Eternl_Knight opened this issue on Mar 18, 2005 ยท 216 posts
Eternl_Knight posted Fri, 18 March 2005 at 7:36 AM
There are two issues at question here. First is the copyright issue and the second the contractual "EULA" issue. Both need to be conosidered in light of these events. First, as far as copyrights go - DAZ reserves the right to stop any clothing content for their figures being distributed. First because one needs the JP's and secondly (though a more tenuous position) - one needs to base the clothing around the shape of said figure. So if you happen to make clothing that competes with one of their products - you're screwed. Same goes with textures as you NEED to use their figures to get these right (either by using a UV template or by painting directly on the mesh). The second issue, and this is alot scarier, is the EULA terms. There is a clause in there that stops anyone who has agreed to it (and that is anyone who has installed V3 which I'm guessing is 90% of the folks here) that you cannot create & distribute models that are "substantially similar" to any you have installed. This means that if you have installed V3, the Dragon, whatever and create something they classify as "substantially similar" - they are within their rights to get you to pull it from distribution (free or sold). Think about that, if one installs their new oriental dragon - one cannot really create another oriental ragon for distribution without DAZ knocking on your door (or at least reserving the right to if your model is more successful than theirs). Do I sound like I have an agenda? Well, yes I do. I don't want to see others fall into the legal quagmire created by DAZ as Sixus1 and others have (yes, there are others that have suffered from this problem!). And it doesn't matter what DAZ says "verbally" about all this either - what matters in court is what is written in that contract (the EULA). And that contract is not weighted in our favour... So while they can "say" they won't pursue us over textures, clothing, etc - it means jack-diddly until they put that text into the EULA we need to agree to before installing their products. And if you think that's asking too much - have a look at the Poser 5 EULA. It specifies exactly that - that one is entitled to use their "restricted content" (the figures, props, etc) for the purposes of making clothing, supporting textures, etc.