Copyright and Games
– Dr Daithi Mac Sithigh
– Dr Keith M Johnston
– Dr Tom Phillips
Summary
How does copyright law (and other legal mechanisms) promote or restrain the development of business models, creative platforms and payment mechanisms in relation to the video game sector? The project considered issues such as licensing, ‘software’ and ‘artistic’ rights, and fraud, from the perspective of developers and users. The role of games as part of the development of a ‘transmedia’ was a key concern, and the extent to which legal certainty and technological innovation facilitate fluidity across platforms, was explored through a roundtable, interviews, and a ‘best practice’ guide.
Project activities
In his blog post entitled Flappy Bird in Context: Using the ‘Games and Transmedia’ Workshop to Examine Gaming’s Current Phenomenon Tom Phillips explores the controversy and context surrounding the release – and withdrawal – of one of the most successful recent mobile gaming titles. This is compared with some of the topics of discussion that arose during a December 2013 workshop organised as part of this work package. Held on 6th December 2013 at the University of Edinburgh the event attracted a range of attendees from the games industry and academia, including Brian Baglow of the Scottish Games Network, Chris Bruce from Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, Ben Farrand of the University of Strathclyde, Yin Harn Lee of University of East Anglia, Nicoll Hunt from I Fight Bears, Rami Ismail of Vlambeer, Ifty Khan, Freelance Games Journalist Rick Lane, Elaine Reynolds from Enterprise Ireland, and Mudlark‘s Matt Watkins
In Industry Talking to Industry: The Develop Conference 2013 Tom Phillips documents the experience of industry engagement at the 2013 Develop Conference in Brighton.
Project outputs include:
- The Hunger (for) Games – presented at BILETA Annual Conference, Norwich, UK, April 2014
- Multiplayer games: tax, copyright, consumers and the video game industries, European Journal of Law and Technology, 2014
- A ‘step into the abyss’ Transmedia in the UK Games and Television Industries, International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations (IJGCMS)
- Discussions with Developers: Free2Play and the Changing Landscape of Games Development, Social, Casual, Mobile: Changing Games
- Don’t clone my indie game, bro”: Informal cultures of videogame regulation in the independent sector, Cultural Trends, Volume 25, 2016
- International Cultures of Creativity and Imitation – presented at DiGRA Annual Conference, Luneburg, Germany, May 2015
- Copyright and Games, Roundtable Workshop, Edinburgh, UK, 6th December 2013 to 6th December 2013
- Second Copyright and Games Workshop, London, 6th May 2014 to 6th May 2014
- Industry Talking to Industry: The Develop Conference 2013 blog post
- Flappy Bird in Context: Using the ‘Games and Transmedia’ Workshop to Examine Gaming’s Current Phenomenon blog post
- Project poster