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Re: bnetd and DMCA



On Thu, Feb 21, 2002 at 01:33:23PM +0100, Robert Millan wrote:
> If you check http://www.bnetd.org, you'll find
> a note explaining that their project has been
> branded as illegal by the DMCA.

s/DMCA/Blizzard/

> Bnetd is a server for networked playing with propietary
> Blizzard games like Starcraft or Diablo. It aims to provide
> the same features as the official BattleNet service.
> 
> Those games are protected in a way that server addresses
> cannot be changed in order to use an unofficial server,
> but the bnetd project (and others, even blizzard itself
> used to) provides a tool to hack the game so that
> unofficial addresses can be used.
> 
> What Blizzard claims is not well specified:
> 
> "The aforementioned site either hosts or distributes software which 
> illegally
> modifies and/or alters Blizzard Entertainment copyrighted software or
> bypasses anti-circumvention technology, thereby infringing upon Blizzard
> Entertainment copyrights."

*I* don't think that's a legitimate invocation of the DMCA. IANAL.

The whole argument is spurious anyway.

> The Debian package only contains the server code, which is
> written as free software from scratch.
> 
> Is that package illegal?

No. Afaik, Debian has not received a cease-and-desist, and no court
has ruled that distributing bnetd is illegal.

If Blizzard sent us such a notice, we might pull the package rather
than argue the point...

> If it does indeed break the DMCA, would it be any problem
> in distributing it outside the US, where this law [1] does
> not prevail?

Not until the international versions come into force, no.

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ | Dept. of Computing,
 `. `'                          | Imperial College,
   `-             -><-          | London, UK



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