[Oblivion Knight]

I just figured I'd pass on a message..

It's up to you whether or not to take the advice, but I suggest you do so.

Well guys, this is what I have done after a recent local issue: I have disabled my arcade and recommend all others do the same. Why? It is pretty obvious after a recent string of US court actions, including one here locally:

Guy was found with copyrighted games and images on his IPB site. Small site, with about 500 regular members. The guy claimed most of the games and images he picked up off of download sites. Several of the games listed were the games provided with the ORIGINAL arcade hacks. He had ads and donate links on his site, therefore the court felt he was making a profit off of the display of games/images. Guy had nothing signed in PAPER; no PRINTED agreement from the MANUFACTURER or an AUTHORIZED distributor of the materials. Records and backup files from his ISP were used.

1 year probation
No online site creation or hosting while on probation
$5000 fine plus $10 per game/$2 per image involved
Forfeiture of his online forum licenses.

John would need to enter into an official agreement with these providers as a distributor, with the games having hard-coded copyright data. Then John would have to provide indemnifying software and license agreements to all users of the software.

The above court issue came about because one company complained about use of their games - that company's games are included in the basic install of v3Arcade.

This tells me that John knows enough about copyrights to get us all into trouble.