Bay 12 Games Forum

... why would losing copyright stop the original artists from profiting from re-releases? You can use public domain stuff to make cash all you like, last time I paid attention to it. So long as someone'll pay for it, anyway.

... mute button could be done in style. Instead of just muting them, your character actually walks up to them, rips the instrument out of their hands, and forcibly crams it down their throat. Instrument access will thereafter be lost until they finish digesting, a time which would vary based on race.

This is best idea.

RSSing the nation weather service may have been one of the better things I've done in a while.

Because now I know ahead of time that this week will basically be rain. Squeeeeeee

Why bother eradicating pesky humans when you can just harvest Europa?

Because the eradication comes with a complementary mid-genocide meal and all the after dinner mints you can bother to leave unirradiated.

Most people do not break these laws, so it is generally not an issue. At the end of the day, copyright gets enforced like any other law, so it seems odd to pick specifically on copyright laws for being enforced like laws.

Copyright law gets enforced incredibly selectively, and an absolutely ridiculous portion of -- at the very least -- the States population has broken copyright at some point or another, if not necessarily via online/computer stuff. I'd wager at this point that a literal majority of the world's population has (because remember, copyright violations extend hella' far beyond the computer.). So... those two statements are kinda' wrong, just on those aspects (there's more besides).

In what way would Frumple's alternatives allow a DF-like project to be constructed?

Have... have you already forgotten Goblin Camp? S'mostly dead at this point, from what I recall, but there's nothing inherent to... any software, really... that somehow magically makes it impossible to be created via group effort, or somehow renders it incapable of being passed from developer to developer. There's nothing about DF that copyright made possible. That's all on Toady's dedication, insofar as I'm aware, and while copyright may or may not make that more likely, it's pretty far from necessary for it.

There's more than one decade+ literary project roaming around the net, collaborative efforts that have survived a great number of folks passing in and out of it. There's gaming projects like that as well (Dungeon Crawl, Angband, as examples).

There's plenty of people who can create beautiful things but wouldn't be able to keep together the motivation like Toady has, and there's nothing wrong with that.

... which is one of those reasons cooperative ventures and FOSS software structures are so wonderful. There doesn't have to be people like Toady to create things like DF. There can be a bunch of people with limited motivation hopping in and out as time and motivation allows, and things still get done. There can be one primary driver and several people who contribute to limited degrees, that massively reduce development time or improve quality (I'd point to something like Tales of Maj'Eyal as an example of that). There's issues with that kind of structure that we're still working on, but, well, that's something that'll be hammered out in due time.

Nah, you're assuming that a person will have the steam to complete even one magnum opus if it takes 10 or 15 years instead of 2 or 3.

I really think you're overestimating the time difference, here. From what I've seen, when you actually get the right team together, the development cycle between a commercial and non-commercial venture isn't that egregiously different. The primary "gap" right now is in regards to raw number of bodies -- commercial ventures have a much easier time distributing the work over a lot of people (since they can effectively bribe people into helping), but in a system where that possibility doesn't exist, you'd likely have a lot more volunteers. Less, yes, so the amount of projects would be lesser, but you'd still have the body count necessary to get projects done in a reasonable time frame. It would likely take more time, yes, due the smaller working group, but you'd be looking at maybe an extra year or two, not an extra decade.

Mm. I should be available in... I think four, five hours from this post? Maybe little sooner, maybe bit later.