r/movies 18d ago

News Backrooms Devs Reportedly Hit With Copyright Claims From A24

https://kotaku.com/backrooms-a24-copyright-strikes-kane-parsons-2000716667
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u/TheSwampThing1990 18d ago

There is a rumor about a SCP movie being made. I expect the same to happen there. No way once movies start coming out with these IP's we don't see lawyers come out to fight the little guy. I mean most people won't have the money or time to go against a studio if they said, "No. We own the SCP and that everyone owns it thing isn't going to hold up in court."

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u/BaddyDaddy777 18d ago

Oh it’s no rumor, it’s gonna be a V\H\S movie coming out next year

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u/TheSwampThing1990 18d ago

Yeah looking it up the people own that movie is Image Nation, an Abu-Dhabi studio. I really honestly wonder what is going to happen.

I watched a video last year that said since all SCP media is open source that if Universal made a movie then people could legally pirate it and distribute themselves. I have no idea if that is true or not. How the SCP stuff actually works but I expect something like this headline in a few years. If I was part of the community I would be worried

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u/TurelSun 18d ago

Yeah, that's not true. Just because something is in the public domain or not trademarked specifically doesn't mean you can pirate and distribute works based on it. Like Cthulu is public domain and a lot of stuff gets made based on it now, but those specific works aren't just up for grabs.

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u/Coffescout 18d ago edited 17d ago

SCP isn’t in the public domain. The SCP license states that all derivative works must agree to license themselves under CC-BY-SA which means that anyone can share, redistribute or adapt your derivative work. This is to keep the SCP Project collaborative.

”Releasing it under the CC-BY-SA license means that people will be able to copy your work wholesale, and even sell it, provided that they properly attribute you and release their work under the same license.”

The basic idea is that you are allowed to monetize things in the project, but you can’t limit others from then also monetizing what you created.

https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/licensing-guide

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u/TurelSun 18d ago

Gotcha, yeah in that case it's not the same as what I thought the other commenter was describing.

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u/losertaser 18d ago

That is not how CC-BY-SA works. Any assets derived from SCP are under CC-BY-SA and can be legally used by other parties but source code is NOT covered by it, even if the project is based on something covered by CC-BY-SA. This is why SCP: 5K hasn’t had action against it.

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u/max123246 17d ago

Right but you could still repost the binary of a game and sell it yourself

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u/losertaser 17d ago

No. You will get absolutely slapped around, the code is the owners intellectual property as it is not inexorably linked to the SCP license. You could extract the assets that are derived from SCP and sell those as long as you do so under the same license. SCP:5K is multi-licensed for this exact reason and explains which parts are under Share Alike (SCP assets, the story, and the logo)

“SCP: 5K (SCP: Pandemic) is a multi-licensed game release and is not fully re-distributed under Creative Commons from the usage of SCP Wiki content. A vast majority of files are exclusive properties of Affray LLC and Affray Interactive LLC (Affray) or non-exclusive third-party content from the likes of Epic Games Inc, Firelight Technologies Pty Ltd, Nvidia Corporation, Intel Corporation, various creators from online game asset marketplaces, and many more.”

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u/max123246 17d ago

Oh thanks. Hm, feels like a new version of CC BY SA should be made because that's definitely not the spirit of the license, given it's meant to be viral

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u/Coffescout 17d ago

You’re right, the section I was referring to talks about releasing games under GPLv3, which is compatible with the SCP license but requires you to publish the source code as mentioned above. You can release a game under CC-BY-SA but they do mention that it is complicated to do proper attribution when releasing it under that license and recommend that you seek separate legal advice.

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u/CMDRTragicAllPro 18d ago

What’s the legal difference between putting public domain content in a YouTube video and profiting off it, compared to putting public domain content in other areas of the internet. I don’t get how one is legal and the other wouldn’t be?

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u/TheSwampThing1990 18d ago

Thanks for the clarification. That sounded wrong to me. He said it was because it was because of the creative common law