On Thursday 25 March 2004 03:25, Arnt Karlsen wrote: > On Thu, 25 Mar 2004 01:47:14 +0100, > "Oliver C." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message > > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > > On Thursday 25 March 2004 00:28, Curtis L. Olson wrote: > > > I think this issue is way overblown. People have been modeling real > > > liveries and buildings in flight sims from day one. If we go down > > > this road, we will have copyright problems with Cessna for modeling > > > a c172, problems with Boeing for modeling a 747 > > ..really? Look at SCO vs IBM etc cans of worms over at Groklaw and try > figure out whether or not case law _has_ Cessna and Boeing owning their > plane designs by the end of this next presidental term. > Microsoft _does_ have the money to do it. > > > > I don't think we should spend too much > > > energy solving non-existant problems. > > ..agreed, and you guys are always welcome over here, should the need > arise. > > > I only wanted to express that we should not provoke the law when it > > is not necessary. Like it is the case when texturing airplanes. > > Take a look at Microsofts FS2004 they don't use real airline names > > on their airplanes either. > > ..no??? I _can_ see a few strategies behind _that_ move. > > > In other words, when we want to simulate a Boeing 747 we have no other > > chance to model such one, but when we want to > > make the Boeing 747 look good and realistiv we don't need to call > > that one Lufthansa. > > ..the best way is to ask the owners of whatever we wanna model. > Worst case, they say no, and then we just abide, and avoid those > Nigerian 419 kinda US lawsuits. On filing a lawsuit, the plaintiff has > to sell a viable story to the effect that there _is_ a case.
This could really become a problem, and not just for flightsim developers. Does anyone remember the issues about the Eiffel Tower lighting? The Co. that has done the lighting for it has apparently put a restriction on anyone displaying photographs of the lighting, citing copyright, iirc. It's not so far from that to an aicraft manufacturer deciding that their designs can only be represented with their permission, either pictorially or in the form of a model. I'm not sure that we need to worry about M$ buying up all the licences though. M$ only supply a tiny amount of the aircraft available for their FS products - the vast majority are supplied by individual free-ware and pay-ware developers, supported by a relatively small number of add-on companies. Perhaps M$ might try to negotiate a licence on behalf of their users and third-party devlopers, but that would be a bit monopolistic, I'd have thought. Something to keep an eye on... LeeE _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel
