Business from exchanging video games
nons...@mynonsense.net
Can I setup a website to facilitate people to exchange video games
with each other? If I charge them for the service, am I violating any
type of copyright/distribution laws?
Scott Jensen
Unless you own the copyrights to those games or those rights have
expired, it would be illegal ... in the US.
Scott Jensen
nons...@mynonsense.net
> Unless you own the copyrights to those games or those rights
> have expired, it would be illegal ... in the US.
Can you explain why? If I own something and a friend owns something,
what is wrong with us exchanging our items with each other and paying
a middleman who helped us find each other?
Mark T.B. Carroll
I can't off-hand think of any that you would be violating; after all,
people resell video games all the time. However, I would certainly
suggest checking what the industry-standard practices are (e.g., for
things like eBay) for making sure you are adequately covered against
negligently enabling criminal enterprise (handling stolen goods or
whatever) or some sort of conspiracy, just in case one of your customers
engages in wrongdoing (piracy, whatever) and you get named as a party in
the lawsuit with the suggestion you were happy to profit off such acts
instead of prevent them. Of course, there are issues like: do people
always have the right to resell games that they have in hand? (E.g.,
what if it came bundled with the computer at time of sale? Are there
Microsoft-Windows-like OEM licenses with some such games?) What do you
do about minors buying games with high age ratings? I don't know if
there's any legal duty, but there's also the matter of PR. Also, what
about very valuable video games? What are the tax reporting
requirements; are there any from your side? Especially when the trade
was of unequal value. There are also more far-out thoughts: e.g., what
about `explicit' games being mailed to conservative countries? So, while
it seems to me that such a website should be quite possible, some
competent investigation of the legal and tax issues (perhaps starting by
investigating terms and conditions of sites where used video games can
be resold) might be worthwhile just in case there's a minefield. After
all, the intellectual property people are all for `fair use' being
construed narrowly enough that one's intuition about what one can do
with things one bought don't always apply.
Mark
JLH
Scott Jensen wrote:
Are you sure? There is/was at least one national computer game retail
chain that bought used games and resold them in their stores in the
U.S. I think it was Cabbage (sp-?). I do not have proof, but I assume
that the retailer did not own the copyrights. And what about eBay's
operations?
I suppose what's bothering me in your statement is: what's the
difference between the model in which one person buys and sells used
game titles and the other in which a middleman is collecting a fee for
matching a buyer and seller of the product? Both processes result in
the exchange of the game between two parties with money changing hands.
I seem to recall reading that, so long as the seller hands over the
media and manuals to the buyer and does not keep any backup copies for
themself, licensed materials could be transferred from one party to
another. Why would one model be legal and the other illegal?
On the other hand, I can see where the brokerage operation itself might
be illegal depending upon how laws in the U.S. states are interpreted.
John Howland
Scott Jensen
Read up on copyright laws. This has been covered by far greater and
better legal experts (which I am not) than me. It is all over the
net. Simply google it.
Scott Jensen
Jim Logajan
It appears there is some small bit of ambiguity. If the exchange involves a
single copy on a single physical medium, then I don't see any problem. The
physical medium has to be exchanged - no upload/download via the net. It
would probably be analogous to being a broker/marketplace for people who
want to exchange used books. On the other hand, if the video game software
is copied such that it exists on two or more physical entities, then you
might be considered to be facilitating copyright theft. It would be
analogous to people scanning their books and you providing an online
service to trade those scanned images. You'd be in deep dung.
At first blush, your proposal appears to be analogous to services that
allowed users to "exchange" music via online sharing sites. Boy, did that
generate a lot of legal battles! I wouldn't advise going that route! But if
your plan is simply to facilitate exchange of physical media then I don't
see a problem. You just need to be very careful that people understand what
is expected of them. And under no circumstances should you host a server
that allows any uploading or downloading - not unless you have money to
spend on lawyers.
All in my very humble opinion.
nons...@mynonsense.net
One site that is already doing it and is US based and seems somewhat
successful is:
Mark T.B. Carroll
Jim Logajan <Jam...@lugoj.com> writes:
> It appears there is some small bit of ambiguity. If the exchange involves a
> single copy on a single physical medium, then I don't see any problem. The
> physical medium has to be exchanged - no upload/download via the net.
Jim - Thank you very much for pointing out this ambiguity! I had
completely missed it. My response had only the physical medium case
in mind.
Mark