[ARCHIVED] Individual Projects

Summary:

Individual, rather then community works

Individual Projects

Dr Gears 12 May 2012 13:37

Ok, i don't know about everyone else, but i've gotten a couple people asking questions about this, and i'd like to get some feedback.

Anything that combines the community at large, and anything relating to profit or money quickly becomes a nightmare. I understand that, and honestly, I think it's better off just being un-addressed. My current question is: what about individuals making a profit? That is to say…a designer wants to make a game or some such, and release it via steam for…say…5 bucks. On-board, they have a couple authors and their various items are being used in-game, and it has been decided to split any and all profits between the lot of them. Is that ok? Is this against both moral and legal guidelines?

Myself…i think this is fair. If it's your own work, i think it's fair to use it as you see fit. No community shop…but if you want to make a t-shirt with your critter on it, and sell it to some buddies, i don't think there's any harm…i don't know. I'm out of my depth here. What do people feel about addressing this?

Re: Individual Projects

DrEverettMann 12 May 2012 14:50

I've actually talked to this with a few others on staff. Personally, I think this is fair. It's certainly legal. I think it's morally fair (though I think that the author of an SCP used should get some cut of the profits, even if it's a minor one).

However, I think now might still be a little too close to the April Fools disaster to announce this. Wait another couple of months, and then see how people take it.

And on a practical level, if anyone wants to do this, there's absolutely nothing we can do to stop them, provided they use the CC license and use proper attribution.

Re: Individual Projects

Dr Gears 12 May 2012 20:29

I kind of guessed as much. I would hope people would at least ask us or the individual authors if they were going to turn a profit off stuff, but i don't think there's a direct, legal issue with it.

I live in terror of the day i see the SCP symbol on a black tee-shirt in one of those "meme-wear" kiosks in the mall…

Re: Individual Projects

DrEverettMann 12 May 2012 22:25

The thing we have to be ready for–the thing we ultimately have to accept–is that when this does happen, there's nothing we can do to stop it. People can legally use anything on the wiki, for profit, as long as they follow the terms of the license. We can't stop them. The most we can do is frown in their direction.

The best we can do, I think, is provide guidelines. Let people know that we don't own a lot of the images on the site, and therefor those can't be used. We can explain how to use the license as best possible. We can strongly urge them to only use SCPs with permission (with the knowledge that there's no way we can stop them if they do so without it). If it's going to happen, we may as well give our support to those who do so right.

Last edited on 12 May 2012 22:26 by DrEverettMann Show more

Re: Individual Projects

Sorts 12 May 2012 18:01

I think it's fair to note that everything we've created sprang out of someone using a photo of a sculpture by an artist who had no input on 173 or anything that we've done since. And the author of 173 himself is not active in the community. If someone builds off of our work in the way we have built off theirs we really should look at that in a similar light.

Re: Individual Projects

AdminBright 12 May 2012 18:27

As long as people don't use other peoples stuff for money… Like, I'd be upset if someone were using Dr. Bright in a game they're getting money for, and not giving any to me.

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Admin, SCP Wiki

Re: Individual Projects

Dr Gears 12 May 2012 20:26

That was my centeral idea. I mean, as long as the authors are ok with whatever is going on, profit or no, i think it's fine to use what you yourself made for…well, whatever purpose. Like you said, just snatching stuff without permission is less ok, and for profit even less so.

Re: Individual Projects

Adam Smascher 13 May 2012 01:52

I feel exactly the same about this as I do about the other proposals for turning a profit from the SCPF and its assorted fiction, which I posted about here and here. Specifically, that without the backbone of the rest of the fiction, no singular author's contributions have the slightest bit of relevance. The pertinent sections being:

No single person could have built the site into what it is now; even so, whether or not they could have is a moot consideration, as they did not. That just about anything posted here is relevant is due to the contributions of far more than singular authors. Publishing anything SCP related for profit, even if it is your own work, is still relying heavily on the success of the community-built site. That is, it is leeching off the success of the work others have put into this collaborative fiction endeavor for individual personal gain, and that's just not right.

It's greedy, dishonest, and taints the thing I've always loved most about the site: that none of this was for profit. That this was just a bunch of like-minded people who banded together on 4chan behind a throw-away creepypasta and built it into something much more for no other reason than they enjoyed scaring the piss out of people. I feel that bringing money into the equation, in addition to causing a slew of problems we don't need and upsetting people for no good reason, would destroy the pure artistic nature of this project.

And…

I would rather nobody make money from the site. We're by the community, for the community. I cannot get behind an official RPG¹ that people are profiting from for the exact same reasons I outlined above. Similar to how no SCP would be nearly as relevant without the rest of them, an official RPG² would be even less relevant without the collective contributions of the entire site community backing it up. Most people wouldn't give a shit if it wasn't for the rest of the site.

No one came into this with the slightest inkling that they were exhaustively building the means for someone else to make money. To turn around and do so is just wrong. None of our works are anything without the rest; the SCPF as it is now is not the product of single authors. If people want to use their works in for-profit endeavors, then they should not be using anything related to the SCP Foundation, because the SCP Foundation is not their creation.

Footnotes

1. The thing in question was an RPG, but this applies to anything done for-profit, be it a videogame, TCG, book, or what have you, and applies regardless of whether or not it's "official."

2. Again, freely substitute videogame, TCG, etc.

Re: Individual Projects

AdminBright 13 May 2012 03:46

So, what should we do about it, if people are making money off of it?

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Admin, SCP Wiki

Re: Individual Projects

Adam Smascher 13 May 2012 04:29

As Mann says, we frown at them. Make it clear we don't endorse it. We could also go a step further. If it's a game, a rulebook, whatever, we would be within our rights to provide torrent links.

Re: Individual Projects

Dr Gears 13 May 2012 23:59

Ok, fair enough…but here's the rub. Our disapproval aside, this is going to happen. Maybe not right away, but soon. Wouldn't it make more sense to at least have some kind of guidelines in place for how to deal with this sort of thing? I fear that if we just frown on/deny this sort of thing, we're going to go down the route that so many game companies seem to be treding.

I think there should be some kind of guide line in place for this. Give credit where credit is due, involve the authors that created what's being used…the SCP "logo" itself is more sticky in that reguard, but i think that's less of an issue. I'm sorry if this upsets you Adam, and i know money is always a issue no matter where you go…but this is going to happen. we've hit a critical mass, and if it's not around already, there will be some kind of SCP Shop or other trinket warehouse set up soon. I'd rather have a guiding hand in that, rather then just say "No." and just…hope, and disapprove of what does come.

I think an individual, if given the oppertunity to do something more with their work/writing, should be able to persue it for fun and/or profit with, if not the outright blessing of the site, at least a lack of disapproving glares.

Re: Individual Projects

Kain Pathos Crow 14 May 2012 01:30

I'm with Gears here. Regardless of what we personally feel, this is going to happen. What we can do is be prepared and have an idea of what to do, giving us a modicum of control over the situation. For people who come to ask our permission, provide links, give feedback, make them feel welcome. For people who don't, or people who we feel are treating the source material badly, we merely state that they're not endorsed, and don't have anything to do with us.

Re: Individual Projects

Adam Smascher 14 May 2012 06:31

Just because it's believed to be an inevitability doesn't mean we need to hurry it along, or do it ourselves, or give other people ideas.

And there will be glares. If someone wants to use their own works for profit, they should use things independent of the SCP Foundation.

There is an alternative I would endorse. And I think it's a lot better than barreling down a path we're ill-prepared for with the nebulous prospect that someone else could beat us to it.

We could establish the Foundation as a non-profit organization. It would be a legal entity, able to hold property. Costs a couple hundred dollars to register as one, depending on the state, and some states have recurring annual fees to keep the organization on the books. We could change our license so that this non-profit owns rights to all works posted after the change while still affording authors some rights, or we could switch to CC Non-Commercial, or stay as we are, whatever. Nobody would pocket anything as a result of this, and we can still produce whatever merchandise people fancy. It's just held in an account we can draw from to pay for upkeep of the non-profit status, hosting (once we get to that point), etc, and we could use it to actually fund an SCP Foundation get-together or something if we actually managed to bring in enough. This is a lot more honest than decreeing every man for themselves and bastardizing what so many have worked to build.

SpikeBrennan can explain this non-profit business further. He knows a lot more about this than I do.

Re: Individual Projects

TroyL 14 May 2012 06:39

I would like to hear more from Spike. I'd like to know exactly what process it would be, costs, etc. before I endorse anything, because this sounds like exactly what we need.

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"WELL FOUNDATION. YOU MADE IT SO EASY. SO VERY VERY EASY." - dimensionpotato

Re: Individual Projects

spikebrennan 14 May 2012 09:57

Will start a separate forum thread when I get a chance. Nusquam's brief explanation is an OK starting point- this was an off-the-cuff idea I had floated in admin chat a week or two ago.

Last edited on 06 Apr 2013 20:19 by TroyL Show more

Re: Individual Projects

Dr Gears 14 May 2012 14:25

this sounds rather great, and i like the idea…but i guess my base question is about individuals who get in to projects and such. Say someone wants to use 682 in a film or something, and is offering some kind of money for the use thereof. I think it's fair for an author, in this situation, to accept it.

I'm all for a not-for-profit shop to help keep the site up, my question was more for the individuals who may do things with their work and such.

Re: Individual Projects

AdminBright 14 May 2012 19:21

like this Xerxes guy who keeps talking about how he's trying to make a video game to sell based on the Foundation.

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Admin, SCP Wiki

Re: Individual Projects

Adam Smascher 14 May 2012 20:37

I think the cut from, say, 682 being in a film should go toward the entire Foundation and not the author, because 682 is nothing without it. Again, the Foundation is not the product of singular authors. That any part of it is relevant is due to everything. It's part of the collective that everyone adds to and refines. 682 specifically is its own microcosm of this, with the open termination log anyone can add to and that itself references numerous SCPs, which contributes immensely to its popularity.

Last edited on 14 May 2012 20:45 by Adam Smascher Show more

Re: Individual Projects

Kain Pathos Crow 15 May 2012 21:26

Saying we do indeed get a large amount of cash for this kind of thing? Aside from hosting costs and all that crap, and self sustaining, hypothetically, what would we do with the extra money?

I mean, why not sorta… I dunno, make our own books? Or games? Or even movies? Again, non profit, but have each venture sponsor the next?

Though, again, this is merely long term hypothetical, but dreams are nice yanno?

Oh, and if we do get made into this kind of non profit organization, who's going to pony up the opening cash? Will all the heads pool it together, or ask for donations, or even go for a Kickstarter?

Re: Individual Projects

Sophia Light 16 May 2012 03:55

Last time we had a donation drive, as far as I recall, that went over really well, and with a bit of advertising… We could probably draw $200 pretty easily.
Also, I hear that nonprofit registration is pretty hard to do, but if we can, it sounds great. Question, so if we went to non-commercial CC or whatever- the nonprofit could use the stuff for commercial purposes (well, so that the money would go to the nonprofit), but others would not? We'd have to make a great transparency policy or something so that users are completely certain that we're not making money from their stuff.