alert- ebay member "orienblack" is selling thecoverproject covers for $15 a pop!

[AppleQueso]

Honestly, my problem isn't so much that he's selling this stuff, it's that he's passing it off as his own.

I have grown frustrated looking for my copy of Wii Sports. I always seem to find the sleeve under my other games or being used as a drink coaster when I have company. So I thought it would be a great idea to make a case for it. Now I never guess where Wii Sports has disappeared off to. This case looks like a store bought game. And now you too can enjoy having Wii Sports in a custom case that looks and feels like the real deal.

If he was at least being courteous enough to link to our site and provide the printed and already cased games as a service, I'd have no problem.

[AppleQueso]

another guy is selling covers from our site (even found my Silent Hill covers). I didn't report him or anything, just sent a message:

Dear evie_1971,

Hi, I'm from http://www.thecoverproject.net/

Website sound familiar?

I personally made a few of those DVD covers you're selling. If you're going to sell materials taken from our website, could you at least credit us and give a link to our site in your auctions?

I know the common response here is to demand they stop selling, but honestly I'd just like to see us credited. If individual buyers still want to buy from this guy instead of doing it themselves using covers taken from here, that's their choice.

Anyhow, I'll post any followups, if he's respectful I say we leave him alone. If not... well there's always that report button.

UPDATE he was very friendly and cooperative and agreed to link to our site

[BadChad]

Thats all that needs to be done. If they wanna be asses, then take that next step.

[Mick Dundee]

sadly there are only 4 eBay items right now that contain thecoverproject.net in the description:
http://desc.shop.ebay.com/i.html?_nkw=thecoverproject.net&_sacat=0&_odkw=thecoverproject.net&_osacat=0&bkBtn=&LH_TitleDesc=1&_trksid=p3286.m270.l1313&_rdc=1

[AppleQueso]

sadly there are only 4 eBay items right now that contain thecoverproject.net in the description:
http://desc.shop.ebay.com/i.html?_nkw=thecoverproject.net&_sacat=0&_odkw=thecoverproject.net&_osacat=0&bkBtn=&LH_TitleDesc=1&_trksid=p3286.m270.l1313&_rdc=1

When I checked this link when you initially posted it, one of those 4 WAS one of this seller's items. He said to give him until the end of the day, so I'm not worried.

[Mick Dundee]

i guess...... but clicking it again and looking up the items individually i see he/she took it back out of the info.

[TheValeman]

I think a little perspective is in order here.

Anything we put up on this site .... barring completely custom created artwork .... is actually illegal anyway. Whatever way you look at it the copying of original artwork is copyright infringement. It doesn't matter that you may have bought the bare game second hand from Ebay etc and just want a nice cover/case for it. Or you want to put it in a DVD case instead of a CD case. The owner of the cover in question has complete control over how they want their product delivered etc.

In light of that I personally don't have too big a problem if someone takes my N64 covers and sells someone a UGC so they can protect their original cart and make it look nice on a shelf. Sure it miffs me when we don't get credit for the cover ... but considering the legal issues of doing what we are doing I can't see the problem. Hey, if someone is stupid enough to buy a UGC+cover for $15 then they probably have too much money or no common sense. Or Both 

What I DO object to is using our covers to facilitate pirated material, especially around CD/DVD based games. I have always objected to us hosting covers for CD/DVD based products given how easy it is for people to copy them. You can always say that people get those second hand without covers too but we all know that the vast majority of people are probably using copied games. That's why I was happy to get my huge collection of N64 covers up here but after I uploaded a few Dreamcast/PSX games I felt it wasn't aligned with my views to put any more up. That's just my thoughts on the matter ....

[Snowcone]

I agree with just about everything TheValeman had to say on this topic. We don't own the work and we honestly have no say what others do with it in any capacity. Sure it sucks, but I'd never risk selling these simply because it could jeopardize our ability to continue to provide these to the community.

I don't condone piracy either, but I've bought enough second hand games missing covers that I see the value for storing disc based game covers.

Anyway, the bottom line is that people will always try to make a quick buck doing something without any effort. That's all this is. It's not the first time and it's not the last time it'll happen.

[TheValeman]

Agreed.

While I personally have issues with putiing up CD/DVD based covers I certainly don't care that others choose to do so. It's purely a personal thing in that regard. And I would hate to see great artwork lost forever etc ... it's invariably the preservation vs potential misuse aspect that plagues all retro preservation efforts and not just covers. At www.retromags.com for instance we scan old gaming magazines but we draw the line at 1999 so as to limit potential damage to companies selling currently available titles. Doesn't make it right AT ALL but as with N64 covers .... they are really old school retro so it's somewhat easier on the conscience.

Snowcone once stated that our site wouldn't have any impact on the Chinese knock off merchants as they simply buy one original and print a zillion copies and I agree with him 100% on that one.

But it only takes one Company .. Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo ... to decide that we are infringing on their IP and they could come down on us like a ton of bricks. Far less likely to happen over N64 , Genesis or SNES than because we have Wii covers etc. Hence a certain self preservation aspect to my comments as well.

I freely admit that I sold off my N64 collection in UGC's with printed covers and had no issues with it because they were original manuals and carts so from my perspective I didn't see anything wrong with it. So I do get that you will get original disc games sold without covers too. That's why I don't have too many issues if someone wants to make an original cart/disc look nicer and store safer for a potential buyer.

[AppleQueso]

I generally agree, but I need to respond to a few things.

What I DO object to is using our covers to facilitate pirated material, especially around CD/DVD based games. I have always objected to us hosting covers for CD/DVD based products given how easy it is for people to copy them. You can always say that people get those second hand without covers too but we all know that the vast majority of people are probably using copied games. That's why I was happy to get my huge collection of N64 covers up here but after I uploaded a few Dreamcast/PSX games I felt it wasn't aligned with my views to put any more up. That's just my thoughts on the matter ....

I'm going to have to strongly object to this assertion. Finding disc based games second hand without covers is extremely common, anybody who collects any amount of Playstation, Dreamcast, Saturn, Xbox, Gamecube, etc games can tell you this. Not to mention, just taking one look around at the posters on this forum will tell you that a vast majority of us are collectors. It's no coincidence that our site is popular among collector-oriented sites such as Racketboy. I honestly do believe that the number of people who use our covers for pirated games is very much in the minority compared to people using them to house their actual collections. Besides, I doubt a pirate cares too much about how their collection looks on a shelf anyhow.

But it only takes one Company .. Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo ... to decide that we are infringing on their IP and they could come down on us like a ton of bricks. Far less likely to happen over N64 , Genesis or SNES than because we have Wii covers etc. Hence a certain self preservation aspect to my comments as well.

Given our low visibility compared to similar sites, don't you think that if there was any danger in us getting shut down that we would've seen a site like cdcovers.cc threatened with legal action long before us? We may be technically infringing on their copyrights, but we're not depriving them of profit. Nintendo likely knows about us, as to most of the major companies, and they aren't concerned because nothing we're doing is harming them. Shutting us down would be nothing but a PR nightmare and a waste of their own money and resources..

And we don't facilitate piracy. We never have, and honestly don't think we ever could. The only way we would be facilitating piracy would be if we were providing a means to obtaining or using pirated games. Cover art doesn't do that.

[tiktektak]

Even if we would get problems with one of the big companies like N or M we then could just drop support for the newer stuff and it would be all good wouldn't it?

[AppleQueso]

Even if we would get problems with one of the big companies like N or M we then could just drop support for the newer stuff and it would be all good wouldn't it?

Likely they'd ask us to cease hosting all of their covers.

That's assuming it's even likely that they'd give us trouble to begin with.

[ShaggyB]

I see your point, but still if you set something free over the net then don't be surpised or upset how it plays out. Thats just the nature of the net. Also this person could have just been charging for teh assembly of them or 15 for the case, I mean there no way to know for sure. This just has a number of auguments within it that you can not balance, and for people that created something to begin with that they didn't have permission to go playing with to then get upset when they see someone else using it, should be taken as a compliment to them instead of an insult. If one person is guilty in a situation like this then everyone is guilty, because it began with the people that created these things to begin who  didn't have permission by the companys to use the names of the games or the art.

As I said there is a doulbe standard being set here, and for people (including the admins) to start pointing fingers is crazy. People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. From what i see the whole site is based on peaple making covers for games they don't have any permission or rights too(I'll stand corrected if someone posts their rights), and the site will even give you the tools you need to do it yourself with.  

By all means please explain this to me?

wow, just wow.

anyway, I know alucardian is a troll, but MisterCreazil is exactly right, TCP covers contain IP from the original release, even if they are put together/cleaned up by us, thus I don't think any of us think we have any rights to them ourselves.

what we do have the right to do, indeed our duty is to make sure no one ever sells them, including us, they are free for everyone, period.

I agree... though i have purchased one from ebay as a convenience (though adding up the cost of shipping an official ds case and printing the cover on regular paper.... dude only made $1. But they used glossier paper so prolly less)

though i think it really comes down to the profit one is making.... A little for ones time and cost of materials seems fine... but I too would more enjoy the site being credited.

[TheValeman]

This particular issue crops up every few months and someone usually goes to town on it.

We have no legal rights to host this stuff whatsoever. The fact we are under the radar is irrelevant to the legalities of the situation. It may simply be luck that we haven't been asked to remove the files, either by the copyright owners OR the sites Hosting company. That happened to us over at www.retromags.com and it caused a heap of issues believe me. Asking people to say where they got the files from COULD ... I stress COULD ... cause more issues for us than doing nothing about it.

Example ... someone buys a PS3 game off EBAY to find it is a copy. Makes a complaint to Sony. Sony looks at auction and see's our site mentioned. Lawyers visit Snowcone.

This is probably a bit of an overkill example but given the knock-off volumes on EBAY it does represent a potential issue. All I am saying is that sometimes staying below the radar by not advertising yourself has better long term effects for the cause than the feel good factor of getting your name out there.

[thesubcon3]

Exactly, that's how I have always conducted my site as well.

In all honesty, this site will likely never get a cease order because it is free publicity/advertising for the companies and their products. It's not like this domain is making any money off of selling the covers and there aren't tons of ads. It would be where as Valeman said, people advertising on eBay who are making money off the covers with copyright infringement, could get adverse attention directed towards the site. And while the majority don't approve of selling them, we can't really do anything about it except put in complaints on eBay.