Adam, your post came in during my post. There was no need to mention the 1.99 packages because they are not going to happen. Like the new paragraph states in the upload screen, artists will be contacted for permission. No artists have been contacted so no art will be sold.
Good, and yes, I will replace Emil's and Mop's email with yours in my forum leader contact list. The last update was about the 26th of January pre-domwar team champions. They are already done:)
With lesson's learned, I just want to get back to running a darn challenge. I'll continue to visit here now and then to answer any future questions.
How is that a misunderstanding on Polycount's part though? Isn't it you misunderstanding what the art community as a whole would be okay with? I'm just not sure why Polycount is singled out when other sites did the same 'expose.'
If you consider acknowledging the 'add on' feature as a mistake - Do you also acknowledge saying “Yup, this might make a few artists angry… but, not my problem.”?
I would never consider 'Why not?' a valid answer for anything. So, why continue to expand in the same direction knowing full well that it has lead to problems in the past? Sure, you can see it as a personal challenge or something, but if you actually are going to try and juggle a job like you're saying - wouldn't that just add way more of a burden than needed? I don't recall anyone equating more people to keep track of to 'fun.'
What does it take to qualify as a DW5 organizer? (you mentioned no one qualified)
Prizes aren't my main concern - but - how did some get Cintiqs and others didn't? I'm curious what that process was and how some seemingly vanished. I get that you're saying shipping and organizing a bunch of different international mailing addresses is a huge pain in the ass, fine, but how do some participants get it and others don't? did you just stop halfway?
Will your changes help the judging process at all or will it all be left to public votes?
How is that a misunderstanding on Polycount's part though? Isn't it you misunderstanding what the art community as a whole would be okay with? I'm just not sure why Polycount is singled out when other sites did the same 'expose.'
If you consider acknowledging the 'add on' feature as a mistake - Do you also acknowledge saying Yup, this might make a few artists angry but, not my problem.?
I would never consider 'Why not?' a valid answer for anything. So, why continue to expand in the same direction knowing full well that it has lead to problems in the past? Sure, you can see it as a personal challenge or something, but if you actually are going to try and juggle a job like you're saying - wouldn't that just add way more of a burden than needed? I don't recall anyone equating more people to keep track of to 'fun.'
What does it take to qualify as a DW5 organizer? (you mentioned no one qualified)
Prizes aren't my main concern - but - how did some get Cintiqs and others didn't? I'm curious what that process was and how some seemingly vanished. I get that you're saying shipping and organizing a bunch of different international mailing addresses is a huge pain in the ass, fine, but how do some participants get it and others don't? did you just stop halfway?
Will your changes help the judging process at all or will it all be left to public votes?
This man asks all the questions as if he were my own tongue.
Gav - Fun for me means, if I like doing it, I do it. Artists always try to surpass themselves with their art. I on the other hand, do it with art challenges.
polycount was singled out because they posted a DW logo with dollar signs behind it and revealed a personal private email.
Only two cintiqs were given. One for the 3d champion, and one for the 2d champion. Even the 2d champion, all the way in Fuzhou China, got his. The remainder of the tablets were medium intuos tablets. These too, have all been delivered. Please feel free to email any of the winners and ask them if they got their tablets.
What does it take to qualify as an organizer? The desire to want to run an event for other forums and publicize them and their artists with the best of that organizer's talents. Also, to successfully conclude the challenge. There is a lot more, like html design, scripting, coordination and stuff, but the single most important attribute remains as - Desire to want to do it and keep doing it.
The changes for judging actually is an awesome idea that came from here, from jacque choi I think. Other than speeding up the process and letting artists see and vote on final finished work immediately, it also highlights artists as team's best. This is actually better than a top 75 page. Being a team best looks better on a resume. For instance and example, bogdan as team best for polycount, looks better than being in a pool of 75 entries. So, yes, the changes will help, legitify, simplify, speedup, and make better, the judging process.
You should stop, like, now. Read this: http://www.cls.yale.edu/page.asp?file=2/168
And srsly, digital is a legit medium; it is not necessary to put the definition in legal documents; they also cover media to be invented in the future. Just stop it.
Hi Fred!
Let me first just make this very important point before I say anything else:
Copyright was a law born about 500 years ago when the printing press was invented. It was feared that people would print seditious books against the church and monarchy, so they made it illegal for anyone but government approved publishers (stationers) to print books the government had approved for printing. That's the law our copyright act is based on. A law that censors publications. It made the stationers rich. And they lied to government that it protects authors so they could get the law renewed. That said, here's the rest of my response:
There is no such thing as Intellectual Property as far as the Copyright Act is concerned or any other law for that matter. It's a fake word made up by people that want to extend the power of copyright to keep their monopoly on ideas and Yale is a private school that is not above being reproach to spread propaganda. The page on Yale is lying. You can search the entire text of the copyright act and not find one iota of language referring to or granting any form of property rights to any copyrightable works. Copyright is NOT a property right. It is a legal, temporary, government granted monopoly given to those that create art as an incentive to create more art. That is all it is. You have no property rights over non-physical representations of art in any way. I've been researching, discussing, debating, and learning what it is really all about and I can tell you with absolute certainty that you have no legal claim of ownership to any idea you come up with. You have distribution rights over it and you have the right to exploit the works, but you do not own the idea that inspired it. I cannot be any more clear than that.
Kaptainkenals:
You are mistaken, there is no legal definition of theft (as in US criminal law) that would convict anyone of theft if they were to take a copy of someone's work. By definition set by the law it is not theft. The dictionary definition pertains to the colloquial definition of theft, not the legal one. To be considered theft by the definition of law, property must taken which deprives the owner of possession. Copying a work does not satisfy that definition, which is why copyright infringement cases are tried in civil court. IP does not exist as a term in any law pertaining to copyright works.
EarthQuake:
That is the US Patent and Trademark Office. It grants temporary monopolies on inventions, not ideas. Again, there is no law granting ownership of an idea.
Ok, if you all want to claim that IP and ownership of ideas is real, I hereby claim ownership of any representation of a blue duck on a pink pond. It's my idea and I own it. Do you see how stupid that is? That's what you're claiming is your right. That's the kind of extreme the publisher's would go to if they had such a right. They act too much like that already. If we let such a farce of a law like that to exist, nobody would create new works, because all of the ideas would be owned and there are no 100% original ideas. All art is derivative of what came before it. Without that, we would not have much art, or any at all.
What are you afraid losing by admitting that copyright is not a property right and that ideas cannot be owned? Man, Thomas Jefferson would slap you all for saying ideas are property.
Which reminds me. If you won't take my word for it, take his:
[FONT=verdana, helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property." - Thomas Jefferson
And thus, they made certain that ideas could not be property. Had that been true, we wouldn't need copyright.
I think I've said as much as I can as clearly and factually as I possibly can. If you still think I'm wrong, then I'm sorry you don't have the courage question conventions and find the truth for yourselves. I was hoping in a forum of artists I would find a few enlightened individuals that would take interest in learning what copyright is really all about (or at least not take the "You're wrong! Stop talking!" stance), but those of you who responded don't seem to want change the way things are. You're happy with a handful of corporations hoarding our culture and selling it back to us piecemeal.
polycount was singled out because they posted a DW logo with dollar signs behind it and revealed a personal private email.
Ah, so some weird attempt at revenge for bringing awareness to a change in context to rules/agreements for a competition in regards to those that participated after the fact...got ya. Classy.
SO every court case that has ever been handled someone suing over copy write infringement...the lawyers and judges and so forth got it wrong...or are they in on it?
SO every court case that has ever been handled someone suing over copy write infringement...the lawyers and judges and so forth got it wrong...or are they in on it?
That makes not sense whatsoever. The courts never ruled on copyrights as property. They ruled on them as rights to distribution and exploitation of protected works as it is stated in the copyright act. When the RIAA took Jamie Thomas to court over those 24 songs on Kazaa, it was their clients' copyrights they were defending, not property. If you distribute works that are protected (any new works are automatically protected) without permission, you are violating someone's right to choose whom may receive copies.
You're right to say you can't copyright or own "an idea". Usually. You can as you noted patent inventions, which are sort of like ideas, but it's not all-encompassing to ideas of any sort. I can draw a picture of a red frog jumping over a farmhouse, and while I do then have the rights to that picture - someone else could just as well paint their own image of a red frog jumping over a farmhouse. That is correct.
Your little rant about Intellectual Property not technically existing, and copyright not equaling a property right - that's just silly. It matters not if IP's listed in the copyright act. The phrase "pocket watch" probably isn't in there either, but its meaning is still there. A word or phrase is only as viable as people acknowledge it to be, and the term intellectual property has been used for a long, long time - both among the general populace, as well as the courthouse. "Made up" or not. Hell, years ago "lol" didn't mean anything and now you see it all over the place. We've even had a judge use the word "trolling" to describe someone's actions! Point being...arguing over that, is stupid.
And while you may not have "property rights" over a digital image, again, you're arguing words. Words are relative, who gives a shit. You can still take someone to court for using one of your works without your permission, especially if they're making money off of it. This is generally considered "stealing" or "theft", and depending on where you get your definition from - it would be accurate. You're looking for your definition in a law book, others - from a dictionary. Which one is right or wrong is completely and utterly relative and again, it's foolish to argue about it. I really don't see the point.
You're right to say you can't copyright or own "an idea". Usually. You can as you noted patent inventions, which are sort of like ideas, but it's not all-encompassing to ideas of any sort. I can draw a picture of a red frog jumping over a farmhouse, and while I do then have the rights to that picture - someone else could just as well paint their own image of a red frog jumping over a farmhouse. That is correct.
Your little rant about Intellectual Property not technically existing, and copyright not equaling a property right - that's just silly. It matters not if IP's listed in the copyright act. The phrase "pocket watch" probably isn't in there either, but its meaning is still there. A word or phrase is only as viable as people acknowledge it to be, and the term intellectual property has been used for a long, long time - both among the general populace, as well as the courthouse. "Made up" or not. Hell, years ago "lol" didn't mean anything and now you see it all over the place. We've even had a judge use the word "trolling" to describe someone's actions! Point being...arguing over that, is stupid.
And while you may not have "property rights" over a digital image, again, you're arguing words. Words are relative, who gives a shit. You can still take someone to court for using one of your works without your permission, especially if they're making money off of it. This is generally considered "stealing" or "theft", and depending on where you get your definition from - it would be accurate. You're looking for your definition in a law book, others - from a dictionary. Which one is right or wrong is completely and utterly relative and again, it's foolish to argue about it. I really don't see the point.
Nevertheless, property law does not cover creative works. It only covers physical property. So, the canvas and paint you used to make a painting is protected. The digital photo you took of it is not. There is no law that grants the right to "intellectual property". It is a tool control public opinion and strengthen their position. Those that created the first copyright law were careful to not allow that. If you can present me with a US law that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that creative works are property, I will concede my position.
All that aside though, it's not a good thing. That means that the big publishers get to own the majority of popular works and anyone that wants to advance the arts by deriving works from those, are going to be slapped down by copyright. It's a hinderance to the advancement of the useful arts. A complete contradiction to the underlying principles that copyright was created for.
Ah, so some weird attempt at revenge for bringing awareness to a change in context to rules/agreements for a competition in regards to those that participated after the fact...got ya. Classy.
I don't think this is helping the matter, but, I will answer anyways. Resigning and giving up is not revenge, it's simply giving up and wanting out. As for bringing awareness to a matter, cgsociety and cghub did the same, but they did not reveal personal emails with quotes, make a flashy banner, or make suggestions of "offering your work for sale to line [my] pockets" and much more.
I don't think this is helping the matter, but, I will answer anyways. Resigning and giving up is not revenge, it's simply giving up and wanting out. As for bringing awareness to a matter, cgsociety and cghub did the same, but they did not reveal personal emails with quotes, make a flashy banner, or make suggestions of "offering your work for sale to line [my] pockets" and much more.
I would imagine that if we didn't have a veteran history with Dominance War/GA like we do our post would have been the same as CGHUB and CGSociety. It was subjective, but at the time it was felt it needed to be said.
Moving on, a lot of people are happy to see theres a challenge/contest happening and thats what matters now.
Nevertheless, property law does not cover creative works. It only covers physical property. So, the canvas and paint you used to make a painting is protected. The digital photo you took of it is not. There is no law that grants the right to "intellectual property".
Just for the record - while I noted before I think arguing the terms is stupid, there are shit tons of laws that grant the right to Intellectual Property. We have government offices that work towards guaranteeing people those rights. We have many laws in which IP is explicitly mentioned. Including our Copyright Law of the United States. (I encountered it actually on the first segment I read, Chapter 1, many, many times.)
You have distribution rights over it and you have the right to exploit the works, but you do not own the idea that inspired it. I cannot be any more clear than that.
[/SIZE][/FONT]
Isn't this the entire point? Copyright = the exclusive right to copy something. (as far as I know, don't know legal defenitions, but it's kind of in the name). I agree with you that owning an idea would be pretty stupid, but distributing someone else's work and making money off it without their permission would be illegal. Right? IMO that's the entire thing, you don't own the idea, but you do own the exclusive rights to that (digital or not) piece of art. So if someone publishes your art you get to say: hey I have the exclusive right to publishing that art! GTFO!
But I don't know wether I'm adding anything to the debate, don't know a thing about American law.
Wooo, that ignore user list feature is indeed handy!
Haha. Genius.
Copyright is boring as hell. Back to DW, so how's the judging going to work, is it public voting to decide the top 75 and then go to professional judging. I would prefer this than an all public vote as judges comments are very important and leaves forum politics at the door where popularity rules over artistic execution. After seeing comicon judging I think judges should have voted on atleast the top 10 as if everyones only got 5 selections then the same 5 artists will pop up and now and then a new entry gets a vote and elevates them in the standings drastically. If theres a top 10 then the judges should vote top 10, I think only one judge did top 10 for comicon which is how it should be done to be fair. Not slagging off the judges as they dud their jobs brilliantly but I think a top 10 selection should have been put in for fairness.
I've never been a fan of public voting, it's good for minis where the results aren't so important but on big events I think pro judging is needed. Might be a hassle to setup but it means the judging is fair as professionals can single out brilliant execution over 'that looks pretty' mentality
Copyright is boring as hell. Back to DW, so how's the judging going to work, is it public voting to decide the top 75 and then go to professional judging.
How would you suggest the public voting work though, obviously ranking someones top five would not work to weed out 75 submissions. I like the idea of a public vote to narrow the selection for the final judges, but I can't see an efficient way of doing it. Having people rank each piece on a scale would probably be the most meaningful, but that would take hours for every person who wished to be involved.
For instance and example, bogdan as team best for polycount,
leaked info?...I think so. He deserves it. Lets hope he can take top spot.
This thread is getting silly now. Copyright law. Come on. Whether something is legal or not is matterless. Use common sense. Its wrong to take others stuff, including ideas.
It's evident that greevar either doesn't or can't read:
Copyright protects the manner in which an author expresses a fact or an idea.
IP is from the execution of the idea. My idea of a sexy vampire with a massive sniper rifle - it's just an idea, it's not IP, the moment I execute it, that execution is my IP, someone else can do a similar idea, but executed completely differently - the IP's will differ, and belong to their respective authors.
It has nothing to do with the medium.
IP protects artists, what the artist does with his IP is up to him, so if u want to give it away for free, so be it, but some people need their rights to make a living.
And your examples of people making a living off their "free" artwork, still their IP, it's their choice how they use it.
That said, I see no point lowering myself any further.
There are some problems with public voting. Public voting is great becaise artists from various forums can vote and offer unbiased votes, so the top best for a team truly deserve to be the top best. However, there are occasions when an entry that should have made the top best, got denied because a forum’s participant rate was 15 entries or under. (meaning, if a forum has 105 entries, they get 9 entries that move into the finals [3 entries for 15 base, plus 1 per 15 additional thereafter], so if a forum has 'only' 15 entries, but 5 awesome entries deserve to go to the finals, the 2 extra must be chopped unless a personal vouch is made for the extra entries). To compensate, I must personally go in and verify if an entry that is missed deserves an opportunity to proceed into the finals. However, to do this, I must bring each additional entry up with the judges and ask if they think it is worthy to break the system and add it as a team best. It's true that it is not ideal to give me power to break the system, but, for any system to work, a humane perspective must be included.
~ I'm gonna step in quickly and remind you that many of you are missing the most vital point.
One of my managers told me this; reminding me that if my shit went up for sale it wasnt a question of copyright'. It was a question of me breaking my contract, and the studio could be seen as abusing the software licence because a single person who didnt pay for it stems to gain from it.
Might I remind you all that most of us are in contracts with our studio that state that NO MONETARY GAIN can be made by any of our personal work we make where we use the studios software.
That means that if you worked on a domwar piece in a lunch hour and it eventually became a part of a priced download package (regardless of if it was you who gets the money or not),
you have broken your contract and are under good cause to get fired. ALSO you have broken the law by using a piece of software that leads to money transactions which you dont have a personal licence for (studio software licences are for the studio not you).
The Rage was NEVER initially about copyright. It was about the fact that nobody is contractually allowed to make money from Maya/Max/Zbrush/Photoshop if you were ever used the studio computers, and your bosses have every right to fire you if they find out otherwise.
Dreamer - thank you for saying that. I was unaware of that matter. This does put a new perspective on everything and it will need to be addressed in the future. However for the time being, in dw5, it's of no concern. No money will be made from the the event except for donations. Donations don't give any profits, but they do make the server and programming costs a tad lighter:)
Neox - As artists, to sign a contract, we usually don't have a choice. When I signed my EA contract, it wasn't pretty, but I had to do it.
Judgings never gonna be 100% unless you have a team of judges that judge everything from start to finish but having them go through that amount of entries is crazy for a volunteer based system and Im sure would put people off judging in the first place. I remember before you did an allocated amount per forum depending on quantity, again though that could be abused as quantity over quality can happen if allocated before the judging begins. We learnt from comicon aswell that not one person should make this decision due to personal taste and many great entries will be lost (Im sure my choices would be drastically different from the next guy).
Maybe the public vote system could be there for the initial narrowing down and you can crown forum champs but then afterwards decide on a cutoff for each forum that would result in top 75 or whatever (so GA top 12 go thru, PC top 62 go through and 1 from the other forums for example hehe, based on the quality). Make sure the judges are involved in this and then you leave it to them to give you a top 20 selection each but maybe only comment on their top ten to cut out workload. I dunno but atleast the top 20 would be chosen fairly and complaining to a minimum.
good point dreamer it gets all fudged up when you think about software licences and commercial use, especially for students. Luckily it never got to that though and fred acted quickly to take it out, hes apologised and I think we should all move on now. We all do silly things and its obvious he knows it was wrong. Doesnt stop the fact though that alot of people will never enter DW again because of it
crazyfool, Yes, the system of public voting is in place 'only' to determine the top entries for each team. After this, the entries would be judged by pros. After looking at the results of the pre-domwar challenge, I have to admit, public voting is pretty accurate. However, like I said, there were a few forums that missed the quantity of entries to signify artists moving into finals. For instance:
Here, there was only one animation entry handed in. Technically, if we used the system, it would not make it into the finals, but it was truly worthy to be placed into the final pool. This will happen with the main event too, so a humane addition to the public voting system is needed. I could assign the task of determining whether an entry is fit or not for moving into the finals to another source of judges, but, it's usually pretty simple to see if an entry is good or not. Personally, I think public voting will be awesome for a the main challenge. I can't really see any flaws in it except for that whole quantity thing. which can be surpassed with a humane touch.
it doesn't even have to be with a monetary background at first, but what happens if you find one of your side projects so cool you'd like to do more from it, bam you are wasted
what if some book author loves your work and asks you to sell it for the cover of one of his books? it would be such a shame when a contract then fucks you up
as for the eating thing, socialize with your colleagues go out and grab some food, eat for the joy and not just for the energy it gives you, such a waste of ressources if you just stuff things into you while you are working on stuff, your body will thank you one day :P
i totally understand it if from time to time you feel the need to do something in a lunchbreak but on a daily base its just unhealthy
Also, i think there is too much stupid talk about this "event" in the thread.
I say, DO NOT participate and lost your time, you perfectly can do great things without a comp. Furthermore, this competition has lost all credibility and now we have people trolling around here.
it doesn't even have to be with a monetary background at first, but what happens if you find one of your side projects so cool you'd like to do more from it, bam you are wasted
what if some book author loves your work and asks you to sell it for the cover of one of his books? it would be such a shame when a contract then fucks you up
as for the eating thing, socialize with your colleagues go out and grab some food, eat for the joy and not just for the energy it gives you, such a waste of ressources if you just stuff things into you while you are working on stuff, your body will thank you one day :P
i totally understand it if from time to time you feel the need to do something in a lunchbreak but on a daily base its just unhealthy
~ Im going to explain to why Im not Stupid.
Regarding side projects;
I had two choices. I could have Not signed my contract, stay broke with looming university fees and try to find somewhere else to work. Or realise that not many places were going to hire me as a character artist out of school without putting me on a project I probably didnt care about. I chose the latter because I could just do my personal projects at home if I wanted to. Which seemed like a tiny sacrifice.
Regarding the socialising;
I have 20 lunch breaks a month. I use about 6 or 7 of those for painting, or competitions etc. Because sometimes I just feel like it. Nowhere did I say I did it on a daily basis.
Calling me stupid, and saying things like go out and grab some food like Im some hermit is pretty condescending. I could label out all the exciting things I get up to with my girlfriend, or friends, but thats just pointless. Instead; please can you not call me Stupid for my day to day life choices.
i didn't say you are stupid, i said in my oppinion signing such contracts is stupid and working in the low amount of freetime most artists have is in my oppinion also stupid, this doesn't make you stupid - it's just my oppinion, you don't have to share that oppinion.
And to compensate for the "stupid" i think i can call it wrong to give rights of stuff you do in your freetime to the company you are working in, it's just wrong.
As for the food decision, i already said i (you don't have to agree) think its all right if you every now and then have the feeling to do something but i think its wrong and not good to anyone to keep working and working the whole day, thats what breaks are for and thats what people a couple of years ago fought for, to earn some breaks and not work themselves to death.
You don't do that, so its totally fine
When you view an entry you are allowed to grade it from 1-10, 1 being bad, 10 being superduperawesome. Grade as many entries as you want (that in your opinion deserve grading). If everybody does this, all entries are bound to get more than at least a couple of votes, giving an indication of its quality.
Average the ratings per entry, select the top 75, wade through exceptionally low entries and exceptionally high ones to make sure none got "joke voted" and pass the top 75 on to the jury for judging.
What do you think?
You might want to keep the ratings per entry a secret, as getting a really low rating might not be liked by some artists . But just use it to select the top 75 or so.
So, if I get like 10 ppl to give me 10 points, that makes my score 10; on the other hand 900 ppl average your score at 7.54, and that makes me a winner? If only politicians were voted that way (or maybe they are). Dunno if this is a good idea.
Also, community voting grants certain advantages to some individuals, who are, say popular or helped a lot of people over the years, but this does not ensure an entirely "fair" judging. The best way, in my opinion, is giving all the voting rights to professional judges. How does CGTalk do it btw?
what about an even simpler, youtube style like/dislike? the most awesome entries should have the highest number of likes. Isn't the reason youtube adopted the system because when people like something, they just whack 5 stars on it..
think about this: you go through the entries in order.. awesome, 9 points.. oo, that's also awesome 10 points.. wait, this next one is *even awesomer!* now what.. do I go back and reduce all my other votes by one??
Yes, that's how Eurovision is voted, but how do you define a community if everyone is registered at GA? Or are you saying only ppl who entered the competition should vote?
Replies
With lesson's learned, I just want to get back to running a darn challenge. I'll continue to visit here now and then to answer any future questions.
If you consider acknowledging the 'add on' feature as a mistake - Do you also acknowledge saying “Yup, this might make a few artists angry… but, not my problem.”?
I would never consider 'Why not?' a valid answer for anything. So, why continue to expand in the same direction knowing full well that it has lead to problems in the past? Sure, you can see it as a personal challenge or something, but if you actually are going to try and juggle a job like you're saying - wouldn't that just add way more of a burden than needed? I don't recall anyone equating more people to keep track of to 'fun.'
What does it take to qualify as a DW5 organizer? (you mentioned no one qualified)
Prizes aren't my main concern - but - how did some get Cintiqs and others didn't? I'm curious what that process was and how some seemingly vanished. I get that you're saying shipping and organizing a bunch of different international mailing addresses is a huge pain in the ass, fine, but how do some participants get it and others don't? did you just stop halfway?
Will your changes help the judging process at all or will it all be left to public votes?
This man asks all the questions as if he were my own tongue.
polycount was singled out because they posted a DW logo with dollar signs behind it and revealed a personal private email.
Only two cintiqs were given. One for the 3d champion, and one for the 2d champion. Even the 2d champion, all the way in Fuzhou China, got his. The remainder of the tablets were medium intuos tablets. These too, have all been delivered. Please feel free to email any of the winners and ask them if they got their tablets.
What does it take to qualify as an organizer? The desire to want to run an event for other forums and publicize them and their artists with the best of that organizer's talents. Also, to successfully conclude the challenge. There is a lot more, like html design, scripting, coordination and stuff, but the single most important attribute remains as - Desire to want to do it and keep doing it.
The changes for judging actually is an awesome idea that came from here, from jacque choi I think. Other than speeding up the process and letting artists see and vote on final finished work immediately, it also highlights artists as team's best. This is actually better than a top 75 page. Being a team best looks better on a resume. For instance and example, bogdan as team best for polycount, looks better than being in a pool of 75 entries. So, yes, the changes will help, legitify, simplify, speedup, and make better, the judging process.
Let me first just make this very important point before I say anything else:
Copyright was a law born about 500 years ago when the printing press was invented. It was feared that people would print seditious books against the church and monarchy, so they made it illegal for anyone but government approved publishers (stationers) to print books the government had approved for printing. That's the law our copyright act is based on. A law that censors publications. It made the stationers rich. And they lied to government that it protects authors so they could get the law renewed. That said, here's the rest of my response:
There is no such thing as Intellectual Property as far as the Copyright Act is concerned or any other law for that matter. It's a fake word made up by people that want to extend the power of copyright to keep their monopoly on ideas and Yale is a private school that is not above being reproach to spread propaganda. The page on Yale is lying. You can search the entire text of the copyright act and not find one iota of language referring to or granting any form of property rights to any copyrightable works. Copyright is NOT a property right. It is a legal, temporary, government granted monopoly given to those that create art as an incentive to create more art. That is all it is. You have no property rights over non-physical representations of art in any way. I've been researching, discussing, debating, and learning what it is really all about and I can tell you with absolute certainty that you have no legal claim of ownership to any idea you come up with. You have distribution rights over it and you have the right to exploit the works, but you do not own the idea that inspired it. I cannot be any more clear than that.
Kaptainkenals:
You are mistaken, there is no legal definition of theft (as in US criminal law) that would convict anyone of theft if they were to take a copy of someone's work. By definition set by the law it is not theft. The dictionary definition pertains to the colloquial definition of theft, not the legal one. To be considered theft by the definition of law, property must taken which deprives the owner of possession. Copying a work does not satisfy that definition, which is why copyright infringement cases are tried in civil court. IP does not exist as a term in any law pertaining to copyright works.
EarthQuake:
That is the US Patent and Trademark Office. It grants temporary monopolies on inventions, not ideas. Again, there is no law granting ownership of an idea.
Ok, if you all want to claim that IP and ownership of ideas is real, I hereby claim ownership of any representation of a blue duck on a pink pond. It's my idea and I own it. Do you see how stupid that is? That's what you're claiming is your right. That's the kind of extreme the publisher's would go to if they had such a right. They act too much like that already. If we let such a farce of a law like that to exist, nobody would create new works, because all of the ideas would be owned and there are no 100% original ideas. All art is derivative of what came before it. Without that, we would not have much art, or any at all.
What are you afraid losing by admitting that copyright is not a property right and that ideas cannot be owned? Man, Thomas Jefferson would slap you all for saying ideas are property.
Which reminds me. If you won't take my word for it, take his:
[FONT=verdana, helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property." - Thomas Jefferson
And thus, they made certain that ideas could not be property. Had that been true, we wouldn't need copyright.
I think I've said as much as I can as clearly and factually as I possibly can. If you still think I'm wrong, then I'm sorry you don't have the courage question conventions and find the truth for yourselves. I was hoping in a forum of artists I would find a few enlightened individuals that would take interest in learning what copyright is really all about (or at least not take the "You're wrong! Stop talking!" stance), but those of you who responded don't seem to want change the way things are. You're happy with a handful of corporations hoarding our culture and selling it back to us piecemeal.
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Ah, so some weird attempt at revenge for bringing awareness to a change in context to rules/agreements for a competition in regards to those that participated after the fact...got ya. Classy.
That makes not sense whatsoever. The courts never ruled on copyrights as property. They ruled on them as rights to distribution and exploitation of protected works as it is stated in the copyright act. When the RIAA took Jamie Thomas to court over those 24 songs on Kazaa, it was their clients' copyrights they were defending, not property. If you distribute works that are protected (any new works are automatically protected) without permission, you are violating someone's right to choose whom may receive copies.
You're right to say you can't copyright or own "an idea". Usually. You can as you noted patent inventions, which are sort of like ideas, but it's not all-encompassing to ideas of any sort. I can draw a picture of a red frog jumping over a farmhouse, and while I do then have the rights to that picture - someone else could just as well paint their own image of a red frog jumping over a farmhouse. That is correct.
Your little rant about Intellectual Property not technically existing, and copyright not equaling a property right - that's just silly. It matters not if IP's listed in the copyright act. The phrase "pocket watch" probably isn't in there either, but its meaning is still there. A word or phrase is only as viable as people acknowledge it to be, and the term intellectual property has been used for a long, long time - both among the general populace, as well as the courthouse. "Made up" or not. Hell, years ago "lol" didn't mean anything and now you see it all over the place. We've even had a judge use the word "trolling" to describe someone's actions! Point being...arguing over that, is stupid.
And while you may not have "property rights" over a digital image, again, you're arguing words. Words are relative, who gives a shit. You can still take someone to court for using one of your works without your permission, especially if they're making money off of it. This is generally considered "stealing" or "theft", and depending on where you get your definition from - it would be accurate. You're looking for your definition in a law book, others - from a dictionary. Which one is right or wrong is completely and utterly relative and again, it's foolish to argue about it. I really don't see the point.
Nevertheless, property law does not cover creative works. It only covers physical property. So, the canvas and paint you used to make a painting is protected. The digital photo you took of it is not. There is no law that grants the right to "intellectual property". It is a tool control public opinion and strengthen their position. Those that created the first copyright law were careful to not allow that. If you can present me with a US law that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that creative works are property, I will concede my position.
All that aside though, it's not a good thing. That means that the big publishers get to own the majority of popular works and anyone that wants to advance the arts by deriving works from those, are going to be slapped down by copyright. It's a hinderance to the advancement of the useful arts. A complete contradiction to the underlying principles that copyright was created for.
If that interests you, take a look at this article which details the history of copyright:
http://questioncopyright.org/promise
It's fascinating read and very enlightening.
I don't think this is helping the matter, but, I will answer anyways. Resigning and giving up is not revenge, it's simply giving up and wanting out. As for bringing awareness to a matter, cgsociety and cghub did the same, but they did not reveal personal emails with quotes, make a flashy banner, or make suggestions of "offering your work for sale to line [my] pockets" and much more.
Goddamnit I never knew this existed!!!!
I would imagine that if we didn't have a veteran history with Dominance War/GA like we do our post would have been the same as CGHUB and CGSociety. It was subjective, but at the time it was felt it needed to be said.
Moving on, a lot of people are happy to see theres a challenge/contest happening and thats what matters now.
Just for the record - while I noted before I think arguing the terms is stupid, there are shit tons of laws that grant the right to Intellectual Property. We have government offices that work towards guaranteeing people those rights. We have many laws in which IP is explicitly mentioned. Including our Copyright Law of the United States. (I encountered it actually on the first segment I read, Chapter 1, many, many times.)
...
*cough*
(Go Dominance War!)
Isn't this the entire point? Copyright = the exclusive right to copy something. (as far as I know, don't know legal defenitions, but it's kind of in the name). I agree with you that owning an idea would be pretty stupid, but distributing someone else's work and making money off it without their permission would be illegal. Right? IMO that's the entire thing, you don't own the idea, but you do own the exclusive rights to that (digital or not) piece of art. So if someone publishes your art you get to say: hey I have the exclusive right to publishing that art! GTFO!
But I don't know wether I'm adding anything to the debate, don't know a thing about American law.
Haha. Genius.
Copyright is boring as hell. Back to DW, so how's the judging going to work, is it public voting to decide the top 75 and then go to professional judging. I would prefer this than an all public vote as judges comments are very important and leaves forum politics at the door where popularity rules over artistic execution. After seeing comicon judging I think judges should have voted on atleast the top 10 as if everyones only got 5 selections then the same 5 artists will pop up and now and then a new entry gets a vote and elevates them in the standings drastically. If theres a top 10 then the judges should vote top 10, I think only one judge did top 10 for comicon which is how it should be done to be fair. Not slagging off the judges as they dud their jobs brilliantly but I think a top 10 selection should have been put in for fairness.
I've never been a fan of public voting, it's good for minis where the results aren't so important but on big events I think pro judging is needed. Might be a hassle to setup but it means the judging is fair as professionals can single out brilliant execution over 'that looks pretty' mentality
How would you suggest the public voting work though, obviously ranking someones top five would not work to weed out 75 submissions. I like the idea of a public vote to narrow the selection for the final judges, but I can't see an efficient way of doing it. Having people rank each piece on a scale would probably be the most meaningful, but that would take hours for every person who wished to be involved.
leaked info?...I think so. He deserves it. Lets hope he can take top spot.
This thread is getting silly now. Copyright law. Come on. Whether something is legal or not is matterless. Use common sense. Its wrong to take others stuff, including ideas.
Anyway. I'm off to invent Lego.
IP is from the execution of the idea. My idea of a sexy vampire with a massive sniper rifle - it's just an idea, it's not IP, the moment I execute it, that execution is my IP, someone else can do a similar idea, but executed completely differently - the IP's will differ, and belong to their respective authors.
It has nothing to do with the medium.
IP protects artists, what the artist does with his IP is up to him, so if u want to give it away for free, so be it, but some people need their rights to make a living.
And your examples of people making a living off their "free" artwork, still their IP, it's their choice how they use it.
That said, I see no point lowering myself any further.
One of my managers told me this; reminding me that if my shit went up for sale it wasnt a question of copyright'. It was a question of me breaking my contract, and the studio could be seen as abusing the software licence because a single person who didnt pay for it stems to gain from it.
Might I remind you all that most of us are in contracts with our studio that state that NO MONETARY GAIN can be made by any of our personal work we make where we use the studios software.
That means that if you worked on a domwar piece in a lunch hour and it eventually became a part of a priced download package (regardless of if it was you who gets the money or not),
you have broken your contract and are under good cause to get fired. ALSO you have broken the law by using a piece of software that leads to money transactions which you dont have a personal licence for (studio software licences are for the studio not you).
The Rage was NEVER initially about copyright. It was about the fact that nobody is contractually allowed to make money from Maya/Max/Zbrush/Photoshop if you were ever used the studio computers, and your bosses have every right to fire you if they find out otherwise.
wasting your well deserved lunchbreak to work is as well pretty stupid
but well might just be my oppinion
Neox - As artists, to sign a contract, we usually don't have a choice. When I signed my EA contract, it wasn't pretty, but I had to do it.
Maybe the public vote system could be there for the initial narrowing down and you can crown forum champs but then afterwards decide on a cutoff for each forum that would result in top 75 or whatever (so GA top 12 go thru, PC top 62 go through and 1 from the other forums for example hehe, based on the quality). Make sure the judges are involved in this and then you leave it to them to give you a top 20 selection each but maybe only comment on their top ten to cut out workload. I dunno but atleast the top 20 would be chosen fairly and complaining to a minimum.
good point dreamer
fredh - nobody likes contracts
You always have a choice, question is, how much are you willing to give away for a job
http://www.gameartisans.org/contests/minis/view_entries_3d4all_anime_1.html
Here, there was only one animation entry handed in. Technically, if we used the system, it would not make it into the finals, but it was truly worthy to be placed into the final pool. This will happen with the main event too, so a humane addition to the public voting system is needed. I could assign the task of determining whether an entry is fit or not for moving into the finals to another source of judges, but, it's usually pretty simple to see if an entry is good or not. Personally, I think public voting will be awesome for a the main challenge. I can't really see any flaws in it except for that whole quantity thing. which can be surpassed with a humane touch.
~ No. I'm not stupid. I just like making things while I eat, and I don't see the problem in NOT using software I didn't buy to make extra money.
If ever I wanted to do a personal project with monetary gain in mind; I have a home computer for that.
what if some book author loves your work and asks you to sell it for the cover of one of his books? it would be such a shame when a contract then fucks you up
as for the eating thing, socialize with your colleagues go out and grab some food, eat for the joy and not just for the energy it gives you, such a waste of ressources if you just stuff things into you while you are working on stuff, your body will thank you one day :P
i totally understand it if from time to time you feel the need to do something in a lunchbreak but on a daily base its just unhealthy
Also, i think there is too much stupid talk about this "event" in the thread.
I say, DO NOT participate and lost your time, you perfectly can do great things without a comp. Furthermore, this competition has lost all credibility and now we have people trolling around here.
It's a pinch!
~ Im going to explain to why Im not Stupid.
Regarding side projects;
I had two choices. I could have Not signed my contract, stay broke with looming university fees and try to find somewhere else to work. Or realise that not many places were going to hire me as a character artist out of school without putting me on a project I probably didnt care about. I chose the latter because I could just do my personal projects at home if I wanted to. Which seemed like a tiny sacrifice.
Regarding the socialising;
I have 20 lunch breaks a month. I use about 6 or 7 of those for painting, or competitions etc. Because sometimes I just feel like it. Nowhere did I say I did it on a daily basis.
Calling me stupid, and saying things like go out and grab some food like Im some hermit is pretty condescending. I could label out all the exciting things I get up to with my girlfriend, or friends, but thats just pointless. Instead; please can you not call me Stupid for my day to day life choices.
And to compensate for the "stupid" i think i can call it wrong to give rights of stuff you do in your freetime to the company you are working in, it's just wrong.
As for the food decision, i already said i (you don't have to agree) think its all right if you every now and then have the feeling to do something but i think its wrong and not good to anyone to keep working and working the whole day, thats what breaks are for and thats what people a couple of years ago fought for, to earn some breaks and not work themselves to death.
You don't do that, so its totally fine
now stop being stupid and get back to flaming Fred.
When you view an entry you are allowed to grade it from 1-10, 1 being bad, 10 being superduperawesome. Grade as many entries as you want (that in your opinion deserve grading). If everybody does this, all entries are bound to get more than at least a couple of votes, giving an indication of its quality.
Average the ratings per entry, select the top 75, wade through exceptionally low entries and exceptionally high ones to make sure none got "joke voted" and pass the top 75 on to the jury for judging.
What do you think?
You might want to keep the ratings per entry a secret, as getting a really low rating might not be liked by some artists
Also, community voting grants certain advantages to some individuals, who are, say popular or helped a lot of people over the years, but this does not ensure an entirely "fair" judging. The best way, in my opinion, is giving all the voting rights to professional judges. How does CGTalk do it btw?
think about this: you go through the entries in order.. awesome, 9 points.. oo, that's also awesome 10 points.. wait, this next one is *even awesomer!* now what.. do I go back and reduce all my other votes by one??