Well, you can't blame citricsquid or any other staff member for this stuff. It is simply against the law to do that kind of stuff stated above.
It is copyright violation to play the game without paying for it. It is against the forum rules (NOT illegal) to post older versions here.
HUGE difference
it IS illegal to distribute a copyrighted program that is not your property. buying Minecraft does NOT mean you own it, it means you are licensed to USE it. and don't give me crap about it being a U.S. law..because it's not. it is an INTERNATIONAL law. that is the reason games aren't available to be sold in some countries, because they refuse to abide by said international laws. if Mojang so wished to do so they can sue anyone who redistributes Minecraft.
You are actually wrong here. As there is nothing listed on the web page that says your paying for a license, but I can see where your confused as this is the standard way most developers like Microsoft and apple work. His site quite clearly states that you are not allowed to redistribute the game even after you have modified it. I am not trying to say your wrong in that you are allowed to redistribute only that purchase of the game is not a license. Earlier before the site was updated it actually was in there that you are buying the game and its yours, just that you are not allowed to redistribute.
What in essence that your buying is an account from the game developer to unlock the exe file that you download from there site. So unlike when you go buy say like an xbox and you want to sell it to someone else you can give them the system, this method prevents you from doing that.
P.S. Just in case anyone is wondering about jailbreaks on consumer electronics it is perfectly legal as there is no law that prevents you from modifying your own hardware. Remember that once you buy "hardware" from anyone it is now your property and the seller has no rights to take it away or even punish you from hacking any part of it. This is why modchips are not illegal and only the bios that runs them is. This is contrary to what the big boxers what you to think, Microsoft, Sony, Apple , etc......
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
You can normally find me lurking about on the #archlinux or #archlinux-offtopic channels on freenode.net.
I have been lost in the nether for a few days now.......
edit: removed angry spray. I misread the post and thought it was suggesting people actually owned the copy of the game they downloaded, which of course they do not (copyright law is unambiguous about this). But on re-reading it, it seems he understands that.
This does bring up an interesting idea, that perhaps maybe Mojang should continue to host the previous version alongside of the current version, so that people that wish to go back to the older update (and didn't think to back it up) can log into the site and download it.
Yes, sounds like a good idea. I can't really understand why they don't already do so, because it can't really hurt Mojang in any way, but by not doing may annoy members of the minecraft community.
This does bring up an interesting idea, that perhaps maybe Mojang should continue to host the previous version alongside of the current version, so that people that wish to go back to the older update (and didn't think to back it up) can log into the site and download it.
Yes, sounds like a good idea. I can't really understand why they don't already do so, because it can't really hurt Mojang in any way, but by not doing may annoy members of the minecraft community.
But Mojang sorted that issue out by giving you the option to update or not and the ability to easily access your files to back them up. If they were to host previous versions of Minecraft on the website then the loading experience would most likely be slower, with Minecraft.net having more downtime.
edit: removed angry spray. I misread the post and thought it was suggesting people actually owned the copy of the game they downloaded, which of course they do not (copyright law is unambiguous about this).
No, that's pretty much what he's saying.
Quote from Treah »
Garbage
It can't be both ways. Either it's a license, or he can't specify what you do with the software after you've purchased it.
Of course, the point of this thread is that people are distributing the .jar files on these particular forums. Even if it were not explicitly against the forum rules, how stupid can people be? :smile.gif:
Quote from Kusinagii »
DMCA garbage
The fact that you need an account to legally download the game software *IS* a form of DRM. On top of that, he uses obfuscated code. Modifications without explicit permission are DMCA violations by themselves, whether or not the software is further distributed.
Are we going to see a giant RIAA style crackdown and mass of lawsuits? Of course not.
Quote from Tei »
Don't discuss laws if you are not a lawyer, or at least start a post about law with IANAL.
No need unless you're giving legal advice, and no one in this thread is. Only thing people need to stop discussing are things about which they are either wrong, or simply do not understand. All of the relevant laws can be found on government sites using Google, but no one seems to want to read.
Also, follow the rules of the forum, whatever the rules are. There are forums where people share warez, this is not one of these. This is his house, we have to follow his rules.
Don't discuss laws if you are not a lawyer, or at least start a post about law with IANAL. But really, really really.. is best to no discuss laws.
Laws are not easy to understand, and use his own language, common sense is not enough to understand law, without any real law experience.
Yeah basically this.
The other problem as well is that whats law in one place is not the law in another. For instance the DMCA works one way in the US, but different in another country. And it gets even wierder when countries try to "long-arm" their laws outside of their borders (I'm looking at you america!)
The gist of most copyight laws however generally follow a few principles;-
1) You own the media
2) You don't own the intellectual property. (Ie, you might own the disk, but not the data on it that you purchased)
3) However an IP owner can grant you permissions to use his intellectual property within the bounds laid out in a licence
4) But if those are not explained, then you must assume the copyright laws are the rules in force. This generally means no you can't copy to someone else that game you purchased without permission.
Theres other bits and pieces like fair use, but sadly outside of the basics above, these vary wildly from juristiction to juristiction.
Your best bet in working out what you should know about copyright law is to look up your own countries version of groups like electronic frontiers who will tell you the basics of the more complicated bits (as well as why some of these laws are just plain nutso)
There is one thing people need to understand though. Just because Notch might not have asserted copyright early in the piece, doesnt mean you can flout it. Most countries are signatories to something called the Berne convention that means that even if the IP is not registered or asserted, it still exists.
Some other things people need to remember
1) Just because something is offered freely , doesnt mean it aint violating. The price of an object might determine damages, but it wont determine guilt except in some very edge case determinations of fair-use.
2) Fair use is complicated! Look up both your local laws , and US laws on whats acceptable as fair use. Copying a whole article into a forum post generally is NOT fair use. Excerpting a paragraph and attributing it for further discussion, generally IS. But heres the fun party: This might not be true in your country! It could be better, it could be worse!
3) Copyright is NOT trademark NOR patent. Don't think that in depth article you read about one of these concepts applies in any way to one of the others. Trademarks apply to things like names and markings. Copyright covers works of art or science or code or whatever. Patents cover implementable ideas. Don't confuse em!
4) Copyright violation is a crime AND a civil violation. If your done for a criminal charge, its easier to defend, but you can go to jail! If your sued, its a bit harder to defend (more relaxed standard of evidence, usually 'balance of odds') but you wont go to jail (but you might lose your stuff!) Oh and sometimes you can be done both ways. This is known in legal terminology as "you just got screwed badly son".
5) Maps and music have really heavy and wierd copyright attached to them.Not 100% relevant here, but you should be aware of that.
IANAL, so don't take this as "advice". I'm just a shmoe who once worked for the government and my opinion is of no weight at all.
All of you discussing the legal stuff do realize that your entire conversation is moot right?
The people who run the forums have said that sharing links to older versions of the game is against the forum rules. This being a oligarchy, their word is law within the confines of the forum.
So it doesn't matter what the real world law may or may not be. Post a link here to an older version and you get banned. It's that simple.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Tis far better to be a witty fool than a foolish wit.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't "backup and archival" fall under Fair Use?
They do but only for your own use. Meaning that you are allowed to create a backup copy of the software, but you cannot share that backup with another person.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Tis far better to be a witty fool than a foolish wit.
Omg people... @.@ I swear I read through this topic and about half the posts just repeated the same thing over and over. Here's my true honest opinion about sharing minecraft files. Mojang does NOT want people to do it. Whether your country has a law against it or not, it is wrong and (as stated earlier in this topic) buyers did agree in the Terms NOT to do it when they bought the game.
Moving on to the forum terms. By all means the community working these forums has already stated that they will agree with the rule of not sharing minecraft files (particularly key .jar files). A rule that this forums has that ALL users should understand is that they have asked nicely (with consequences just in case) that you too agree not to share minecraft files on the website. It doesn't matter if you are hosting it yourself or just providing a link to it, don't do it. Now, the MinecraftForums.net and Mojang themselves are by no means an internet police force there to search out and stop all cases of these files being shared throughout the internet.
I do not support downloading minecraft files, I know many people on these forums agree with me (I have quietly read their posts). I also found that when my downloader updated to 1.4 it actaully left a backup file for me named minecraft 1.3_01.jar which i renamed minecraft.jar and boom.... I was returned to the previous version. Now users should not expect something like this to just happen. I recommend making a backup of what version of minecraft you have. Again, I am not the first person to suggest making a backup, but I completely agree.
To the users making direct remarks to the U.S. copyright:
Again, you also agreed to the Minecraft terms of service when you created your account and bought the game.
One final note. I can understand many users requesting an archives database for older version on Minecraft, mostly for playing in SMP reasons. This is not the best place to be posting that. Ask it somewhere that a Mojang employee is more likely to read it. I am sure if you do a little working you can find a place where you can put that as a suggestion.
Good Day Community!
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
(Don't copy my rig! It's old and you will be sad)
AMD A10-7850K(4.1GHz) (4-Core) (CPU/GPU)
Corsair 8GB Memory(2 x 4GB) (DDR3-2133) (Vengeance Pro) (Dual Channel)
Corsair 4GB Memory (2 x 2GB) (DDR3-2133) (Dual Channel)
ASUS A88X-PLUS Motherboard(ATX) (FM2+)
Corsair 240GB SSD(2.5") (SSD) (Neutron Series GTX)
Western Digital 2TB HD(3.5") (7200RPM) (HHD) (Caviar Black)
It's so simple to those of you wasting your time arguing laws and such moot information.
You agreed to the terms when you made a profile for the forums. Not distributing the files was one of those terms... doesn't matter if you actually read the print when you agreed, doesn't matter if you didn't. You agreed or else you wouldn't have a profile on here.
Dont put the needed minecraft files up on another site, say, hotfile, rapidshare, mediafire, etc...
When you bought your account you agreed to it. it's on the page with it. It is implied, if not said. get over it.
How to revert back down a version? pure simplicity, if you can think ahead for 5 seconds.
Log in. See the "Update" screen... CLOSE THE WINDOW. Just exit out totally.
go to your .mincecraft folder.
rename the /bin folder, say, like, /bin-1.3_02 . Really.
start up minecraft. Choose "Options" button. enable the full re-download.
Log in. Get the new files. It will be your current /bin folder now.
Congrats, you now have a local archive of the previous version (with whatever mods you may have had) AND the new version!
Seriously, all it takes is 5 seconds of thought and common sense. It's what i did, and with some simple folder renaming i can flop between 1.3 and 1.4.
If your going to use the excuse "But i use the old launcher" then fine, your inability to wait 5 seconds extra due to the launcher getting the tumblr page, then it's your bad for being impatient and a moron. The new launcher was released for a good reason, several actually. Use It.
ok guys... if you really, REALLY want to be able to downgrade... use the new launcher and back up your BIN folders (not your minecraft.jar.) ive been doing this sense alpha and just put them all in one folder organized by version. This (i believe) is completely legal and gets you what all you guys have been whining about. So go make an old bins folder and throw your beta 1.4 or what ever youve been playing on into it.
It's illegal for us to just give you beta 1.3. I understand that you're not happy with 1.4, but I should remind you that the moderating staff are NOT affiliated with Mojang. Take it to Mojang support, not to the MCforums staff. We can't do anything about your game.
When you bought the game, you bought it in full understanding that you were not to distribute it. DO NOT DISTRIBUTE MINECRAFT. That is the one major rule.
I'll quote what the above user said:
Quote from SoloDev »
Ok, my 2 cents.
Dont put the needed minecraft files up on another site, say, hotfile, rapidshare, mediafire, etc...
When you bought your account you agreed to it. it's on the page with it. It is implied, if not said. get over it.
How to revert back down a version? pure simplicity, if you can think ahead for 5 seconds.
Log in. See the "Update" screen... CLOSE THE WINDOW. Just exit out totally.
go to your .mincecraft folder.
rename the /bin folder, say, like, /bin-1.3_02 . Really.
start up minecraft. Choose "Options" button. enable the full re-download.
Log in. Get the new files. It will be your current /bin folder now.
Congrats, you now have a local archive of the previous version (with whatever mods you may have had) AND the new version!
Seriously, all it takes is 5 seconds of thought and common sense. It's what i did, and with some simple folder renaming i can flop between 1.3 and 1.4.
If your going to use the excuse "But i use the old launcher" then fine, your inability to wait 5 seconds extra due to the launcher getting the tumblr page, then it's your bad for being impatient and a moron. The new launcher was released for a good reason, several actually. Use It.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
[12:41] Coffeeeeeee!
---
[16:29] "And lo, the tacos were delicious"
I really don't understand why mojang doesn't allow us to do this in the first place... I mean, as long as I bought Minecraft, why the hell would i not be able to play in a older version? WHy is this rule here in the first place? Weird, I hope Notch either cahnges it or justifies it in the future.
You are actually wrong here. As there is nothing listed on the web page that says your paying for a license, but I can see where your confused as this is the standard way most developers like Microsoft and apple work. His site quite clearly states that you are not allowed to redistribute the game even after you have modified it. I am not trying to say your wrong in that you are allowed to redistribute only that purchase of the game is not a license. Earlier before the site was updated it actually was in there that you are buying the game and its yours, just that you are not allowed to redistribute.
What in essence that your buying is an account from the game developer to unlock the exe file that you download from there site. So unlike when you go buy say like an xbox and you want to sell it to someone else you can give them the system, this method prevents you from doing that.
P.S. Just in case anyone is wondering about jailbreaks on consumer electronics it is perfectly legal as there is no law that prevents you from modifying your own hardware. Remember that once you buy "hardware" from anyone it is now your property and the seller has no rights to take it away or even punish you from hacking any part of it. This is why modchips are not illegal and only the bios that runs them is. This is contrary to what the big boxers what you to think, Microsoft, Sony, Apple , etc......
I have been lost in the nether for a few days now.......
Trigger-happy ex DOJ employee here lol.
Yes, sounds like a good idea. I can't really understand why they don't already do so, because it can't really hurt Mojang in any way, but by not doing may annoy members of the minecraft community.
But Mojang sorted that issue out by giving you the option to update or not and the ability to easily access your files to back them up. If they were to host previous versions of Minecraft on the website then the loading experience would most likely be slower, with Minecraft.net having more downtime.
No, that's pretty much what he's saying.
It can't be both ways. Either it's a license, or he can't specify what you do with the software after you've purchased it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine
Of course, the point of this thread is that people are distributing the .jar files on these particular forums. Even if it were not explicitly against the forum rules, how stupid can people be? :smile.gif:
The fact that you need an account to legally download the game software *IS* a form of DRM. On top of that, he uses obfuscated code. Modifications without explicit permission are DMCA violations by themselves, whether or not the software is further distributed.
Are we going to see a giant RIAA style crackdown and mass of lawsuits? Of course not.
No need unless you're giving legal advice, and no one in this thread is. Only thing people need to stop discussing are things about which they are either wrong, or simply do not understand. All of the relevant laws can be found on government sites using Google, but no one seems to want to read.
This here is the most important point, of course.
Yeah basically this.
The other problem as well is that whats law in one place is not the law in another. For instance the DMCA works one way in the US, but different in another country. And it gets even wierder when countries try to "long-arm" their laws outside of their borders (I'm looking at you america!)
The gist of most copyight laws however generally follow a few principles;-
1) You own the media
2) You don't own the intellectual property. (Ie, you might own the disk, but not the data on it that you purchased)
3) However an IP owner can grant you permissions to use his intellectual property within the bounds laid out in a licence
4) But if those are not explained, then you must assume the copyright laws are the rules in force. This generally means no you can't copy to someone else that game you purchased without permission.
Theres other bits and pieces like fair use, but sadly outside of the basics above, these vary wildly from juristiction to juristiction.
Your best bet in working out what you should know about copyright law is to look up your own countries version of groups like electronic frontiers who will tell you the basics of the more complicated bits (as well as why some of these laws are just plain nutso)
There is one thing people need to understand though. Just because Notch might not have asserted copyright early in the piece, doesnt mean you can flout it. Most countries are signatories to something called the Berne convention that means that even if the IP is not registered or asserted, it still exists.
Some other things people need to remember
1) Just because something is offered freely , doesnt mean it aint violating. The price of an object might determine damages, but it wont determine guilt except in some very edge case determinations of fair-use.
2) Fair use is complicated! Look up both your local laws , and US laws on whats acceptable as fair use. Copying a whole article into a forum post generally is NOT fair use. Excerpting a paragraph and attributing it for further discussion, generally IS. But heres the fun party: This might not be true in your country! It could be better, it could be worse!
3) Copyright is NOT trademark NOR patent. Don't think that in depth article you read about one of these concepts applies in any way to one of the others. Trademarks apply to things like names and markings. Copyright covers works of art or science or code or whatever. Patents cover implementable ideas. Don't confuse em!
4) Copyright violation is a crime AND a civil violation. If your done for a criminal charge, its easier to defend, but you can go to jail! If your sued, its a bit harder to defend (more relaxed standard of evidence, usually 'balance of odds') but you wont go to jail (but you might lose your stuff!) Oh and sometimes you can be done both ways. This is known in legal terminology as "you just got screwed badly son".
5) Maps and music have really heavy and wierd copyright attached to them.Not 100% relevant here, but you should be aware of that.
IANAL, so don't take this as "advice". I'm just a shmoe who once worked for the government and my opinion is of no weight at all.
The people who run the forums have said that sharing links to older versions of the game is against the forum rules. This being a oligarchy, their word is law within the confines of the forum.
So it doesn't matter what the real world law may or may not be. Post a link here to an older version and you get banned. It's that simple.
They do but only for your own use. Meaning that you are allowed to create a backup copy of the software, but you cannot share that backup with another person.
It should be ok too post up the .jar!
The thing is useless by itself!!!
Therefore, even if you download it, you still need to buy an account before playing.
(Although you actually can launch the game without logging in with MCPatcher by clicking test minecraft)
Sheesh, who doesn't want to revert to like Infdev or something?
**** you!
Moving on to the forum terms. By all means the community working these forums has already stated that they will agree with the rule of not sharing minecraft files (particularly key .jar files). A rule that this forums has that ALL users should understand is that they have asked nicely (with consequences just in case) that you too agree not to share minecraft files on the website. It doesn't matter if you are hosting it yourself or just providing a link to it, don't do it. Now, the MinecraftForums.net and Mojang themselves are by no means an internet police force there to search out and stop all cases of these files being shared throughout the internet.
I do not support downloading minecraft files, I know many people on these forums agree with me (I have quietly read their posts). I also found that when my downloader updated to 1.4 it actaully left a backup file for me named minecraft 1.3_01.jar which i renamed minecraft.jar and boom.... I was returned to the previous version. Now users should not expect something like this to just happen. I recommend making a backup of what version of minecraft you have. Again, I am not the first person to suggest making a backup, but I completely agree.
To the users making direct remarks to the U.S. copyright:
Again, you also agreed to the Minecraft terms of service when you created your account and bought the game.
One final note. I can understand many users requesting an archives database for older version on Minecraft, mostly for playing in SMP reasons. This is not the best place to be posting that. Ask it somewhere that a Mojang employee is more likely to read it. I am sure if you do a little working you can find a place where you can put that as a suggestion.
Good Day Community!
(Don't copy my rig! It's old and you will be sad)
Some day I will upgrade to Ryzen!
You agreed to the terms when you made a profile for the forums. Not distributing the files was one of those terms... doesn't matter if you actually read the print when you agreed, doesn't matter if you didn't. You agreed or else you wouldn't have a profile on here.
Just don't do it.
Simple as that.
Dont put the needed minecraft files up on another site, say, hotfile, rapidshare, mediafire, etc...
When you bought your account you agreed to it. it's on the page with it. It is implied, if not said. get over it.
How to revert back down a version? pure simplicity, if you can think ahead for 5 seconds.
Log in. See the "Update" screen... CLOSE THE WINDOW. Just exit out totally.
go to your .mincecraft folder.
rename the /bin folder, say, like, /bin-1.3_02 . Really.
start up minecraft. Choose "Options" button. enable the full re-download.
Log in. Get the new files. It will be your current /bin folder now.
Congrats, you now have a local archive of the previous version (with whatever mods you may have had) AND the new version!
Seriously, all it takes is 5 seconds of thought and common sense. It's what i did, and with some simple folder renaming i can flop between 1.3 and 1.4.
If your going to use the excuse "But i use the old launcher" then fine, your inability to wait 5 seconds extra due to the launcher getting the tumblr page, then it's your bad for being impatient and a moron. The new launcher was released for a good reason, several actually. Use It.
When you bought the game, you bought it in full understanding that you were not to distribute it. DO NOT DISTRIBUTE MINECRAFT. That is the one major rule.
I'll quote what the above user said:
[12:41] Coffeeeeeee!
---
[16:29] "And lo, the tacos were delicious"