FR: Magic the Gathering Community
TO: Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast
CC: Ebay
SUB: NUTS! (Or, Your Recent Action Against Alterations)
Recently a Magic the Gathering player had his hand-painted alterations taken down for sale from Ebay for copyright violations, to wit:
"We understand that not all of our Magic: The Gathering® fans agree with all of our choices. We also understand that people sometimes alter our cards for their own reasons. Such alterations however, infringe Wizards’ intellectual property rights, including copyrights. As the legal owner of the copyrights in Magic™ cards, only Wizards has the right to copy, display, distribute and prepare derivative works of those cards.
One aspect of our games that many people enjoy is tournament-style Magic™ play. Since a player conceivably may attempt to play an altered art card during a Magic™ tournament, and since the nature and extent of alterations may vary, Wizards recognizes that tournament judges ultimately must determine when an altered art card should be disallowed from use in a tournament. This ability of tournament judges in no way affects Wizards’ copyrights, and should never be interpreted as permission for anyone to create or sell altered art cards."
This is so wrong that it's almost hilarious. First, no player needs the permission of either Wizards of the Coast or Hasbro to alter their own cards, as such actions are covered by the First Amendment's freedom of expression clause. Second, the rights of Hasbro or Wizards of the Coast to a physical card end where your relavent distribution contracts do; in other words, possession in 9/10 of the law and Hasbro/WotC no longer has it. Third, derivative works have been held by the Supreme Court to have Fair Use protection (see Campbell vs Acuff-Rose Music, inc) and the same applies to fan art (which card alterations arguably are).
To summarize, neither Hasbro nor Wizards of the Coast has any legal ground to stand on and were this to ever extend beyond two private corporations reaching their own agreements, into the purifying light of the legal system, we rather suspect Hasbro/WotC would lose the case. But, by all means, please continue courting a class action lawsuit.
PS: Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast might want to think upon the fact that their behavior is alarmingly fascistic.
I'll be delivering it tomorrow night, since I don't work weekends.
I hope you, the OP and everyone affected gets through and gets a real response. As you may notice, I also alter cards and thus have an interest in this as well. That said, I have some reservations about this letter.
Writing a letter such as this would be more effective if it were professional, pithy, and precise. This letter fails to meet those standards, in my opinion (I have a law degree, have spent many hours doing legal research and writing, and have written legal correspondence in a professional setting). I am not trying to discourage you from voicing your position, just saying that you should work on this letter some more to give it a better chance of having the impact you desire. Some tips:
1) Basic spelling, capitalization, and punctuation: I saw at least 3 mistakes on my first read-through. While I have seen some awful writing come through from actual licensed attorneys, it is always better to have mistake-free writing.
2) Tone: At best, this letter sounds like an editorial from a school paper. At worst, you come across as the stereotypical petulant gamer. You are writing to a party who is making an attempt to protect their IP. Recognize that, and assert your rights without dismissing theirs so flippantly.
3) Legal argument: Are you an IP attorney? Do you understand the Fair Use Doctrine? It is not an easy or clear one. Are you aware that the first statutory factor would (probably) weigh against Fair Use protection with regard to selling card alters? I don't know you, and you may indeed have legal knowledge/training, but it doesn't come off as such in this letter. This makes the threats you make towards the end of your letter seem rather empty.
Anyway, hope that wasn't too harsh, just stating what I perceive to be areas that need improvement. Even if you have a great letter, you would really have to communicate through the proper channels. Not sure where you are sending this letter.
Here's a hand drawn play mat I finished over the weekend (at Gen Con no less!). I've drawn a few more, and I have a Sharuum mat in the works. Let me know what you think!
Looks great! I really like the flow of the Momir/Simic mat.
Took this for a spin on CubeTutor. Am I missing something, or is there no way to increase the number of packs for drafting to 5 packs? I was able to make it a 4-player draft, but only 3 packs. Here's what I ended up with, seems like it could be fun: Bartel Runeaxe
Dungeon Geists is back out, and Gifts Ungiven is back in. Missed that card too much, and Geists was too unwanted as a 4-drop.
I like this change. Gifts does way more work than the Geists (at least around here).
EDIT: Another RDW; not sure about how I built the deck. Decided to branch out and try and draft a Reanimator deck too. Just realized I have Goblin Welder in there for shenanigans with the big robots, but the only other artifact to weld with is a Mox. Clearly I need to learn how to build decks better.
It's been bloody hard for me to keep my list over 90% pimped. I got it to 94% at one point, but what with so many expensive recent foils, I haven't had the money to splash out on foil Standard stuff.
If you have the time, you should just do some more alters for your cube. You certainly have the skills.
Uh, I'm not sure that it works quite like that. If your opponent has 4 creatures and you have 5, their life total goes to 4, which means you need to push through 4 damage, not just one.
Unless you alpha strike in a situation where your opponent must block and lose all 4 creatures, then play the spell during your after combat main phase. Then again, you may be winning anyway.
Beta/CE or foil with Beta art gets my vote as well. It is one of those cards whose original art is so iconic I would make a cube just to have the card in it.
I've been playing Type 4 for years. It is a great way to pass some time between rounds at a tournament, or just to get some quick, fun games in without worrying about anyone getting mana screwed or flooded. I like how cards that are considered "unplayable" in other formats can find a home.
It is fun played as a shared stack, separate stacks, and/or drafted.
As far as X-spells go, there are 2 X-spells in my stack: Dwarven Catapult and Forced March. These don't need any limitation, unlike typical X-spells. I don't have any firebreathing creatures in my stack, so we don't need to worry about that. Basically the rules of my stack are:
1. Unlimited mana
2. One spell per turn unless alternate casting cost/free play is used
I did this in honor of the soul we lost. 2 weeks have gone by, but the world still feels off...
You will be remembered, may you rest in peace.
The top to middle of the left border and the middle of the right border look good. I would have to agree with Juju and say that the top border needs some work to match the texture of the background. Also, it could be materials or technique or whatever, but the lightning extensions over the text box need more work. Some of those branches are pretty loose, and they need more precision in general. The central parts of each branch of lightning need more layers to match the intensity of the original, and the pinkish glow around the lightning seems to be missing. This can be seen most clearly in the transition from the original art to the extensions at the type line. Some good work, but needs more refinement to look truly finished.
My first attempt at mimicking a "genre" of alters that I'm very fond of.
Reference is all bigup alters
Made with two pens, a marker, an exacto knife, some glue and a random foil I had laying around. It wasn't supposed to end up as a card as I was just testing waters, but here it is
I like how it turned out, even if it was just an experiment. Would be interested to hear bigup's feedback.
I hope you, the OP and everyone affected gets through and gets a real response. As you may notice, I also alter cards and thus have an interest in this as well. That said, I have some reservations about this letter.
Writing a letter such as this would be more effective if it were professional, pithy, and precise. This letter fails to meet those standards, in my opinion (I have a law degree, have spent many hours doing legal research and writing, and have written legal correspondence in a professional setting). I am not trying to discourage you from voicing your position, just saying that you should work on this letter some more to give it a better chance of having the impact you desire. Some tips:
1) Basic spelling, capitalization, and punctuation: I saw at least 3 mistakes on my first read-through. While I have seen some awful writing come through from actual licensed attorneys, it is always better to have mistake-free writing.
2) Tone: At best, this letter sounds like an editorial from a school paper. At worst, you come across as the stereotypical petulant gamer. You are writing to a party who is making an attempt to protect their IP. Recognize that, and assert your rights without dismissing theirs so flippantly.
3) Legal argument: Are you an IP attorney? Do you understand the Fair Use Doctrine? It is not an easy or clear one. Are you aware that the first statutory factor would (probably) weigh against Fair Use protection with regard to selling card alters? I don't know you, and you may indeed have legal knowledge/training, but it doesn't come off as such in this letter. This makes the threats you make towards the end of your letter seem rather empty.
Anyway, hope that wasn't too harsh, just stating what I perceive to be areas that need improvement. Even if you have a great letter, you would really have to communicate through the proper channels. Not sure where you are sending this letter.
Looks great! I really like the flow of the Momir/Simic mat.
I like this change. Gifts does way more work than the Geists (at least around here).
EDIT: Another RDW; not sure about how I built the deck. Decided to branch out and try and draft a Reanimator deck too. Just realized I have Goblin Welder in there for shenanigans with the big robots, but the only other artifact to weld with is a Mox. Clearly I need to learn how to build decks better.
If you have the time, you should just do some more alters for your cube. You certainly have the skills.
EDIT: lol wow, double 'nath'd
Here's a couple of EDH Generals:
It is fun played as a shared stack, separate stacks, and/or drafted.
As far as X-spells go, there are 2 X-spells in my stack: Dwarven Catapult and Forced March. These don't need any limitation, unlike typical X-spells. I don't have any firebreathing creatures in my stack, so we don't need to worry about that. Basically the rules of my stack are:
1. Unlimited mana
2. One spell per turn unless alternate casting cost/free play is used
The top to middle of the left border and the middle of the right border look good. I would have to agree with Juju and say that the top border needs some work to match the texture of the background. Also, it could be materials or technique or whatever, but the lightning extensions over the text box need more work. Some of those branches are pretty loose, and they need more precision in general. The central parts of each branch of lightning need more layers to match the intensity of the original, and the pinkish glow around the lightning seems to be missing. This can be seen most clearly in the transition from the original art to the extensions at the type line. Some good work, but needs more refinement to look truly finished.
I like how it turned out, even if it was just an experiment. Would be interested to hear bigup's feedback.