Dilemma over distributing other people's free stuff

[MrDude]

Hi all

So I was curious, let’s say I start distributing my RPG kits to the world and I want to include a sample scene with all my elements in place and start people off with a complete first level…

Now imagine all the NPC characters just standing there, motionless, looking all dull and dreary… now imagine I include the A* pathfinding code from this very forum and have my characters all walk around (Sure, I could create my own little waypoint system and predefine their movements, but once they start using the level to build upon I am sure they are gonna throw it out and replace it with proper movement code, so why the heck not just include it in the first place…?)…

Same with the detonator freeware. Say I use it in the scene to create some realistic fire for a building that explodes as soon as you enter the village… This is free to both me and to anyone who uses the kit, but it does not belong to me…

Should my own products contain only my own stuff or is it acceptable to include other people’s freeware as long as I don’t make claims of ownership thereof? Drastic example: Say I create a hide-and-seek mechanic and place a character of my own creation in the Unity Demo scene and add my mechanic to the soldier and to my character and then distribute that demo scene as the showcase of my mechanic…

I am a tad confused in this respect as I want to include as much as I can and make it look as good as I can but some of the stuff I want to include already has much much much better freeware versions available… so what to do?

Both in terms of the content creators and the customers side, would you feel cheated or somehow wronged?

Your thoughts?

[anon_69921219]

If I were a customer, I wouldn’t care at all how much you put in that wasn’t your own stuff, as long as you weren’t scamming me (giving me nothing BUT free stuff, which I can get elsewhere for free).

As long as what I am buying is something you did that I couldn’t do or that would take me too much time-- I don’t care.

I honestly don’t even care if others steal work or not to help with their own. I know that’s not moral, but to be honest-- all I care about are two things:

1. Getting what I need done…DONE!

2. Not breaking any laws, so when it is done, it can’t be taken away from me.

Because in the end-- it doesn’t really matter to ME whether or not YOU or Average Joe Simpson was the majority of the meat. As long as what YOU did was enough to help me (such as, putting it all together in a way that I couldn’t or didn’t want to) then great! $$$ for you. Time savings for me.

Also, I see a lot of stuff in humanity as deserving free use. I believe everyone who works hard should earn just and fair amounts, and no one should ever be cheated. But I also believe in free and open software, and the apathy for caring about a corporate losing out when they already make way too much. If one guy makes 5 billion dollars off of a program, I really don’t care if he loses 3 billion because of this or that.

I do believe in giving credit-- but once again, it’s all vanity. Who cares? Even if I were to work really hard, and someone else were to not give me credit for my work-- what does it do for me? Nothing. It doesn’t affect me at all.

As long as you aren’t breaking any laws, as long as you aren’t claiming specifically “I did this exactly. And this. And this. I made those things.” then I don’t see anything wrong with it. If someone subtly misdirects people to think THEY did it all-- i still don’t care. Assumptions make asses of everyone.

The only things I have problems with is independent businesses being hurt by wrongdoing (even one single piracy or theft can hurt an indie business badly) and I have problems with liars who PURPOSEFULLY claim SPECIFICALLY they created something they didn’t. If you led people to believe you created A* pathfinding, I don’t care. If you said specifically, “I created A* pathfinding.” I’d want you to lose at life

I’m weird, I know. But in the end, I think most of this type of stuff and other topics are just vanity or greed, which I don’t care about.

[anon_1014682]

I would avoid including anything that’s not built into Unity, so any 3rd party scripts commercial or other wise.

It would be better to leave that to tutorials and videos. If it was scripts that rely heavily on or extend the functionality of a commercial 3rd party solution, you wouldn’t have much choice.

a pack of new trees - sample scene would be fine showing it working with the built-in terrain.
a pack of 3d houses at various stages of destruction - tutorial/demo video with acknowledgement/link to a script that would make it work.

Licensing and copyright is just a minefield, imho.

[Dreamora]

Detonator adding wouldn’t be a problem but for anything thats distributed for free through the asset store I would include references on where to get it cause that way they can easily stay up to date for example (detonator, unitysteer, behave - to name some that would likely find its way in ;)).

[galent]

Many products are built by combining other people’s work, from games to multi-million dollar business IT solutions. As long as you’re legally compliant (some licenses stipulate that you can’t distribute, others make your end product free and open source), you’re fine.

unity stuff is free for any use (at least to Unity customers).

Now, taking a demo, making a nearly unmodified game (like an iOS game that will remain unmentioned…) is definitely skating on the line of “taking credit for other’s work”.

That said, it’s a coder problem (typically) that you need to make everything yourself or it isn’t “right”

Hope this helps,

Galen

[anon_1014682]

@galent

That said, it’s a coder problem (typically) that you need to make everything yourself or it isn’t “right”

I worked with a Lead Programmer and Junior Programmer, where the Lead would do nothing but just edit his name into the header files of the source the other guy did. He’s probably still working in the industry… but working might not be quite the right word!

[Dreamora]

you wouldn’t believe how much work it is to hide such incapabilities and always find “monkeys” talented yet feared enough to work out well for ya

[galent]

@callahan.44

I worked with a Lead Programmer and Junior Programmer, where the Lead would do nothing but just edit his name into the header files of the source the other guy did. He’s probably still working in the industry… but working might n fauot be quite the right word!

Well, that’s a bit of a different scenario… yes I’ve found that type, and the type that spends 90% of their time trying to convince the world all is well, it’s someone else’s fault/incompentencies that are to blame… (oddly, a disturbing of PhDs fit into that second category…)

Using a freely distributed (for commerical and personal use) API, open source project/pieces, models, animations… as long as you’re not just repackaging the original work with no value add, isn’t the same thing as taking credit for someone else’s work. Yes, you should list your sources of packaged addins, but, if it’s free to use, then it’s free to use. It starts getting questionable when you have put little work into the end product yourself. (of course, most collab posts for MMO projects already make the leap of faith that the idea is 99% of the “value”. That coding/graphics stuff is easy right? hehe)

Cheers,

Galen

[anon_69921219]

@galent

Many products are built by combining other people’s work, from games to multi-million dollar business IT solutions. As long as you’re legally compliant (some licenses stipulate that you can’t distribute, others make your end product free and open source), you’re fine.

unity stuff is free for any use (at least to Unity customers).

Now, taking a demo, making a nearly unmodified game (like an iOS game that will remain unmentioned…) is definitely skating on the line of “taking credit for other’s work”.

That said, it’s a coder problem (typically) that you need to make everything yourself or it isn’t “right”

Hope this helps,

Galen

This is what I meant to say. LoL…

[mikesgames]

maybe you could export the demo’s to webplayer files, and just include the webplayer files instead??

[anon_58592029]

It would be ok as long as you give credit where it is due.
If I gave away a free pack of 3d models or whatever, and then you decided to start using those in your pack I would take it as a compliment.
I would play it safe though and at least contact whoever originally made it just in case.

[Arges]

@anon_58592029

If I gave away a free pack of 3d models or whatever, and then you decided to start using those in your pack I would take it as a compliment. I would play it safe though and at least contact whoever originally made it just in case.

Yeah, careful with that. Start by looking at the license. In the specific case of UnitySteer you could re-distribute it without a problem, as long as the license is present, given the MIT license terms. If the code you’re redistributing is GPL (say, AngryAnt’s GPL release of Path) then you have to bear in mind the implications of how that license affects the terms in which you can distribute your own code.

With art packs it’s the same. Often I see licenses which allow the inclusion and redistribution on a final product, except other art packs, or they might be released under a Creative Commons license with specific terms.

Consider the license first, then when in doubt ask the creator for clarification.

[runevision]

You can redistribute assets provided by others if the license they provide it under allows that. In cases where assets provided in the Asset Store are not provided under a custom license but use the standard Unity End User License Agreement, there is this paragraph to consider:

2.3 Licensor grants to the END-USER a non-exclusive, worldwide, and perpetual license to the ASSET to integrate Assets as parts of electronic games and interactive media. END-USER may otherwise not sublicense, rent, lease or lend the Assets. It is emphasized that the END-USERS shall not be entitled to transfer in any way (including, without, limitation by way of sublicense) the Assets in any other way than as integrated parts of electronic games and interactive media.

[MrDude]

Hi all. Thanks for the valuable feedback.

Of course I am not going to try and screw over any of the content creators and I will stay completely within any included license. I have contacted a few devs for content I was considering including and received replies like “sure, but I want a copy of whatever you use it in” (which I think is fair) and “use it any way you like”… So clearly in these instances I have the author’s blessing so SHOULD I decide to do so, I know it will be okay…

The thing that I was concerned about was if you get my kit, open it up and find 90% of my stuff and then notice I have that free kit in there and this free script in there etc… Would you then feel cheated for finding free content bundled together with commercial content…? That was what I was concerned about.

For example, in the shop in the village I intend to include a few weapons for sale. These models were provided by a forum member as a free package… so if you get my town, complete with story, shops, quests, etc etc etc and then go into a shop and find models that are free to you on the forums, anyway… See, THAT was what was worrying me… How would you react to that…!?

That was the concern I had…

Not so much “May I”, but rather “How would you feel”…?

At the end of the day, if I have a choice between:
a) giving you less and keeping everyone happy or
b) giving you more and having to listen to complaints from 10% of the people…
I’d rather go with a…