Posted under General
would anything yukkuri count as a part of ZUN's intellectual property? Also is this site hosted in the US? Because if both of the above are true posting pictures here might be considered a felony according to Bill S.978 unless we get specific permission from ZUN to do so.
Sorry if this is just me being paranoid but even if it doesn't include this stuff that bill is something to be looked into anyway since it is worded so badly. (In my opinion anyway)
Updated by Tea
There's many more artwork that profits off zun's works. Touhou doujins being sold in comiket in particular... along with "unauthorized" figurines and whatnot.
This is a free site, so I wouldn't worry about it. They have much bigger fish to go after than a site that's dedicated to a meme.
Ok glad to hear that. Makes this slightly whole thing slightly "less" disturbing to me
Legally, we're all screwed.
Practically, as long as no one is stupid enough to share personal information or goes around pissing off the wrong people, we'll be fine.
To quote someone else commenting about that bill:
"I wish people would just calm down about this bill. If you go and actually read the full text of bill S.978 and absorb what it actually says you will see that it's limited by sections 107 of title 17, it says so very clearly. In layman's terms ...{this}... will still be protected by fair use even if the bill does pass.
Now enough with the histeria already lol"
Explosion said:
To quote someone else commenting about that bill:"I wish people would just calm down about this bill. If you go and actually read the full text of bill S.978 and absorb what it actually says you will see that it's limited by sections 107 of title 17, it says so very clearly. In layman's terms ...{this}... will still be protected by fair use even if the bill does pass.
Now enough with the histeria already lol"
Except Reimu, Marisa and the other characters we use are all clearly referenced/based on the original Touhou characters. Fair use is laughably weak when "Marisa uses Dosu Spark" compared to "Kirisame Marisa uses Master Spark". (Bodied yukkuris are practically the community shooting itself in the head with a shotgun)
Fair Use is very, very, very hard to argue if you're not using it for educational purposes.
"Fair use" has most of its connotation behind profiting off the works. As long as you're not selling this stuff its hard to get people to care enough to hire a lawyer, especially when they won't get any money.
In the states you're liable to be sued for anything and everything anyways. I would worry more about trolls and translators not finishing your favorite series.
Except even if you're not profiting off the works, "fair use" is rarely accepted as a valid legal defense. Worse still is that, in "fair use", the DEFENDANT has to prove that his/her use was "fair". Since all of the work is re-posted from other sources, OYP would lose by default.
Really, "fair use" is the defense of last resort. If you're honestly trying to use it in a blatantly infringing case such as OYP (which actually has the "normal" Touhou characters in some pictures) you have no idea what you're talking about.
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-s978/show
OpenCongress Summary
Makes unauthorized web streaming of copyrighted content a felony with a possible penalty of up to 5 years in prison. Illegal streaming of copyrighted content is defined in the bill as an offense that "consists of 10 or more public performances by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copyrighted works" and has a total economic value, either to the copyright holder or the infringer, of at least $2,500.
Ummm... that has nothing to do with anything here. This place isn't showing footage of touhou games. The site is a repository of touhou meme based art(big emphasis on the art part and what the implies). If you're talking copyright infringement in general then I have to wonder why you'd worry about it now or at all. Nobody but disney really goes after fanworks that are non-profit. On top of which the subject in question is a japanese product made by an independant developer that to my knowledge has no holdings and/or been localized to the US meaning there's a mountain of international laws to go through first.
Short story: only Zun himself has the ability and final say so to sue or shut down this place or any other with touhou fan art sites and since his work is heavily fan driven it's a snowball's chance in hell that'll happen as long as it stays benign to the series and non-profit.
Also: http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-a.html
Fair use is far more than just "educational purposes". The only reason its a "weak defense" is because corporations have a lot more money and lawyers to throw around to bend the interpretation to their favor than the individuals they're sueing.
Either way this bill has no effect on the site here and any copyright fuckery is never going to happen so calm down people.
Explosion said:
Ummm... that has nothing to do with anything here. This place isn't showing footage of touhou games. The site is a repository of touhou meme based art(big emphasis on the art part and what the implies). If you're talking copyright infringement in general then I have to wonder why you'd worry about it now or at all. Nobody but disney really goes after fanworks that are non-profit. On top of which the subject in question is a japanese product made by an independant developer that to my knowledge has no holdings and/or been localized to the US meaning there's a mountain of international laws to go through first.
Just because YOU say its art, doesn't mean the courts say its art. And SquareEnix, Nintendo, EA and Activision have a brutal history of going after non-profit fan works. Just because it doesn't make the front page headlines doesn't mean companies aren't crushing non-profit works in the background.
Oh and way to not read your own quote.
Illegal streaming of copyrighted content is defined in the bill as an offense that "consists of 10 or more public performances by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copyrighted works" and has a total economic value, either to the copyright holder or the infringer, of at least $2,500.
Lets see:
I think this site caters to more than 10 people during any 180-day period and infringes on 1 or more copyrighted works. I'm damned sure the entire Touhou cast is a pretty valuable piece of copyright to ZUN in excess of $2,500.
Well in the unlikely case this indeed becomes a problem for the yukkuri community, would moving the hosting to non-American servers suffice? Or are you American yu-fans/yu-artists still criminals after that.
It's unlikely that anything would happen even if it were passed; and it's unlikely to be passed at all. This is not the first time they've tried this, and it won't be the last. The basic purpose behind this bill is that the big content companies, who can afford to buy Congresspeople, are trying to offload the cost of their legal departments onto the DOJ (cause lawsuits are expensive) and they most likely haven't bought enough Congresspeople (yet) to get past the fact that that would mean even more spending, taking money away from better (better == more politically popular) uses, etc.
ParticleMan said:
Well in the unlikely case this indeed becomes a problem for the yukkuri community, would moving the hosting to non-American servers suffice? Or are you American yu-fans/yu-artists still criminals after that.
I'm sure we have several Russian friends among us somewhere.
Explosion said:
Either way this bill has no effect on the site here and any copyright fuckery is never going to happen so calm down people.