Has anyone ever been convicted of copyright offences for....

[mr_m0nks]

using an emulator with illegally obtained ROM's?

just wondering.



anyone know of any stories on the web?

[Mortificator]

I heard there was this guy who disappeared after playing Gals Panic in MAME and they never found the body.

[ROBOTRON]

I read in the paper once where a guy had emulated Zed Blade ROM and his psychiatrist ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti '.

Sssssssssssssss.........

[Aru-san]

I think a better question is:

Has anyone ever been convicted of copyright and trademark offences for playing a game outside of the region assigned?

I don't understand how playing a game outside the assigned country would cause people to sue in the first place.

On-topic, I have never seen any cases where using an emulator with illegally obtained ROMs caused a company to sue. Besides, with old ROMs, it's not like they're still making a profit off a video game that was made 10-25 years ago, IMHO.

[Dave_K.]

I think a better question is:

Has anyone ever been convicted of copyright and trademark offences for playing a game outside of the region assigned?

I don't understand how playing a game outside the assigned country would cause people to sue in the first place.

The copyright/region notice only applys to operators (someone who is operating the game in public for profit) not the individual player (who never sees the warning screen when the PCB is first turned on). Even then, I don't think I've herd of any operators getting sued for operating games out of region.

On-topic, I have never seen any cases where using an emulator with illegally obtained ROMs caused a company to sue. Besides, with old ROMs, it's not like they're still making a profit off a video game that was made 10-25 years ago, IMHO.

You bet your ass a company like Ultracade would be sued in an instant if they didn't obtain proper license for all the roms they distribute to operators. But when it comes to home users you have to be joking.

[Necronom]

I think a better question is:

Has anyone ever been convicted of copyright and trademark offences for playing a game outside of the region assigned?

I don't understand how playing a game outside the assigned country would cause people to sue in the first place.

On-topic, I have never seen any cases where using an emulator with illegally obtained ROMs caused a company to sue. Besides, with old ROMs, it's not like they're still making a profit off a video game that was made 10-25 years ago, IMHO.

The region notice has very little to do with copyright but with the fact that using arcade hardware that isn't cleared for this region (think it's the FCC in the US) is not exactly legal.
Same story right now with all the Street Fighter 4 machines operated outside Japan.
As for the Roms - sure they would love to sell you an old rom instead having you download it for free but the truth is that many companies ignore the rom sites and take it as a sign to start capitalizing on the whole "retro trend". As long as you don't have any commercial interests you should be fine downloading and playing as many old roms as you want.

[Ed Oscuro]

Give it some years - "gamer advocacy" groups put together by the industry will eventually start down the trail blazed by the RIAA.

[Daedalus]

It's unlikely anyone has even been sued for just using roms. Most companies do not make a profit on those games anymore, and thus have no reason to protect them. I think the sole exception may be Nintendo, which tries to threaten people for sharing roms of its main franchises (Mario, zelda, etc).

But even with copyright infringement in general, every lawsuit I've seen targets people who upload the IP, not download it (P2P users get targeted because the client uploads data as soon as you start downloading it.)

[Ed Oscuro]

P2P users also get targeted because you can see everybody's IP right there. Easy pickins' most of the time.

And Nintendo is just leading the charge - they want to be able to make continuing money off their old IP. Enough people are able to get over the "if it's not advanced in graphics it's not fun" Neo Geo style argument from years past and will pay to play old games they either missed or lost (or they want to brag about what's in their Wii) that it makes lots of sense to keep those old games under wraps.

As everybody knows, it's mainly the ESA members that are getting their ROMs pulled from sites. Few other people really seem to care.

It should be noted that game companies are free with copyright in other ways, as the ability of sites to put watermarks on everything and the Ookami IGN logo debacle shows.

[neorichieb1971]

Think of roms like your old trainers. You could wear them but if they got stolen you wouldn't bat an eyelid.

[Ed Oscuro]

So you're saying that I can sell my shorts on the Wii, essentially!

[I'm Alec]

Yeah, I did 24 months for emulating Metallica: The Arcade Game

[jonny5]

my buddy got an email from his ISP saying that they had been contacted by sony about him downloading a final fantasy PSX game

only similar case ive ever heard about first person