01011001
Banned
no you can't. the only way you legally can have a rom or iso of a game is if you dumped them yourself.
downloading a rom is always illegal.
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A legal look at Nintendo's Dolphin crusade...and its a bit dicey
- Thread starter VGEsoterica
- Start date
no you can't. the only way you legally can have a rom or iso of a game is if you dumped them yourself.
downloading a rom is always illegal.
00_Zer0
Member
I could see Dolphin taking the keys out, but then that still doesn't keep the Dolphin Team from escaping Nintendo's wrath. Nintendo will still have proof those keys were in there for a long time.
They could claim Dolphin stole their intellectual property(keys) and distributed them illegally in the past, causing Nintendo irreversible damage.
With how crazy Nintendo is about sparing no expense at suing some of these people I could see the court system siding with Nintendo and demanding some ridiculous amount of compensation/fine...or maybe even jail time.
With how crazy and unpredictable the court system and judges are today who knows how this would all turn out.
sankt-Antonio
:^)--?-<
IMO it’s not price, it’s convenience. Nintendo could sell all their catalog for outrageous money and it would sell. Just needs to be less of a hassle then getting an emulator off of steam and downloading some roms from gif knows where.
DemonGamerTTT
Member
Yea, mate. Emulator use is above board, and absolutely not primarily a way to play pirated games….
Did you just get off the boat?
I don’t necessarily agree with Nintendo’s litigious nature, but I can understand why they pursue emulators and want them stopped.
Theres no such a thing as "right" or "wrong" everything is based on point of view.
Can you make the case on why emulators are "hurting" Nintendo businesses?
CleverCaviar
Member
I know what you mean, but to labour a point of clarity (be a boring arse basically), Nintendo can download ROMs of their stuff as much as they like - they own the copyrights.
Skifi28
Member
Agreed. Forks don't kill people, people kill people.
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Pretty sure Bleem lost in court, it was the other Playstation emu (Connectix) that was ok... and Sony just bought them out.
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Thaedolus
Member
It’s pretty simple:
If you’re distributing copyrighted material, you’re doing something illegal. Dolphin appears to have been doing something of a no no by including copyrighted decryption keys, or something close to that description, which means Nintendo has a right to shut that shit down.
If you’re reverse engineering a console without utilizing/distributing copyrighted info? Have at it. There’s nothing wrong with me plugging a cart or other software that I bought into another device legally capable of playing it.
Theft is wrong. Doing what you want with something you’ve legally obtained is not.
If you’re distributing copyrighted material, you’re doing something illegal. Dolphin appears to have been doing something of a no no by including copyrighted decryption keys, or something close to that description, which means Nintendo has a right to shut that shit down.
If you’re reverse engineering a console without utilizing/distributing copyrighted info? Have at it. There’s nothing wrong with me plugging a cart or other software that I bought into another device legally capable of playing it.
Theft is wrong. Doing what you want with something you’ve legally obtained is not.
Thaedolus
Member
Bleem didn’t lose in court, the mounting legal fees forced them out of business
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Thaedolus
Member
It wasn’t a loss on legal merits. A multinational conglomerate forcing a small business out of the market through malicious litigation isn’t anything anyone should be happy about.
I’m getting up there in age and may be very well out of my depth here, so cut me a lil slack.
If the dolphin emulator allows potential illegal use of pirated content, shouldn’t the developers do everything they can to combat that, or else be held accountable?
I mean look at YouTube. They created this streaming platform that users can upload anything they want. Even copyrighted material. So what does youtube do? They combat the potential illegal use of their platform to prevent the sharing of copyrighted material.
Shouldn’t Dolphin developers be held to a similar standard?
If the dolphin emulator allows potential illegal use of pirated content, shouldn’t the developers do everything they can to combat that, or else be held accountable?
I mean look at YouTube. They created this streaming platform that users can upload anything they want. Even copyrighted material. So what does youtube do? They combat the potential illegal use of their platform to prevent the sharing of copyrighted material.
Shouldn’t Dolphin developers be held to a similar standard?
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
I disagree.
Its pretty scummy to try and leech off someone else's IP and ecosystem for profit at a time when its still actively being sold.
Sorry but the argument that its justified because Sony are "so big" and these are the plucky "little guys" just doesn't sit right with me. Were the precedent to stand what's to prevent an established company doing the exact same thing to any up and coming competitor?
Why try to invest and innovate when you can simply mooch off of somebody else's stuff?
Thaedolus
Member
They weren’t leaching off their IP, that’s the point and why they didn’t lose on legal grounds. Bleem developed something that can do the same thing (and better) without utilizing Sony’s IP. That’s absolutely legal and if you have an issue with it, develop better/more secure IP rather than abusing the courts to drive someone out of business because you know they can’t afford the legal fees.
VGEsoterica
Member
Yes unfortunately sometimes the “right” party can’t afford to prove they are right so they can’t continue the fight due to legal fees
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Trust me as someone with Bleem 1.0: It didn't do the same thing "better". It was barely functional, a real piece of shit software.
Thaedolus
Member
Then the market should’ve been allowed to correct for that, not piling legal fees on the developer with dubious court claims
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
How can it be established that they arrived at the duplication of function fairly (i.e. not as the result of disassembly or any other sort of "unclean" method) without proving it in a court of law?
They put it out as commercial product in full knowledge that the owner of the thing they are piggy-backing off would be unhappy with the competition and demand them prove they created it within the existing legal framework... Sorry, but if they weren't prepared for a legal challenge, they were extremely foolish!
Thaedolus
Member
Sony and their lawyers could've established that themselves before filing. That would be the ethical thing to do. Obviously they didn't, because they didn't win.
They put out a commercial product knowing they hadn't violated the law, and the onus to prove that they had violated the law is on the company (Sony) making that claim. You shouldn't have to have millions of dollars lined up to prove a negative in court. Sony had to prove that Bleem violated the law, they didn't, but still used the court to bleed them dry. I have no idea why you think that's a good thing.
BlackTron
Member
The only way to fully legally play a game in an emulator is to dump your own legit copy of the game to make a ROM, and to load that ROM into the emulator.
Pirating the same game would just mean that someone else dumped their copy of the game, and gave it to you. That is -you downloaded it instead of dumped it, resulting in the same file. Dolphin has no idea where it came from.
NeverYouMind
Member
What concerns me is whether a hardware emulated reproduction of Wii/Gamecube and other key encrypted consoles would be illegal should things go sideways in this case?
That could potentially mean completely shutting down all future endeavours of specific hardware emulation in the parts of the world where these laws are enforced.
That could potentially mean completely shutting down all future endeavours of specific hardware emulation in the parts of the world where these laws are enforced.
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
No, its not for either party to judge. This is a thing that needs to be proven in a court of law because obviously both sides have a financial interest in being proven right. It demands arbitration by an independent authority.
FunkMiller
Member
Any point of view other than that emulators are predominantly used to play pirate games is wrong. Because they are. And always have been.
Now I don’t think Nintendo should bother chasing them down and getting them banned, but to claim that emulators are used as some glorious, legal means of preserving games by the vast, vast majority of people who use them, is ridiculous. They are used to pirate shit.
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genesisblock
Member
Is Nintendo going to go after the android version of the emulator as well or is this just got for PC?
Thaedolus
Member
Yes it is a thing for both parties to judge. When you’re making business decision, legal and ethical questions should always be considered in advance. I’m always advising my company on my interpretation of federal laws when determining how to proceed, that’s my job. It’s only when things are questionable and/or disputed between two parties that you should end up in court. But in this case, it’s not questionable or disputable. This was settled legally in the 80s with IBM PC clones. It’s totally legal to reverse engineer and clone hardware. Any lawyer worth a damn would know this and would advise Sony they didn’t have a case they could win. Sony brought the case anyway. My conclusion is they must’ve known they’d lose, but went to court anyway because they knew they’d run Bleem out of business with legal fees. Bleem was just a handful of guys, Sony knew they couldn’t afford a prolonged legal battle, even if it was brought on dubious grounds and went against settled law. So they crushed them. That’s a shitty thing to do.
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Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Yes, of course they brought the case. They had to send the message that they were prepared to protect their interests tooth-and-nail.
As I pointed out before, if a little company could bring this to market what's to stop a much bigger, richer, competitor from doing the exact same thing?
lordrand11
Member
Cars can be proven to be overwhelmingly used for nefarious purposes though, then it can be considered harmful.
The biggest reason Ninty hasn't sought this out in court to completely eradicate it is because they have a fairly large chance of losing which would establish a precedent for it's continued existence. Emulation isn't illegal as the software programs are working as intended without being bundled with any copyrighted works.
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Thaedolus
Member
And that’s a shitty thing to do when they don’t have legal grounds. Just being the big guy shouldn’t give you the justification to squash any competition. Most people view competition as a good thing for the market.
Nothing. And there’s nothing wrong with that. If Sony could reverse engineer the Switch to let me run games on my PS5 at 4K/60 I’d say hell yes, let’s go.
F0rneus
Tears in the rain
I'm pretty sure that accidental double posts are fine. You are in no danger. Now tell me what you think about Activision/Blizzard........
lordrand11
Member
What does ABK have to do with this?
Consolidation in the gaming industry has been happening unregulated for years, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo (to name the big three) have created shells of some of my personal favorite studios. At this point, I don't give two fucks about the ABK/MS purchase, I think Sony does the exact same damn thing that MS does and due to market position swings their weight around a bit more hardcore (especially considering their exclusivity arrangements with non first-party studios). If a large scale purchase like this needs to be regulated than we need to scrutinize **every** purchase by any competitive platform in gaming.
F0rneus
Tears in the rain
lordrand11
Member
Oh no I got it, figured I'd give my take anyway xD
Your sense of humor is broken I see...
Thaedolus
Member
I sure hope you haven’t bought anything on virtual console, or subscribed to Nintendo’s online service with all those NES, Genesis, SNES, and N64 games then, or bought Mario 3D All Stars, or any number of other commercial emulation projects…
Maybe I’m an outlier in that I don’t sell my old games and consoles, but emulation is a matter of convenience or a better experience for me. Yes, I have hundreds of old games on dozens of systems taking up space in my house. Yes I have a CRT and original hardware to play them on. No, I don’t want to always sit down in my office where those things are to play Mario 3. I’ve got a Switch and online subscription or my Steam Deck, and there’s no moral ambiguity about me playing a 30+ year old game my family first bought in the 80s, and I still physically own, and then bought again digitally probably another half dozen times, on a Steam Deck. And there’s no problem with me playing something I bought like TotK on Yuzu if I wanted to, though I’ve put 100 hours in on my launch day Switch because I want the glitch free experience.
All that old hardware is going to die eventually and emulation is the only way to preserve the old software. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, even if people are using it to pirate. Some people drive cars drunk, that doesn’t mean the majority of car drivers are doing so.
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Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Let me just say this; I honestly respect your position as a fan, I get it. But I just think the consequences at a business and creative level were such things to go unchecked would be severely negative.
Its very much like people who make these remakes and tributes to IP they don't own; I appreciate the passion and the effort, but you cannot take someone else's thing and try and make a commercial product out of it without their consent! That's just not right.
F0rneus
Tears in the rain
Well done. And well said.
Thaedolus
Member
Such things are checked by patent and copyright/IP laws though. There are actionable checks. What emulators and creators like the Bleem crew do is work inside this system and get around these checks. There’s nothing wrong with that.
That’s not what’s happening in a legit reverse engineering project. This is like arguing nobody should be able to make an automobile on an assembly line because Henry Ford did it first. That’s absurd.
BlackTron
Member
Concerning the existence of other emulators like on Android. I think it's a matter of context. Android is like the Windows of phones; it's an "open platform" and everyone knows the app store is not curated well and anything can get tossed on there, the opposite of Apple's walled garden approach.
On the other hand, Steam is a very successful platform with a narrow focus on gaming, and they even make a hardware in the same form factor. It's far more egregious and draws more attention to have it on their storefront.
If the keys were mistakenly included in a build on github, it is likely that Dolphin devs would have recognized and corrected the mistake before Nintendo noticed. But by drawing massive attention to yourself by pushing boundaries, you create an environment where you can't even make a tiny mistake because you put yourself under scrutiny.
On the other hand, Steam is a very successful platform with a narrow focus on gaming, and they even make a hardware in the same form factor. It's far more egregious and draws more attention to have it on their storefront.
If the keys were mistakenly included in a build on github, it is likely that Dolphin devs would have recognized and corrected the mistake before Nintendo noticed. But by drawing massive attention to yourself by pushing boundaries, you create an environment where you can't even make a tiny mistake because you put yourself under scrutiny.
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Thaedolus
Member
MVG found a post from years ago pointing this issue out. It really has nothing to do with where the software is being hosted, it’s to do with it containing copyrighted material, which seemingly has been known for years now. It’s a big misstep to keep copyrighted material in the software package, and Nintendo has a legit case to DMCA it here.
I’m not against companies protecting their IP and copyrighted material when something is legit stolen. But if someone legit reverse engineers a competitive solution in a clean room environment, go for it.
The Stig
Member
I also have my bleemcast disc for GT2, hence why i thought they won
FunkMiller
Member
I’d suggest that your situation is not all that common when it comes to emulator use.
I have nothing against them, but people are dragging Nintendo for trying to get rid of them, when it’s clear to see why they are doing it. I don’t think they should succeed, but we all know the reasons why, and from their point of view, it’s valid.
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Thaedolus
Member
I’m not dragging Nintendo for a valid protection of their IP in the case of Dolphin using copyrighted keys. But when they overstep and go after legit efforts to reverse engineer things without utilizing their IP, they can eat a dick.
I actually have no idea what proportion of users of emulators are pirating things, but I can almost guarantee the number of people emulating using officially licensed emulators on NSO, virtual console, or those mini consoles vastly outnumber them. And companies like Nintendo have been caught utilizing the open source scene in their own commercial products. Like, some NSO or virtual console games were verifiably using ROMs from the internet and others have used open source emulator code to rerelease their products. So let’s not pretend they’ve entirely kept their noses clean here either.
SF Kosmo
Al Jazeera Special Reporter
Which, let's be honest for a moment, it is. I mean yes, you can use emulators for things like homebrew development but their primary purpose, both intended and actual, is to run legacy software.
Trying to challenge this in court is fucking stupid. Regardless of if common sense is on your side, the law isn't. The laws are written to empower corporations, not to protect media archival or whatever.
diffusionx
Gold Member
If Dolphin is using keys that it is not allowed to use then it is screwed. Massive self-own by them and I would be surprised if they did quite frankly, but I guess reverse-engineering this stuff is really really difficult, and that is why most emulators of anything more modern than a SNES tells people to rip their own BIOS.
Define "harmful" and "nefarious", marijuana was illegal for decades yet every single mall in America had a head shop selling bongs and pipes that they claimed was for tobacco, everyone knew what it was for, but it's not illegal to sell a smoking device.
Define "harmful" and "nefarious", marijuana was illegal for decades yet every single mall in America had a head shop selling bongs and pipes that they claimed was for tobacco, everyone knew what it was for, but it's not illegal to sell a smoking device.
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theclaw135
Banned
Wii games are encrypted. Inherently, any significant emulation or modification to Wii software involves circumventing DRM.
Captain Toad
Banned
Nintendo protects their properties more than anyone else. They also have the most valuable properties in the industry and are the only ones who manage to keep their software value from dropping years after launch.
You might not like it, but I can't fault them for running their business like they do.
You might not like it, but I can't fault them for running their business like they do.
BlackTron
Member
True, but often that decryption can or would take place independently of the end user. For example, your ROM/ISO is already decrypted and therefore no decyption tech needs to work in the emulator.
While it is true that decyption is inherent to enabling the whole process, it isn't necessary to execute it or have the tools to do it every time you play either. Imagine if it was illegal to use 7zip, and then one person used 7zip to extract some files and then gave those files to everybody, who kept sharing them with each other. Even though 7zip was necessary to enable it, I wouldn't say that everyone in the entire chain is 100% guilty of using 7zip either -even if those files aren't 100% kosher for any myriad of other reasons. It would be far more egregious if 7zip was illegal and then built into File Explorer for Windows so everyone can just extract 7zip archives on the fly, every single time they access those files. Which is what Dolphin did by including the decryption keys in the Steam release.
Yeah it's inherently the same, but in a very different context that is much worse and asking for trouble.
Icymanipulator
Member
Family friendly on the outside.
Willing to jail humans in a cage and sue people over hacked saves on the inside.
Willing to jail humans in a cage and sue people over hacked saves on the inside.