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I would not side with GW if it was an unreasonable c+d. However, from what I understand this one was using GW artwork and Patreon to make money. You can't really blame GW for shutting it down, they pretty much had no choice anyway with how copyright law works.

 Grimgold wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
This is pretty simple.

GW produces products which contain information.

This program (and similar) give you that information for free.

GW loses money that way. End of story.

Beyond that US laws on IP are defend it at every opportunity, or lose your right to defend it. If they let Web roster get away with it, other less scrupulous companies could use that as precedence. GW was as nice as they could possibly be given the situation, and even the author of web roster got that point.

The real issue is that jagweed who reported it to GW.

 Marmatag wrote:
The real issue is that jagweed who reported it to GW.

As soon as there was a paper trail that can prove they knew, they were forced to act. That could be used as evidence in a future IP case if they ignored it.

 Marmatag wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
This is pretty simple.

GW produces products which contain information.

This program (and similar) give you that information for free.

GW loses money that way. End of story.

Beyond that US laws on IP are defend it at every opportunity, or lose your right to defend it. If they let Web roster get away with it, other less scrupulous companies could use that as precedence. GW was as nice as they could possibly be given the situation, and even the author of web roster got that point.

The real issue is that jagweed who reported it to GW.

lol, if it's the top result in google (and it was), someone didn't have to drop the dime, hell I'm sure GW employees were using ti to build lists.

 Elbows wrote:
I enjoy programs like the one mentioned as much as the next person. I have no idea how/why this should surprise anyone. Tons of GW content there used without permission. Completely understandable. If they make money by selling products and information, why allow that information to be provided by other sources for free? (and even minor profit if the Patreon stuff is true).

I can't get over how many people villify GW (and heaps of other companies) for defending their products/IP.

For me it isn't so much their decision, since they are technically right, it's the obvious double standard they are applying between AOS and 40k. Scrollbuilder was similar, and GW didn't send a C&D; they asked the guy to remove the donate button and then rolled it into their own site while heaping praise on the creator as a pillar of the community. The 40k version doesn't even get asked to comply with anything (e.g. "We need you to remove the link to Patreon and stop using our images"), it's just siccing the hounds on him and removing it entirely. Along with other things that make it clear they plan to treat 40k differently because it's the "cash cow" and they can get away with it (e.g. no PDFs of units for 40k, but there are/will continue to be for AOS) and it's just frustrating.

 Trickstick wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
The real issue is that jagweed who reported it to GW.

As soon as there was a paper trail that can prove they knew, they were forced to act. That could be used as evidence in a future IP case if they ignored it.

Exactly. So whoever emailed GW about it is the problem.

rugludvanguard wrote:
Defending their IP against what exactly ? what damage was GW occuring from the List Builder?

I see two possibilities here:

1) GW didn't like the extensive use of their artwork, which gives off the impression that the fan made list building software was officially endorsed. If this is the case, remove all the artwork and there should no longer be any issue.

2) GW is creating their own official list building software that they don't want to compete against. Again, remove all the infringing artwork.

The only place this gets even a little sketchy is them laying claim to "army points and stats for 40K units". That's not something that they can claim for copyright infringement over (facts and rules are not covered by copyright laws, to the bane of game designers everywhere) nor is it a violation of their trademarks (you aren't selling Aeldari, you are discussing them in context of the work as sold by GW).

The logos and iconography is something which is a bit of a middle ground. Most of them are not creative enough to qualify for copyright protection, so they have only trademark protection - which is far less broad, and specifically only relates to selling things and brand recognition. Basically, if using them does not create brand confusion in the marketplace, there's nothing GW can do about it. Just labeling the list builder as "An Unofficial 40k List Builder, Not Endorsed by Games Workshop" is probably enough to protect against claims of trademark violations as long as the purpose of the work was to discuss, comment on, or otherwise criticize GW's work. However, I'm sure GW has a different opinion on this and unfortunately, the only way to test it would be in court.

The artwork and website pictures though - that's a no-no.

On the other hand, there have been fan-run online list builders for X-Wing and Heroclix for years (complete with full rules information) with no problems.

I've been saying this since I started playing, but points should be listed freely on the site.

There's no reason to protect the cost of units. You still need the rules to play, and you still need to have a GW printed copy of your rules anyway.

They also don't need to tell you anything about the unit pairings. For instance, yeah, a Big Punchy Fist might be 25 points, but that doesn't tell you about what can take it and when.

I dunno, it just seems odd that this barrier exists in terms of accessibility.

Honestly, I can't blame GW on this they are within their rights to do so.

There is enough army builder out there either way and if somehow they would all shut down I would just make one for my army with excel and they could never take it down eh eh.

rugludvanguard wrote:
Does GW provide a tool to build lists? No
Was the ListBuilder for Profit? No

The result is that i have now to write with pen and paper and much discomfort , so yes GW is being a dick because it forced to take down a useful tool without providing any alternative and pissing off an awful lot of people. Just when I started thinking they learnt their lessons....

Holy hell, talk about entitlement.

How do you think older edition players did things? How do you think people who play things like D&D and Arkham Horror do things? They write things down. I personally type everything in Notepad/Word because I want to be precise. You can do the same and ought to.

Is a program like Battlescribe great? Absolutely. I use it for quick reference and combos to gain insight on points. There's an element of laziness that comes with it though. It does everything FOR you, and you can't guarantee the program to be correct. On top of that, you get the laziest people here copy/paste directly from the program for us to review their lists in the Tactics subforum and Army subforum.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

rugludvanguard wrote:
Does GW provide a tool to build lists? No
Was the ListBuilder for Profit? No

The result is that i have now to write with pen and paper and much discomfort , so yes GW is being a dick because it forced to take down a useful tool without providing any alternative and pissing off an awful lot of people. Just when I started thinking they learnt their lessons....

Holy hell, talk about entitlement.

How do you think older edition players did things? How do you think people who play things like D&D and Arkham Horror do things? They write things down. I personally type everything in Notepad/Word because I want to be precise. You can do the same and ought to.

Is a program like Battlescribe great? Absolutely. I use it for quick reference and combos to gain insight on points. There's an element of laziness that comes with it though. It does everything FOR you, and you can't guarantee the program to be correct. On top of that, you get the laziest people here copy/paste directly from the program for us to review their lists in the Tactics subforum and Army subforum.

We're lazy for using BattleScribe now?

 NivlacSupreme wrote:
We're lazy for using BattleScribe now?

Back in my day, we had to etch our army lists into clay tablets using a hammer and wedge after calculating their point costs on an abacus. Only the rich kids had access to papyrus.

 Sqorgar wrote:

 NivlacSupreme wrote:
We're lazy for using BattleScribe now?

Back in my day, we had to etch our army lists into clay tablets using a hammer and wedge after calculating their point costs on an abacus. Only the rich kids had access to papyrus.

Clay? Sloth and idleness! Back when I was growing up we would have given our left kidney for just the mere chance of clay. We has to catch rats and write lists on them with discarded spoons!

No more lazy than using calculators or wikis instead of books.

But come on, "and much discomfort"?

I was puzzled by this at first but yeah, definitely siding with GW here.

Someone using official artwork, model pics and making a profit? Way too many lines have been crossed.

If he wanted a collaboration then he should've been as minimalist as the Warscroll builder was. No pics, no models, no big logo, just simple words and points.

If he starts another one or someone else does then they should just get fan-made art and models from Deviantart rather than copy and paste the official stuff.

 Trickstick wrote:
Clay? Sloth and idleness! Back when I was growing up we would have given our left kidney for just the mere chance of clay. We has to catch rats and write lists on them with discarded spoons!

At least you had a left kidneys. Kids today are so spoiled.

The site wasn't shut down for being a list building site. The site was shut down because he was using copyright images and info straight from the GW website. The web developer even said as soon as he can figure out how to make the website work and look pretty like it did (cause he doesn't like how Battlescribe looks) he will be back up and running again. This doesn't have anything to do with litst building sites and everything to with copy right infringment which the web dev said he totally violated.

Funny observation:

People are opposed to power.
People are also opposed to list building without a tool.

Insert "but that's none of my business" meme here.

I still use pencil and paper doing my lists... much easier to jig around. That said, the points values being on the unit listings in the enhanced digital indexes is a godsend!

 NivlacSupreme wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

rugludvanguard wrote:
Does GW provide a tool to build lists? No
Was the ListBuilder for Profit? No

The result is that i have now to write with pen and paper and much discomfort , so yes GW is being a dick because it forced to take down a useful tool without providing any alternative and pissing off an awful lot of people. Just when I started thinking they learnt their lessons....

Holy hell, talk about entitlement.

How do you think older edition players did things? How do you think people who play things like D&D and Arkham Horror do things? They write things down. I personally type everything in Notepad/Word because I want to be precise. You can do the same and ought to.

Is a program like Battlescribe great? Absolutely. I use it for quick reference and combos to gain insight on points. There's an element of laziness that comes with it though. It does everything FOR you, and you can't guarantee the program to be correct. On top of that, you get the laziest people here copy/paste directly from the program for us to review their lists in the Tactics subforum and Army subforum.

We're lazy for using BattleScribe now?

Only partly, but the REALLY lazy people copy-paste their lists from it on here, on top of that looking super unaesthetic.

GW owes you NOTHING. See absolutely no problem with them trying to protect their IP. People who do are being unreasonable, entitled leeches in my opinion.

Vaxx wrote:

 CoreCommander wrote:
The roster was done by a very old friend of mine. He poured a lot of effort, free time and passion in it and tried to get in touch with GW on multiple occasions just to make sure he was on good terms with their legal stuff. He also offered to give them rights for code so they can use it for themselves. All he wanted was a good builder so he and other people can enjoy the game...

Thats what I am talking about. GW is being dumb about it.

Wrong. Because of how Trademarks and Copyright work they literally don't have a choice in the matter. They have to go after you. They have a legal requirement to defend their intellectual property or they can be challenged for ownership of it in court.

It's how this has always worked.

Baron Klatz wrote:
No more lazy than using calculators or wikis instead of books.

But come on, "and much discomfort"?

I was puzzled by this at first but yeah, definitely siding with GW here.

Someone using official artwork, model pics and making a profit? Way too many lines have been crossed.

If he wanted a collaboration then he should've been as minimalist as the Warscroll builder was. No pics, no models, no big logo, just simple words and points.

If he starts another one or someone else does then they should just get fan-made art and models from Deviantart rather than copy and paste the official stuff.

Yes putting a list together with this indexes is quite annoying/discomforting: the unit is in one place, the list of additional items in another and the points in another one. So you have to flicker up and down to build your list. I mean easier than carving on stone or putting together a list for 7th (easier to carve stone mind).

So, after a 3 years rehab from 40k, you can imagine my joy when I found the Web Roster Creator , I manage to put a list together and merrily started to do another one when ... the message appeared. Oh well I guess i will have to wait til the Army builder data files are going to be updated (I had the same license since 2006 , best investment ever..)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Arandmoor wrote:

Vaxx wrote:

 CoreCommander wrote:
The roster was done by a very old friend of mine. He poured a lot of effort, free time and passion in it and tried to get in touch with GW on multiple occasions just to make sure he was on good terms with their legal stuff. He also offered to give them rights for code so they can use it for themselves. All he wanted was a good builder so he and other people can enjoy the game...

Thats what I am talking about. GW is being dumb about it.

Wrong. Because of how Trademarks and Copyright work they literally don't have a choice in the matter. They have to go after you. They have a legal requirement to defend their intellectual property or they can be challenged for ownership of it in court.

It's how this has always worked.

Is this actually true or is it just Internet rumors ? Because i have never seen any other gaming company going after this fan tool/material as aggressively as GW...

 Arandmoor wrote:

Vaxx wrote:

 CoreCommander wrote:
The roster was done by a very old friend of mine. He poured a lot of effort, free time and passion in it and tried to get in touch with GW on multiple occasions just to make sure he was on good terms with their legal stuff. He also offered to give them rights for code so they can use it for themselves. All he wanted was a good builder so he and other people can enjoy the game...

Thats what I am talking about. GW is being dumb about it.

Wrong. Because of how Trademarks and Copyright work they literally don't have a choice in the matter. They have to go after you. They have a legal requirement to defend their intellectual property or they can be challenged for ownership of it in court.

It's how this has always worked.

Again, I am NOT saying GW is in the wrong for shutting it down. I am saying they are dumb by not reaching out to talented people and partnering with them in areas like this for 40k.

I also gave an example of how a game developer partnered with talented modders....I can give another with IL2 Cliff of Dover and Team Fusion. Just saying sometimes sharing the same goal pleases more parties than stompping on it.

rugludvanguard wrote:

 Arandmoor wrote:

Vaxx wrote:

 CoreCommander wrote:
The roster was done by a very old friend of mine. He poured a lot of effort, free time and passion in it and tried to get in touch with GW on multiple occasions just to make sure he was on good terms with their legal stuff. He also offered to give them rights for code so they can use it for themselves. All he wanted was a good builder so he and other people can enjoy the game...

Thats what I am talking about. GW is being dumb about it.

Wrong. Because of how Trademarks and Copyright work they literally don't have a choice in the matter. They have to go after you. They have a legal requirement to defend their intellectual property or they can be challenged for ownership of it in court.

It's how this has always worked.

Is this actually true or is it just Internet rumors ? Because i have never seen any other gaming company going after this fan tool/material as aggressively as GW...

That is literally how it works, and every company goes after fan tools/material as aggressively as GW. If you want to see mean, check out video game companies. They're way more aggressive than GW.

There are two ways to lose your trademark. The first is to have it become general vernacular. Kleenex, in the US, is the perfect example. We call all tissues "Kleenex". "Hand me a kleenex. I need to blow my nose," is what you usually hear, even if the person talking is not referring to a Kleenex-brand (TM) tissue.

As a result Kleenex is basically dead as a trademark.

The other is to not defend it when someone uses it without permission. If, for example, you were to let it slide once. Someone makes something with your trademarked character and doesn't pay you for it, and you don't defend it because "it's not hurting anyone!". Later someone else makes something with you trademarked character, but makes it big and starts pulling in cash left and right. You take them to court because...it's your trademark. You didn't give them permission, and they're riding on the back of your hard work and making bank. Even worse, they have taken your character and "improved" upon them, which happens to invalidate your long-term plans for that character.

So you sue. You sue for damages to your trademark, and you sue for the theft of your IP.

That other company is going to immediately point to that one time you let it slide and say that you let them work with your trademark and IP, so you're obviously okay with other people doing exactly what they did.

They now have standing.

You are now screwed.

GW has been building the WH40k IP up for decades. It's literally their life line as a company. If it gets compromised, they're out of business in less than six months.

It would be nice if they had wiggle room to let the community play with their IP a bit, but there are all sorts of legal issues there.

Finally, please note, IANAL

rugludvanguard wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Arandmoor wrote:

Vaxx wrote:

 CoreCommander wrote:
The roster was done by a very old friend of mine. He poured a lot of effort, free time and passion in it and tried to get in touch with GW on multiple occasions just to make sure he was on good terms with their legal stuff. He also offered to give them rights for code so they can use it for themselves. All he wanted was a good builder so he and other people can enjoy the game...

Thats what I am talking about. GW is being dumb about it.

Wrong. Because of how Trademarks and Copyright work they literally don't have a choice in the matter. They have to go after you. They have a legal requirement to defend their intellectual property or they can be challenged for ownership of it in court.

It's how this has always worked.

Is this actually true or is it just Internet rumors ? Because i have never seen any other gaming company going after this fan tool/material as aggressively as GW...

Haven't you heard about Nintendo?

 Arandmoor wrote:
Wrong. Because of how Trademarks and Copyright work they literally don't have a choice in the matter. They have to go after you. They have a legal requirement to defend their intellectual property or they can be challenged for ownership of it in court.

It's how this has always worked.

Well, that's not actually how it works at all. Copyrights are eternal (or effectively are, as Disney keeps extending copyrights by decades every time it comes up) and you can't lose them - only transfer them to someone else (or the public domain). It doesn't matter if something has been reproduced a million times, you are still the copyright owner.

Trademarks can be lost under two conditions: genericity and improper use. Genericity is probably GW's major concern, as they don't want things like "space marine" or "Eldar" to become a generic term - which is kind of what happened, but not really, since the terms were basically taken from Heinlein and Tolkien respectively. There's like twenty trademarks which have become genericized (including Heroin). It's not easy to do and rather uncommon, and the reason why GW lost that big case was because things like "space marine" and "eldar" weren't specific enough or unique enough to qualify for broad trademark protection in the first place. They didn't lose their trademark. It was that the trademark was too broad in the first place.

Improper use is when someone like GW specifically uses trademarks in an improper manner, such as using their own trademarks as a broad categorical description (check out all our space marines) or using a trademark as a verb (he nurgled the crap out of that guy). This can directly lead to genericity - which is why LEGO Corporation insists you don't call them LEGOs, but LEGO bricks.

Basically, GW doesn't want the officially trademarked names like Aeldari, Orqs, Adeptus Whateverus, Windarium Leviosa, or Primarily Spaece Maareens to become generic so that they don't have a "Spots the Space Marine" repeat. That can not happen if the terms are being used EXCLUSIVELY to discuss Games Workshop products. You can not create confusion in the marketplace when you are literally only talking about the one thing being sold with that name.

Corporations, like Games Workshop, have been known to abuse trademark law in order to push their weight around and crush competitors, and GW definitely has a "once bitten, twice shy" thing going on with their trademarks, but they are in no danger of losing their IP rights due to discussion about their games directly. There's nothing to defend (you know, except for all the infringing images).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Arandmoor wrote:

The other is to not defend it when someone uses it without permission. If, for example, you were to let it slide once. Someone makes something with your trademarked character and doesn't pay you for it, and you don't defend it because "it's not hurting anyone!". Later someone else makes something with you trademarked character, but makes it big and starts pulling in cash left and right. You take them to court because...it's your trademark. You didn't give them permission, and they're riding on the back of your hard work and making bank. Even worse, they have taken your character and "improved" upon them, which happens to invalidate your long-term plans for that character.

It's really the genericization that companies fear. It isn't the trademark infringement itself which is a problem (in the cases of fan productions which aren't being sold), but the dilution of the trademark's effect in the marketplace. Trademarks exist to be a singular selling identifier for a company or product, and if a specific trademark comes to not represent that singular publisher's work (either through genericization or through becoming overly inspecific and broad), that trademark's value diminishes to the point that it no longer offers any protection.

That other company is going to immediately point to that one time you let it slide and say that you let them work with your trademark and IP, so you're obviously okay with other people doing exactly what they did.

That's not going to be a very effective defense. You would have to point out that the trademark has become inert due to market factors, like the fact that another work is more popular or well known for the same trademark or that the trademark, through dilution, has become overly genericized and no longer specifically applies to the publisher's work to most people.

But again, discussing Warhammer 40k directly does not dilute the 40k trademark, thus they won't lose their trademark due to genericity. In fact, one of the core parts of trademark fair use is that "the alleged infringer is using the mark to describe accurately an aspect of its products", such that using 40k trademarks to discuss 40k is completely within the realms of fair use. It's more that the use of trademarked elements creates confusion in the marketplace and makes it appear as if it is official or officially endorsed - and that's bad and the thing trademarks were created to prevent.

Long story short, using Nintendo to describe all consoles leads to trademark loss. Using Nintendo to describe the SNES is covered by fair use. Selling something with the word "Nintendo" on it is trademark infringement.

It's a shame, but list building is easy enough in Google docs sheets application.

 Rippy wrote:
It's a shame, but list building is easy enough in Google docs sheets application.

And travelling to China is easy enough with horse drawn wagons.

 BaconCatBug wrote:

 Rippy wrote:
It's a shame, but list building is easy enough in Google docs sheets application.

And travelling to China is easy enough with horse drawn wagons.

It took me 10 minutes to build a 2k and 75 point lists in sheet, plus adding scans of all the datasheets to new tabs.
Plus there are many other apps out there.
Other Rippy was a nice guy, who responded to emails about adding forge World stuff and did it that day for you, but you cannot expect to rip that much stuff off GW and have a patreon and expect to be kept online.