Concerning options alongside PS licenses

[Kiva]

Besides (I just have to add this), since you\'re ovbiously not a developer in the Atomic Blue Non-Profit Organization, why do you care so much about a license, that all the developers in this organization do not have a problem with? It\'s true you\'re not the first person to come here and whine about how stupid and terrible the license is, but seriously, why does the license need to be changed just because you disagree with it? What is it about you that makes you think you have the right to decide it\'s a bad license? It\'s been working good so far, so what is the problem with it? Sure some potential supporters are lost because of it, but if they can\'t handle that there are rules, and rules are there to be kept, then what do we need them for?

In short: Why do you care so much about a license you\'re not restricted by? Did you plan on stealing stuff from PS? Is that why you want it to be loosened up? So you can take all the art and then make your own game named \"ScanePlift\", which you\'ll then sell for money? Well tough luck.

[Caym]

I\'m not sure saying \"we don\'t care about the users\' opinion anyway\" is really in adequation with the concept of a game released under a free licence (even partially).

Originally posted by Kiva
Did you plan on stealing stuff from PS? Is that why you want it to be loosened up? So you can take all the art and then make your own game named \"ScanePlift\", which you\'ll then sell for money? Well tough luck.

Well isn\'t this the point of a free licence in the first place ?

[zinder]

Originally posted by Caym
I\'m not sure saying \"we don\'t care about the users\' opinion anyway\" is really in adequation with the concept of a game released under a free licence (even partially).

Originally posted by Kiva
Did you plan on stealing stuff from PS? Is that why you want it to be loosened up? So you can take all the art and then make your own game named \"ScanePlift\", which you\'ll then sell for money? Well tough luck.

Well isn\'t this the point of a free licence in the first place ?

No. Using a free licence is offering what is already done and will be done in the future in exchange for help in developing it further. Thats the basic idea. And it is up to those developing if and with which particular license they want to go that way. Cause its their work.

For that i dont know why lemontea is insistent on arguing over and over about the art licence. I dont understand why he is unable to accept the decision by the PS team.

[Kunisch]

It should be said that I think that the current arrangements for PS regarding licenses are the best possible solution.

As I see it, the real problem would be if a company started selling PS CD/DVD copies as their product, which this way of licensing solves (And don?t tell me that this wouldn?t happened, we live In a world where people gladly starts a war because of something as stupid as power, and besides it has already happened for a few other software products (I can?t remember the exacts situations)).  

As it is now, the PS engine (if one can call it that) is under GPL which means that it could be used as a base for creating a lot of games.

The database (art, sound, rules etc.) are under the PS license because it seems necessary if you are working with artists, and because the people behind Planeshift want a unique game (as in you are not able to copy the game change the Splash screens and then call it you own game) and since they lead the whole project, then guess what? They actually kind of have the power here!

As I see it, this is the optimal solution, and if the unthinkable thing happens that Atomic blue Shuts down the whole PS project, then don?t you think that they would GPL all the work before doing so ?

Just my 5 cents, hope that it is okay


/Kunisch

PS.: Sorry it this seams like a meaningless post, but I have spend the last week arguing over this license (with IRL friends) and it makes me kind of frustrated.

[Chicane]

Holy moly! I thought I would register at this forum much later, only when the game is more mature. But after reading this thread, I just couldn\'t resist. Let me start by saying this -- guys, RELAX!!! I\'m not sure if I\'m understanding the license correctly or not but I do believe that sound/music, art and similar being protected against butchery is a good thing. So, I completely agree with the devs on that. However, I was disappointed (well, even disgusted at times) at how some of the devs (well, mostly kiva) responses sounded. You may disagree with the guy but he wasn\'t even hostile or hateful. It sounded like he knew that the devs have agreed on a certain license. Nowhere was he taking it upon himself to decide what it should be like. To me, it sounded like he was simply talking, discussing things. He only made a suggestion and listed advantages he thought it would have, even if he was wrong in his observations. If you don\'t agree with him, fine but there\'s no need to assume that anyone who wants to contribute is a worthless idiot. That only makes you an idiot yourself.

Please, people, just calm down. I\'m actually so excited about this project. I cannot even imagine how much work it must be for the devs to even take the game this far. And for free! I truely hope this project will live on and continue improving.

Actually, I\'ve been wondering about the creative contributions myself. I agree that any and all little patches and/or artwork or audio work should not be automatically accepted. But are the developers going to frown upon even suggested contributions? Let\'s say I was so inspired by the game that I wanted to make a really detailed, ORIGINAL and skillfully drawn armor skin. I then post a message on the boards here asking if people like it. Perhaps even make a vote on this and other peoples\' contributions. Then, the winner of the players\' vote simply says, \"feel free to use it in PlaneShift, if you like (with the credit being given to the author, of course), and if not, it was a blast creating something anyway\". Are the devs automatically going to ignore it, no matter how good of a work it is, or are they going to at least take a look at it? What if they really like it? Will they then not use it, even though the author would love them to? Don\'t forget that an author never expects for their contirbution to be automatically included -- ONLY if people on the boards and the devs all agree that they like it.

I want to know if it\'s a waste of time trying to contribute something as only a suggestion, not an expectation. Because in that case, I\'d rather forget PS until it\'s out as a late beta or a final project, and maybe give it a try only from a players\' perspective. While PS team does have \"HELP US!\" in large letters on their site, it usually concerns a full position on a team. I\'m talking about an occassional contribution that would be included ONLY if majority of players and devs would agree on.

How about holding a monthly (ok, doesn\'t have to be monthly, whenever) contest on a new armor or weapon skin and/or model? Then voting on a winner. And then devs can include it in the game, if they too really like it?

I usually hate arguing, so if this just keeps being more fueled with frustration and aggrevation, I probably won\'t reply to this again.

Thanks.

[lemontea]

@Caym:
1)Not exactly as you said, let me clarify: The mode of development I suggested is that the public is free to offer Suggestions for improvments. There will always be a filtering process which decide whether that\'s good or not.
Adventage:
It allow more flexibility because there are a wide diversity of people, each providing some different or similar viewpoint.
If the filtering is well done, it could also boost both quality and speed.
Disadventages:
The filtering process may be slow or difficult to work properly.
If the filtering is not well done, it could cause chaos.

2)My main suggestion is that not only improvement for Planeshift are welcome ( which for the game content, currently is not except for the author/core team himself/themself) , but also allowing people to use creatively made derivative work, as a reward for their creativity.

@Kiva:
1)I did not just come and complain the license was terrible, stupid, or otherwise. I just critize it and try to discuss the varies alternative possibilties. In fact, I do list both the adventage and disadventage, if you lookup the post made before.

2)You think that\'s rules, and that\'s the main problem. Rules are not perfect, in fact, many law can have holes in itself. I\'m sorry to say that if you think the license are set in stone in the first place and do not accept any discussion on it, then you\'re pretty closed-minded.

3)Besides, you have no need to worry about any possible conspiracy. Although not a core developer of Planeshift, I do care about this game and open source development in general. I myself am developer of a small game that\'s undergoing development, and I am very serious about, and respect, intellectual properties, copyrights, etc. I believe that I\'m a civilian myself in that I\'m open to discussion, wanting to contribute constructively, and seek improvement of the community as a whole as honor. Assumption of bad faith, on the other hand, is a sad thing to see in community in that it create tension.

@Caym(2) :
\"Don\'t care about user\" is never equal to \"free(dom) license\" . In fact, many free(dom) licensed software have managed to achieve a high standard that are comparable, or even surpass, the commercial counterpart.

@zinder:
Because people, until now, seems to still misintercepted my idea and the discussion has barely started(in terms of meaningful points)

@Kunisch: See the @Caym: 2) part for main point.

@Chicane: Welcome! I would like to hear more from you. Especially the organising process - Deciding whether a community contribution is good or not , what can we do make sure it work smoothly? I\'ve seen too many times this decide the success or failure of the project.
Also, you may want to refer to @Caym: 2) for my main point. Just make sure you get what I\'m thinking right before we go on.
Edit: And after reading your post seriously, I found that you do mention not regularly made contributions. I would be interested to hear more details from both you and developers about the current process(how is it done currently? ) on the selection of contributions.



Note for all : It seems that currently the discussion is not interactive at all, it\'s always me replying to someone, and that person reply to me... Can\'t we discuss in a more open, and productive way?

[Chicane]

I think this post has steered in a very wrong direction. Perhaps even a bit too late to recover because a lot of people will first go through not so pleasant posts before they get to a normal discussion. I\'m thinking it\'s best to let this thread die, wait a little and make a new post titled \"Suggested Contributions/Content\" or something similar, give a polite and respectful introduction that your intentions aren\'t ill, and that you appreciate the devs\' work, that you\'re only discussing things, not trying to force your opinion on anyone, that you admit you could be wrong and do not mind being corrected, and so on. Most importantly, there has to be a \"take it easy!\" type of feeling set up. Be respectful to other peoples\' opinions, even if they\'re different from yours etc. And it might work.

[Asraniel]

i see some problems with the actual actual licensing:
-a artist gives away the rights of his own art, its not his art anymore, he cant use it somewhere else
-when you code for PS, you give away the rights on your code. sure, it is gpl. but if the team wants to change the licence to closed source, they can do that without asking every coder involved in the code

for me as a coder the second one is the biggest problem

[Kiva]

Originally posted by Asraniel
i see some problems with the actual actual licensing:
-a artist gives away the rights of his own art, its not his art anymore, he cant use it somewhere else
-when you code for PS, you give away the rights on your code. sure, it is gpl. but if the team wants to change the licence to closed source, they can do that without asking every coder involved in the code

for me as a coder the second one is the biggest problem

I honestly don\'t see the problem there?

If you paint a picture and give it to someone so they can put it in their living room, you wouldn\'t suddenly come and say \"Hey I need my picture back because I want to give it to someone else instead\". Would you?

If you helped build a car with some of your friends, you wouldn\'t suddenly come and say \"Hey I need my parts back because I want to help someone else build a car instead\". Would you?

It\'s the same deal here. You contribute to help the project, not to be able to take everything back if you suddenly don\'t like them anymore. Besides, if you were part of the team and you had programmed some bits of the game, why on earth would you ever even think about screwing up everything, by removing your bits and using them for some other project that might seem more interesting?

I want to know if it\'s a waste of time trying to contribute something as only a suggestion, not an expectation. Because in that case, I\'d rather forget PS until it\'s out as a late beta or a final project, and maybe give it a try only from a players\' perspective. While PS team does have \"HELP US!\" in large letters on their site, it usually concerns a full position on a team. I\'m talking about an occassional contribution that would be included ONLY if majority of players and devs would agree on.

Send a mail to Luca (or Keith if you\'re contributing code), and if they can use it they will. If not, they wont. It\'s as simple as that. I also know some of the devs check the fan art from time to time, trying to make the people who do good things there join the team. So the problem isn\'t about contributing, the problem is accepting that you give the stuff to the PS devs, you don\'t just lend it to them.

However, I was disappointed (well, even disgusted at times) at how some of the devs (well, mostly kiva) responses sounded.

I asked him a simple question (why he cares so much when he\'s not affected by this license anyway). The fact that he can\'t answer that question, and that you think it sounded rude isn\'t really anything I can do to prevent. It all depends on how you choose to read my messages. Just because I don\'t make :S :F :E :I :# or :% a lot in my posts, doesn\'t automatically mean that every time I make a post, I\'m furiously mad at someone. I just enjoy making people look stupid/making them realize there are so many things they never thought of (which is by far what I\'m best at).

Oh, and if I choose to make an ass of myself, then you are definitely not the person to tell me I shouldn\'t. There are no people I respect less than those who think they can tell others they\'re idiots, and mean it. You have to remember that I\'m a mod. I\'m not here to provoke people or make offensive comments, I\'m here to make sure others don\'t do it, but if you decide that whatever I say is something bad, be my guest. But I\'d prefer it if you keep your thoughts about me in PM, so I won\'t need to start editing them out of your posts. <-- Look - Happy smilie. That means it\'s funny. Not offensive.

[Teegress]

I have read this thread with keen interest.  Almost everyone has made some constructive statements.
What I have a hard time understanding is the term \"free.\"
How can something be given freely yet still wanting control?  If it is free, then there should be no strings attached.  I do not see how anyone can do this kind of project in today\'s copyright hungry world.
I understand intellectual property is a valued thing.  But when I give of my time freely to a volunteer project, I do not expect payment nor to dominate the people I am serving.
Hope I\'m not off thread.  I expect the licensing matter to concern a lot of serious PS users.

[lemontea]

@Kiva: I will now answer your question of \"why he cares so much when he\'s not affected by this license anyway\"

Refer to my last post , @Kiva section, point 3 , it explained my motivation to post is because I care about this game and open source development in general , as has been mentioned before. I think you already knew that.

As for the word \"care\" , well, that\'s because I treasure the existence and success of every open source project, and treasure them as a reminder to the whole community our potential. Further I believe in the spirit of open source and I\'m a member of the open source community myself(since I\'m the developer for a game see my last post) , I believe every open source project that success is a honor to all members of open source community, no matter whether he participated in it or not. See my idea of \"community as a whole\" ? I believe if I find any possible way to further improve a project, I should propose it by all mean.

I must say that I\'m disappointed by your assumption that \"people that are not affected by sth will not/ should not be interested in that affair\" . This assumption is simply wrong in that it is a motivation power for many open source project to success. Many contributors are not affected by this game anyway, but they still contribute , then do you ask them \"Why you care our project so much when you will not get any harm/benefit from it?\"

As a conclusion, I hope that you respect me and not treat me as someone with conspiracy, if you keep on that attitude, sorry but I can not go on the discussion.

@Chicane: I\'m sorry, but I don\'t think that will be possible in the near term because people just can\'t get the idea clearly with plain text and sometimes people can be so offensive(even have things similar to personnal attack) that I have to act more seriously and slightly more offensively than I would otherwise be. But I can edit my very first post and add the summary, where to look for the \"heart of the discussion\" , etc. Just give me time to write that( sigh, too busy recently )

@Asraniel & @Kiva:
1)There is no need to worry too much about the gpl, since as far as I remembered, changing license will require all coders (including core team and contributors) to agree, which is not very likely to happen.

2)Kiva, your analogy doesn\'t work too well because the concept is different. In both of your cases, they\'re real physical object, consider the painting, it is virtually impossible to make exact copy of it( although you can make copy that looks similar) ; but here the art is in digital format- which means they can be copyed exactly. While the art Asraniel is talking about is the right- the right to use copies of it elsewhere. That also concide with my point \"the team get way too much right on the game content and this scares away some potential contributors\" .

@Teegress:
First, to bold a word or something, replace your with ,repeat with the case

Free has two meanings in open source world:
\"Free as in beer\" You don\'t need to pay to get them.
\"Free as in freedom\" You have the right to share and improve on it, etc. This concept is a difficult one, I suggest you try searching with the terms \"gpl\", \"open source\", and \"free software\"

And why I started this, is due to concern this game is only partially free(as in freedom). The code is in gpl and is free, but the game content are not. Yet they don\'t state this fact clearly enough on the website- In the about page the summary of licenses is at the bottom. I suggest moving it to the top.

My final goal is that they lessen restriction of the game content by allowing conditional outside use. The reason they ban outside use is \"may be there will be many game using their artwork and their position in the market will then be stolen\" . I proposed to allow outside use if people changed the artwork creatively.

[Asraniel]

@Kiva: you dont understand what i was talking about. Your example with the picture has nothing to do with it. On computers you can copy things as many times as you want. So, i dont say that a artist can come and say, \"hei, give me back my texture\", he cant. But he should be allowed to use the same texture somewhere else. I understand the problem of the unicness of the project and you fear a rip off, but look around. how probable is it? not very much, every game makes it own textures/models (most of the time). You cant tell me that in the open source gaming scene you cant tell one game from the other because they all look the same

@lemontea:
Well, gpl is good. but from what i heard, when you contribute code to planeshift, you give also the copyrigth and everything else to the devs. So, if the core devs decide to make this a commercial, closed source game, they can everytime they want. And if they dont plan that, why should they take away the rigths of the coder?

[lemontea]

@Asraniel: That\'s quite a grey area. I\'ve looked up the web page and found this

Source code, other than game rules, are treated as open source software covered by the GNU General Public License, available here http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html with copyright explicitly assigned to Atomic Blue.

The problem is, will the contributor automatically become a member of the Atomic Blue? Also, how will decision of \"Atomic Blue Organisation\" be made? Must there be a majority or even all of members agreeing to make the decision? Or is there a small group of people in the organisation who will make the final decision? I would like to see members in Atomic Blue organisation clarify the situation.

[Kiva]

Originally posted by lemontea
The problem is, will the contributor automatically become a member of the Atomic Blue?

No. You\'re only a member after completing your trial period and signing the PlaneShift NDA.

Also, how will decision of \"Atomic Blue Organisation\" be made? Must there be a majority or even all of members agreeing to make the decision? Or is there a small group of people in the organisation who will make the final decision? I would like to see members in Atomic Blue organisation clarify the situation.

There are 3 leading roles in ABO. Andrew Craig/acraig, Keith Fulton/Vengeance and Luca Pancallo/Talad. They decide what goes on in their respective areas (Andrew - Client stuff, Keith - Server stuff, Luca - Everything). If they don\'t agree, you\'ll have to do it all over, or not at all.

[Asraniel]

this means PS could change into a closed source game anytime they want... sorry but thats not what i call a open source game