement of minor violations also is not selective enforcement. It's a legitimate limitation on the ability to enforce the law.
Anyways, none of this discussion can be proven or disproven to be applicable to this case, because magicdraftsim is not in copyright violation. They (presumably) received a written warning, and they adhered to that warning. So we're unlikely to see whether Wizards was being unrightfully discriminatory in their threats of legal action against copyright violators.
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Now Im not the guy using all the apps they shut down or the site they took down. Coming from an unbiased view Wizards is shooting themselves in the feet over and over again. From their taking down android apps (and still to this day im not sure they put their official app out yet) without replacement, to not putting mtgo on apple whatever. Wizards should keep to making cards, not apps and not tools for the game. If they need to shut something down they should have a decently designed replacement with the features they just killed.
Wizards has an official forum, whats to keep them from shutting down MTGS since its obviously competing with that? Theres thousands of card images here.
Having reasoned fully through my initial reaction, though, I have to admit that it seems unlikely that Wizards is intentionally seeking illegal selective enforcement of copyright law. The threat of (what would be selective) criminal enforcement may be part of magicdraftsim's reasoning, and that is an unfortunate expansion of the power granted to copyright holders; but it isn't Wizards' fault -- it's the fault of others who have abused copyright law in the past.
And MTGS default links to a non-gatherer website, which must be taking views from gatherer, so why not take that down too? And hell SCG has every card image ever, articles, along with making a TON of money from it, what about taking them down? Those singles are lost pack sales too, aren't they?
Wizards is on a slippery slope with each site the kill they pick up speed. Wheres the line? Is it going to be just the mothership because they are "losing money" at every corner?
Most of the images used here are probably fair use (for criticism/commentary). And even best case scenario all they could do is force the site to not use the card images.
SCG's use is clearly fair use - they need to show the card to show what they're selling. I'm not really sure where magiccards.info stands legally, but I'm nearly certain Wizards is aware of it and thus far doesn't care.
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M'saion ulé hraka vair.
Indeed im not saying this site is on their list but attempting to figure their line in the sand for what to take down. A few more extreme examples are in there, but valid. If Wizards keeps up the "war" against anything and everything they are competing with how long til MTGS or SCG gets seen as a threat?
While WotC is within their rights to take it down, this was still inappropriate and silly. WotC might as well take down dozens of other sites for similar reasons if they are going to be this petty.
This just pushes me further away from magic and into war gaming.
How is it greedy to want to make money off something YOU MADE?
- To my youngest sister when she was 6.
1. How does using the law to shut down websites that promote your product make you money?
2. The definition of greed makes no exceptions for cases where the greedy party has made something in the past.
Replies:
"Mythic rarity doesn't make another 'Goyf priced card inevitable any more than printing more cards makes another 'Goyf inevitable." -UrzasSedatives
"Seriously, $80 cards? There's no conceivable way. If even one mythic card hit that price point, everyone and their mother would start buying boxes of Alara to "flip" him." -Charlequin
Being listened to would've beat saying I TOLD YOU SO 3 years later.
Im just waiting for Wizards to shut MTGS down because these forums are competing with their own.
Would that really pass as "educational," though?
I seriously doubt the image quality would come into play.
Doesn't matter, because they could offer something like that. (And technically, they do offer a draft simulator. It's just that it's awful and only for M12.)
Sure, it's bad PR but there's not much of a legal case against Wizards in this case.
Indeed, again i never used the site but feel wizards taking down tools without a replacement over and over is just pissing all over the communities that use them. Again, wheres the line? Is this forum suddenly competing since they cant moderate here. Just another black eye.