N +

I hate to be the guy who spoils everyone fun, but copyright laws apply to the internet also. People 'own' those pictures and when you take them from another site without permission it is a form of theft. And cleaning off their watermarks is the worst kind since the watermark are put there to discourage theft.

I am not so sure on that sir, as I am sure that when IGN take images directly from sites like smashbros.com and watermark them they don't OWN the image. I think they sorta "own" the image if it rests on their servers... like the ones in our gallery rest in our servers.

i know what you guys missed

in the Metroid Prime 3 preview on the wii... the "paint" pictures

kakashi! great call! do you know where to find them?

As long as we aren't making any money hosting the images (like selling them) or calling them our own we're not violating any sort of copyright law. These images were released to the public as publicity images to advertise the game; they're still owned by Nintendo, but everyone is free to display the images without monetary gain.

But the metroid prime preview channel updates every 3 days. I would like to ask a question.

When you go to the preview channel, you usually get the same entrance, like the connecting screen. And once you get to the preview selection screeen, it usually has two videos that arent available till a sertain time. Today is the 20th, and both of the unavailable prievews are now available. But the videos are supposed to be available on the 20th, but only are available on the 20th at 5:00 pm. They should be viewable on the 20th at 12 in the morning. But that is not so.

Is this a small glitch? Or is it only true for my console?

Please inform me on this issue. Thankyou.

Suggesting it's not theft because you're not selling them is the same as suggesting sharing MP3's is ok when people aren't paying you for them. And when you remove someone elses watermark and add you're own that can be interpreted to be a claim of ownership.

Nobody is likely going to care. It's just that so many people think if it's on the internet then it's free to copy and distribute. But the usual copyright laws apply. And if you check IGN's site:

"The Content [including all Web site design, text, graphics, photos, audio, video] is protected by copyright, trademark, service mark, patent and other proprietary rights and laws. Publication, sale, redistribution in any form or medium, as well as modification or use of the Content, except as expressly permitted, is prohibited without the prior written permission of IGN."

MP3s are rips of intellectual property meant to be purchased. It's illegal to distribute them. Distributing screenshots of a video game released to the public by Nintendo for public distribution is not the same thing as illegally ripping CDs to produce MP3s for the intent of distribution. The screenshots are owned by Nintendo, not IGN or whatever website receives them, and are meant to be so. You cannot, however, intend on selling these pictures for monetary gain which we are not.

IGN cannot claim ownership of screenshots released to the public as a result of a Nintendo press release by placing a watermark. We nowhere on this website claim ownership of those screenshots. IGN however, does, and has been sued countless times for this practice and will continue to do so. Nintendo sued them a few years back for claiming ownership of property owned by Nintendo. I believe they've been sued more than once by Microsoft. Nintendo owns the screenshot, and has released it to the public for free distribution. All of these screenshots can be found elsewhere without a watermark of any kind. If Cap'n decides to take a screenshot from IGN and place a watermark of his own over the top of it so be it. The watermark doesn't say "CAPTAIN SEAGULL OWNS THIS SCREENSHOT" does it?

We are, however, doing one thing wrong, and I've expressed this before to the other moderators, and before long we will be doing this if I have my way. We should have to produce a citation for every single picture we use that isn't owned by us such as... let's take the Samus picture at the top as an example. This was an illustration done by someone on deviantArt. It should say something like this:

Source: NameofArtist on deviantArt. Samus Aran © Nintendo.

Like I said if I have my way we will start doing this in the not so distant future.

oh people will die!... Oh sorry, wrong movie quote... It shall be done.

Erhem! Is anyone really going to agree on sumthing here? Your like two little kids arguing over heaven and hell. Please stop, and answer some real questions. PLEASE?

@Noah<insertlongstringofmeaninglessdigits>:
No it wasn't a glitch. The videos are only available when Nintendo gets them available whatever time it might be that day. We didn't answer it because it was rather obvious what the answer was.

Arguing? Meh, it's such a negative word.

Just because I was bored I was reading about copyright on screenshots. I didn't see anything specific for games but it seems screenshots of software, regardless of who created them, remain the property of the software developer. So you would be correct, IGN does not or cannot own a screenshot - unless they own the game. I had never heard they had be sued - I did always think it was strange that they watermarked images that were obviously provided by Nintendo, such as artwork.

But I'm pleased you agree that the source of "art work" should cited. I know many on DeviantArt would give their approval to use their work in such ways.