We should have the high standard. Our entire site is based around passionately respecting licenses, which also means respecting the intentions and rights of the original artists. Few other sites are as strict. And people using art from our site can feel secure that they do have permission and consent to use our art.
We could instead only allow artists to upload their own art. Most other sites operate this way. It would remove any question about whether an artist is choosing the correct license or intending their art to be used in competing games. Then adding new art to OpenGameArt would be contacting an artist and inviting them to also share their art with us.
But we allow people to upload art made by others, because the sharing licenses are for this. Original members like qubodup helped build this collection by asking artists nicely, even if the license was clear.
This wikipedia case is an extreme example of a source for CC-BY-SA art that we would decline by default. We haven't even considered this before, because everyone assumed wikipedia promo screenshots are not meant for reuse in other games.
My stance on this is that "we don't care" is not at all the same as "we want our art to be reused in other games". All art here should be available with pride from the original artists.
Broforce is a closed commercial game. It would be confusing to share their art and plain illegal to use their Trademark without permission. Unless that team wants to publicly share usable game art instead of screenshots, we will not include it in our collection.
Hmmmmm..... welll.... that's complicated. Using a openly licensed screenshot for reuse in a games content...
is probably legal? but certainly not ethical. in our case particularly, we won't care.
Obviously our screenshots and such shouldn't be under CCBYSA 3 then, not sure which license to use then?
Here you can see one of the Broforce devs agree that scraping screenshots for reusable content is "certainly not ethical". And wondering if the license they chose is not the one they intended.
Situations like this is why it's always good to ask before uploading art that is not your own. We hold our collection to a higher standard than simply "trust what the license says".
I have been flexible in the past with art that is definitely marked as Public Domain or CC0. I think people who choose those licenses are more aware that their art can be used in any manner possible. But asking is nice, and may help invite another artist to join our community.
Facebook response from Basil (of BROFORCE team), reposted here with permission.
Hi Clint
Thanks so much for this! I did reply to his message which was (in a way) warning me about a few screenshots being on OpenGameArt. I wasn't altogether worried, as anyone could get the same quality, and newer, screenshots from youtube videos or anywhere else.
Great to know you are on top of things and thanks again for getting in touch about it :)
He said they would not have minded, but agreed it seemed unethical. I clarified that we aim to host art that is definitely, enthusiastically intended to be reused in games.
Redshrike I agree with you on that point about ethics and courtesy. I think it's okay for e.g. a beginner making a game to go through Wikipedia for art to use, and that doesn't have to be unethical. That even seems in the spirit of Wikipedia as a learning/knowledge resource.
It's different for us as a community site, where we're offering art guaranteed to have no commercial restrictions.
We should have the high standard. Our entire site is based around passionately respecting licenses, which also means respecting the intentions and rights of the original artists. Few other sites are as strict. And people using art from our site can feel secure that they do have permission and consent to use our art.
We could instead only allow artists to upload their own art. Most other sites operate this way. It would remove any question about whether an artist is choosing the correct license or intending their art to be used in competing games. Then adding new art to OpenGameArt would be contacting an artist and inviting them to also share their art with us.
But we allow people to upload art made by others, because the sharing licenses are for this. Original members like qubodup helped build this collection by asking artists nicely, even if the license was clear.
This wikipedia case is an extreme example of a source for CC-BY-SA art that we would decline by default. We haven't even considered this before, because everyone assumed wikipedia promo screenshots are not meant for reuse in other games.
My stance on this is that "we don't care" is not at all the same as "we want our art to be reused in other games". All art here should be available with pride from the original artists.
Broforce is a closed commercial game. It would be confusing to share their art and plain illegal to use their Trademark without permission. Unless that team wants to publicly share usable game art instead of screenshots, we will not include it in our collection.
From Ruan Rothmann on Twitter, one of the Broforce team.
Here you can see one of the Broforce devs agree that scraping screenshots for reusable content is "certainly not ethical". And wondering if the license they chose is not the one they intended.
Situations like this is why it's always good to ask before uploading art that is not your own. We hold our collection to a higher standard than simply "trust what the license says".
I have been flexible in the past with art that is definitely marked as Public Domain or CC0. I think people who choose those licenses are more aware that their art can be used in any manner possible. But asking is nice, and may help invite another artist to join our community.
Rainbow Design: I added links between the two comments so that my message and their response are easier to find.
Facebook response from Basil (of BROFORCE team), reposted here with permission.
My original message is above
License cleared, thanks for helping us MobileGameGraphics!
Fantastic theme for Klotski! I really like how these are done.
I had this twitter conversation with one of the BroForce creators.
https://twitter.com/clintbellanger/status/611225375708987392
He said they would not have minded, but agreed it seemed unethical. I clarified that we aim to host art that is definitely, enthusiastically intended to be reused in games.
Redshrike I agree with you on that point about ethics and courtesy. I think it's okay for e.g. a beginner making a game to go through Wikipedia for art to use, and that doesn't have to be unethical. That even seems in the spirit of Wikipedia as a learning/knowledge resource.
It's different for us as a community site, where we're offering art guaranteed to have no commercial restrictions.
Thanks! I've cleared this for download again.
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