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General discussion (archive)A few licencing questions(13 posts)solved(13 posts)solved
(13 posts)solved
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Posted May 20, 2011
GOG games' licence contains the following:
"You may not transfer, distribute, rent, sub-license, or lease the Program or documentation, except as provided herein"

Doesn't it mean that:

1) I cannot actually legally use avatars as avatars? In this way we distribute part of the Program (as defined in the EULA).

2) I can't lend a game to my sister living in the same house, even if I'm not using (or even have installed) the game at the moment?

3) I can't allow anyone to play the game even if I install it at one and only one computer and thus can't use it at the same moment?

Thanks in advance for help! It would be especially nice if sb from GOG team replied. ;)
Post edited May 20, 2011 by mgol
This question / problem has been solved by TheEnigmaticTimage
Posted May 20, 2011
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mgol: GOG games' licence contains the following
Just don't read that. Problem solved.

Also:
1* Avatars are downloaded separately, so they aren't bound by those rules
2* You can never "borrow to", you can either "borrow from" or "lend to"
3* That's neither transferring, distributing, renting, sub-licensing nor leasing... good effort, though. 3/10.
Post edited May 20, 2011 by Vestin
Posted May 20, 2011
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mgol: GOG games' licence contains the following:
"You may not transfer, distribute, rent, sub-license, or lease the Program or documentation, except as provided herein"

Doesn't it mean that:

1) I cannot actually legally use avatars as avatars? In this way we distribute part of the Program (as defined in the EULA).

2) I can't borrow a game to my sister living in the same house, even if I'm not using (or even have installed) the game at the moment?

3) I can't allow anyone to play the game even if I install it at one and only one computer and thus can't use it at the same moment?

Thanks in advance for help! It would be especially nice if sb from GOG team replied. ;)
1) Avatars are considered "Extra Content" by the GoG website, and thus would not be covered under the licensing for the actual game itself. That particular line of software EULA's generally refers to re-selling/re-distributing [eg torrents]/lend on a cash system, etc. It is a standard disclaimer that has been part of EULA's since very early days. Most people don't bother reading the license text though.

2) If you follow the letter of the license (and law [though laws are a gray area for software still]) then only the purchaser may use it. Most game companies/publishers/etc have a little more common sense than that though and tend not to mind if you share amongst your house hold.

3) #2 applies to 3 as well.

In general the EULA's are to cover all bases and cover the game devs/publishers hypothetical butts. I have yet to hear of any legal action being pursued because Johnny shared the game he purchased with his sister Susy and parents Bob and Wilma.
Posted May 20, 2011
There's also a question of what the laws of your country have to say on the matter.

As an example*, according to Norwegian law, I am entitled not only to back up music, movies, and games that I own, I am also legally allowed to distribute copies of said music, movies, and games to friends and family.
I don't know if this would apply to GOG, as I have no idea whether or not my business with them would fall in under Norwegian jurisdiction as they don't have a Norwegian store, however.

*I don't know if this law has been changed lately, I only know of it's existence due to a shitstorm in the media a couple of years back, where the Norwegian Consumer Ombudsman threatened to fine Apple over their licenses in iTunes as they violated Norwegian law, as well as the music business understandably claiming that the term "friend" was poorly defined, and somewhat watered down now with people having thousands of "friends" on Facebook and similar.
Posted May 20, 2011
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mgol: GOG games' licence contains the following
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Vestin: Just don't read that. Problem solved.
Yeah, like that changed things.
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Vestin: Also:
1* Avatars are downloaded separately, so they aren't bound by those rules
Unfortunately, you're wrong. Another part of the licence:
"This end user license agreement (this “Agreement”) is a legal agreement between you (an individual or a single entity “You”) and GOG.com or GOG Limited (“Company”) for the accompanying software product which includes computer software and any associated media, printed materials, and/or “online” or electronic documentation (collectively, the “Program”)."
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Vestin: 2* You can never "borrow to", you can either "borrow from" or "lend to"
My bad.
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Vestin: 3* That's neither transferring, distributing, renting, sub-licensing nor leasing... good effort, though. 3/10.
Putting one's thing publicly is distributing it, isn't it?
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carlosjuero: 1) Avatars are considered "Extra Content" by the GoG website, and thus would not be covered under the licensing for the actual game itself. That particular line of software EULA's generally refers to re-selling/re-distributing [eg torrents]/lend on a cash system, etc. It is a standard disclaimer that has been part of EULA's since very early days. Most people don't bother reading the license text though.
Read my upper response, unfortunately you're wrong...

Thanks for other replies, though.

EDIT: Or does it apply only to documentation etc. contained within setup files? I didn't think about it because GOG usually puts manuals etc. within the extra content.
Post edited May 20, 2011 by mgol
Posted May 20, 2011
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Vestin: Just don't read that. Problem solved.
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mgol: Yeah, like that changed things.
Are you honestly trying to tell me you give a damn about the legal binding of a licence agreement ? Moreover - of one for GOG products?

I'm not a lawyer, I'm a philosopher. Part of my thing is determining what is right and what is wrong - form that perspective, your questions are mostly trivial.
Not to mention that the GOG guys usually encourage their users to trust their common sense - pretty much everything here is based on that assumption: the stability of the forums, the safety of the intellectual property they are selling... Just do what you feel is right, nice and wise - I assure you that no one will mind. This is the practical standpoint.
As for the theoretical - yeah, it might be interesting to analyze the incongruity of the letter of the Law. At best - it can lead to changing its text slightly to better reflect the Spirit. Is that what you're after ?
All I need is a "why".
Posted May 20, 2011
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Vestin: Are you honestly trying to tell me you give a damn about the legal binding of a licence agreement ? Moreover - of one for GOG products?
To a some extent - yes. And not because I'm afraid GOG will send cops after me but I'd like to know what they want me to be able to do with purchased games. They could e.g. sell licences allowing to share games with up to 10 people and I could do it then. As they're not selling such a licence, I won't copy this game to others, just to be fair.

But you're right in one point - I probably care more about what GOG team thinks I can do with purchased stuff, not necessarily what EULA officially implies.
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Vestin: As for the theoretical - yeah, it might be interesting to analyze the incongruity of the letter of the Law. At best - it can lead to changing its text slightly to better reflect the Spirit. Is that what you're after ?
All I need is a "why".
This one, too. I mean, if there were a simple way to change a licence to better reflect actual GOG people view on the subject, I wouldn't mind.

Of course, everything is also about trust. If I expected GOG to disappear tomorrow I probably wouldn't buy games here (and their terms have an option to suddenly disappear cutting off access to purchased games). On the other hand, as much as I love them, I still know business is business so just in case I archive all my games on an external HDD. ;) But I went a little off topic...
Post edited May 20, 2011 by mgol
Posted May 21, 2011
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mgol: If I expected GOG to disappear tomorrow I probably wouldn't buy games here
If GOG were to disappear tomorrow, I'd pretty much buy ALL the games here ;P. Those I have wishlisted, anyway...
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mgol: On the other hand, as much as I love them, I still know business is business so just in case I archive all my games on an external HDD. ;) But I went a little off topic...
But... that's something they actively encourage people to do ! That's the whole point of DRMless digital distribution - you're supposed to download your files IMMEDIATELY after purchase, back them up and keep them safe. In case anything happens to them - they get lots, corrupted or you forgot to back them up in the first place - they offer you the OPTION to redownload them from the site.
Posted May 21, 2011
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mgol: EDIT: Or does it apply only to documentation etc. contained within setup files? I didn't think about it because GOG usually puts manuals etc. within the extra content.
The license is only distributed in the downloaded setup file, and as such only applies to that package (I'm pretty sure the license cannot be viewed on the web site or is available within separately downloaded extras).
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mgol: Of course, everything is also about trust. If I expected GOG to disappear tomorrow I probably wouldn't buy games here (and their terms have an option to suddenly disappear cutting off access to purchased games).
They can only cut off your access to download the games, they cannot (and more importantly, does not try to) deprive you off what you have already downloaded, hence their words "You buy it, you keep it".
Post edited May 21, 2011 by Miaghstir
Posted May 21, 2011
Let me start this with: I'm not a lawyer. There's a chance I'm wrong about this, but I doubt it.
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mgol: 1) I cannot actually legally use avatars as avatars? In this way we distribute part of the Program (as defined in the EULA).
You can't sell, rent, or give someone else the games or the extra content from them. Psting your avatar in an online forum where someone else has (obviously) the ability to see it is isn't selling or renting. Don't make a page somewhere where you say "Here are all the awesome GOG.com avatars. Download any of them you like and use them yourself!" That would be not cool.
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mgol: 2) I can't lend a game to my sister living in the same house, even if I'm not using (or even have installed) the game at the moment?
This is a bit of a grey area. Technically, no you probably can't. Your game license is limited to you. But there's some wiggle room. For example, if you bought NWN from us and gave your buddy a copy so that you guys could play multiplayer together, that's not particularly cool. If you played Riven yourself, finished it, and your sister asks "Can I play?" and you give her a copy to play with (and don't play it yourself at the same time), that's cool.
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mgol: 3) I can't allow anyone to play the game even if I install it at one and only one computer and thus can't use it at the same moment?
In this case you're good, unless you make your buddy pay you to play the game on your computer. If you're just letting him play on your PC while he's hanging out at your house and bored out of his skull, that's fine.

Basically, think of your copy like an actual physical disk. If you lend a buddy your disk (no money is exchanged), you can't play the game while he has your disk. Once he gives it back, you can play again. The one difference between the disk and the download is that you can't eventually sell the download to someone else like you can the disk.

Or, you buddy can be like my friend Josh and take your disk of Freedom Force and never return it. In which case I think the EULA says that you're supposed to go to his house one day and rig a foghorn to go off under his bed at 3.00 in the morning. At least, that's what I did. ;)

Hope that cleared things up.
Post edited May 21, 2011 by TheEnigmaticT
Posted May 21, 2011
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TheEnigmaticT: Or, you buddy can be like my friend Josh and take your disk of Freedom Force and never return it. In which case I think the EULA says that you're supposed to go to his house one day and rig a foghorn to go off under his bed at 3.00 in the morning. At least, that's what I did. ;)
So I'm in the clear then?

I borrowed Unreal Tournament off a friend what, 9 years ago, I think. He promptly forgot that I was the one to borrow it, which I found out when I mentioned it to him a year or so later, as I heard him talking to someone else and mentioning that he didn't know who had the disc, he was surprised that I had it but hasn't mentioned it since. We haven't met since we finished high school, though I've seen the other friend a couple times.

(And if, for some moderately insane reason you're here on GOG, you don't still use the handle "killprix", do you?)
Posted May 21, 2011
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TheEnigmaticT: and rig a foghorn to go off under his bed at 3.00 in the morning. At least, that's what I did. ;)
Video or it didn't happen.
Posted May 21, 2011
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Zchinque: There's also a question of what the laws of your country have to say on the matter.

As an example*, according to Norwegian law, I am entitled not only to back up music, movies, and games that I own, I am also legally allowed to distribute copies of said music, movies, and games to friends and family.
So that's partly how it is in Poland. "Fair use" allows me to copy my music, movies and other graphics to a friend (a real friend, not a virtual one). It doesn't apply to programs (including games), though. That's why I didn't ask about graphics. I know I can't publicly distribute avatars/wallpapers/etc., but I can legally copy them to my sister's computer.

While talking about grey area, I downloaded a cracked version of Heroes of Might & Magic III for my sister (I bought one here for myself). I don't think bad about this, though, because:
1) She's already had a Polish HoMM3 Gold edition.
2) The cracked version didn't have anything in common with a GOG one, it was a user-cracked English version of HoMM3 Complete, so I didn't batten on GOG's work.
3) The Polish translation of this game is awful, non-accurate, sometimes even text is too long to fit where it should so you can't read everything...
4) Gold Edition (in all languages) is a little broken - it doesn't incorporate creatures updates (stats, prices) from Shadow of Death, even though it contains the expansion, it also has some annoying bugs like not being able to view creatures approximate numbers (few, pack, etc.) in enemy heroes' armies.

I don't know why but Ubisoft keeps putting the Gold Edition of HoMM3 in most packs, e.g. their last Ubisoft Exclusive Heroes I-IV pack...
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TheEnigmaticT: Hope that cleared things up.
Yep, it did, thanks!

And also thanks for everyone else for your points of view on the matter.
Post edited May 21, 2011 by mgol
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General discussion (archive)A few licencing questions(13 posts)solved(13 posts)solved
(13 posts)solved