If you could add one thing to Vanilla Doom

[fraggle]

myk said:

I already referred to the distribution package and how the distributable item is that package (the installation files) and not some "unpacked result" (the modified IWAD.) What the author gives you is only the portion he made, more or less, which is dependent on that mix with IWAD content. That distributed portion, as it is, is protected by copyrights. My position does not assume the author shares any conception with me. On the contrary, my position is opposed to the idea that we can assume what the author thinks without hearing it from him. It simply abides by copyright.

Graf Zahl said:

Sigh...

Sometimes I get really tired by all this copyright bullshit. I have to agree with Gez about one thing: When copyright becomes an ideology that only serves itself it's lost.

I actually agree with both of you. Copyright can be really annoying and a colossal waste of time a lot of the time. Unfortunately, it's just the way it is. Myk is right - the authors have distributed their work in a particular form that, by our current standards, is nothing but a huge timewaster. We really ought to just get rid of it and upload plain zipped versions, but we can't - legally, at least. The text files for these WADs specifically say "you may not modify this".

Realistically you could fix them anyway, stick them on a website and nobody would probably complain, but I doubt you'll get them past Ty. It would be nice to have proper fixed versions in /idgames.

I would really like to see an organised effort to identify old WAD files that have been packaged in silly ways, then to locate the authors of these things and get their permission to upload fixed versions.

I actually have a vested interest in making this happen. One of my crazy pie in the sky ideas is for an automated WAD downloader for Chocolate Doom, to allow people to play classic mods just by selecting them from a list. One of the main things that put me off when I looked into it was the oddball mods like these ones - such a program would need to be able to deal with ARJ and LHA files in addition to ZIP, for example. Yuck.

[Maes]

Well for the particular case of OTTAWAU we can wait for the author's input. I sent him an introductory email about the situation, so hold your breath. It will be interesting to see his point of view on the matter.

[kristus]

Csonicgo said:

well, there is Happy Doom, that was mentioned in the DOOM FAQ long ago. one look at that makes you wonder how the hell the author expected that to work at all. And there are some that no longer exist on the internet. :(

It lacks the file DMGRAPH (this is one of those kinds of mods I spoke about earlier)

Maes said:

Here, have fun. That's the bad news ;-)

I gotta hand it to you. You sure found one fucked up specimen there. But what will actually change after you ran the installation thingy? It seem like it wanna change the EXE. But how, and is there anything more than that?

[Graf Zahl]

Maes said:

Here, have fun. That's the bad news ;-)

Holy shit! That's got to be the most screwed up distribution I've ever seen...

[Creaphis]

fraggle said:

We really ought to just get rid of it and upload plain zipped versions, but we can't - legally, at least.

Actually, the more I think about this point the less I'm convinced of it. The line between package and object is extremely fine, as the ultimate natures of both are the same invisible differences in magnetism; but a distinction can still be drawn, made more obvious by analogy. When I play some old Doom mod, what I see as the intellectual property is the levels, graphics or other modifications themselves - ie. everything that can possibly be encountered while the work is being used. Much in the same way, when watching a movie, what comprises the work, the intellectual property, is the movie as it is viewable, not the basic molecular composition of the physical apparati that make viewing the movie possible. Now, let's pretend that I'm watching a movie from a DVD, which some selfless filmmaker has placed under a Creative Commons license with a no-derivates clause. Let's also pretend that I have some superbly luddite friend who only has a VHS player. I make a copy and hand it to him. Is transcribing the movie from one format, ie. physical package, to another, in violation of copyright? In any remote, idealistic way? If it isn't, then in what important way do digital distribution packages differ?

[Never_Again]

[DuckReconMajor]

You MAY distribute this WAD, provided you include this file, with no modifications.

You can distribute it any way you want, as long as the text file has no modifications.

Yay for dangling modifiers!

[Super Jamie]

DuckReconMajor said:

You can distribute it any way you want, as long as the text file has no modifications.

Yay for dangling modifiers!

Actually, if you follow proper punctuation rules, the part of a sentence between the commas is supposed too be removable whilst still having the remainder mean the same thing.

Much like that one.

[DuckReconMajor]

Super Jamie said:

Actually, if you follow proper punctuation rules, the part of a sentence between the commas is supposed too be removable whilst still having the remainder mean the same thing.

Much like that one.

Actually, if you follow proper sentence structure, both clauses after the commas are removable. And the meaning of the remaining sentence cannot be compared to one whose meaning is up to interpretation.

[GreyGhost]

Csonicgo said:

well, there is Happy Doom, that was mentioned in the DOOM FAQ long ago. one look at that makes you wonder how the hell the author expected that to work at all. And there are some that no longer exist on the internet. :(

Here you go - a few minutes work in XWE (mainly getting the status bar face and hand sprites aligned properly) and it's ready to run. In accordance with the author's wishes, I've included the zipped original in this release. While the act of merging the author's work to create a "no-tears" source port compatible PWAD is technically still a breach of copyright (it's not explicitly permitted) what I'd like to know is whether a re-release like this - incorporating the unmodified original - would be acceptable in the /idgames archive?

Legalese:
You can distribute this if you want, but you must distribute the original HAPPY.ZIP, with all files intact.

[Maes]

kristus said:

I gotta hand it to you. You sure found one fucked up specimen there. But what will actually change after you ran the installation thingy? It seem like it wanna change the EXE. But how, and is there anything more than that?

From my understanding of the installers, it patches the .exe without DEHACKED, and DOOM.WAD without either DMGRAPH or DEUSF, by using BDIFF/BUPDATE. The actual changes are in the PCH files, which are unusable unless applied to the exact versions of DOOM.WAD and DOOM.EXE they were created against, bit per bit (there's an utility the installers use to verify if they're OK in that sense).

The only way to make it into a "proper" installer, is to

1. Install it as it was meant to.
   
2. Load the modified .EXE with DEH and save the differences as one large DEH file (I think it can be done, but I'm not sure).
   
3. Scan DOOM.WAD for any changes, updated graphics etc. and extract them to a separate PWAD.
   
4. Merge OTTAWAU.WAD and that separate PWAD.
   
5. Hey presto! Un-fucked up release!
   
6. Release to Internet
   
7. ????
   
8. PROFIT!!!
   

[bimlanders]

Originally, like Zdoom, id wanted to have bullet holes riddle the walls, but they couldn't make it work. I would have loved this as a thirteen year-old to see bullet holes and blood cover the walls during a firefight, like in Zdoom.

However, it would be Doom 2 that I had the most 'I would change this and that' moments for me. I wanted the traditional boss at the end of each episode. And while the Icon of Sin level is supremely difficult, it is so in a cheap way. I would have rather fought some sort of super Satanic Beast!

[myk]

Creaphis said:
Is transcribing the movie from one format, ie. physical package, to another, in violation of copyright?

The install package is another matter, related to distribution, and not directly to artistic creation, and can be moved through various mediums without problem; a cassette tape, a floppy, a DVD, and so on. Derivative works are an artistic contribution to an original.

Grey Ghost said:
would be acceptable in the /idgames archive?

When text file is ambiguous, ask the author or stick to the more conservative interpretation.

bimlanders said:
Originally, like Zdoom, id wanted to have bullet holes riddle the walls, but they couldn't make it work.

Rather, they didn't want it to slow the game down or didn't want to spend time or effort on secondary details that didn't make much if a difference. They already had to limit the maximum number of sprites on the screen and were wary of making the levels too large or complex, with limits to go with that, so it's not surprising the dropped bullet and blood marks. They must have felt the temporary puffs, explosions and splats were enough.

[Creaphis]

myk said:

The install package is another matter, related to distribution, and not directly to artistic creation, and can be moved through various mediums without problem; a cassette tape, a floppy, a DVD, and so on. Derivative works are an artistic contribution to an original.

And this of course doesn't counter the point I was making. As the install package is another matter aside from the artistic creation, how then does the modification of the distribution package of a Doom project interfere with copyright restrictions placed upon use of its artistic content?

[myk]

Creaphis said:
As the install package is another matter aside from the artistic creation,

It's another matter from moving it from one medium to another keeping its shape except for any automated machine-dependent "changes" that occur materially. Copyright applies to those files "as is" as well as anything derived from them (such as a modified copy of the IWAD with the installed content.) If you touch the install package you mess with copyrights because of distribution concerns, as the distributive package is a way in which the author controls the distribution.

[Creaphis]

Well I don't like it.

Be that as it may, I'm surprised that your personal feelings on this matter match what copyright (I begrudgingly accept) dictates. You say that if a map author fails to maintain or relicense his old works, then if newer audiences find it impossible to appreciate said works, this is simply the author's problem. What about us? What about those who actually want to be able to appreciate a wider body of wads, for their historical value, at least? As far as I'm concerned, to faithfully obey the rules of copyright is not the only option.

[myk]

I've explained repeatedly that I favor copyright here for community reasons. It keeps us together in a humane fashion because it's based on what the people who made the stuff we can use said. It encourages us to respect and contact each other instead of acting without consideration as if we dealt with things we take for granted. A few WADs may become harder to install or get for this reason, but this is offset by a valuable form of interaction.

Copyright can be perverted by interests and power, but if you react to that where it does not apply, you lose out on two fronts, not just one.

[Maes]

myk said:

A few WADs may become harder to install or get for this reason, but this is offset by a valuable form of interaction.

Speaking of which, I had no reply from the author of OTTAWAU, despite my mail not bouncing and having positive indications that he's still alive. Maybe it didn't get through the spam filters or something.

I see where myk is coming from and going at, but in such extreme cases as OTTAWAUs I view it more as an "I'll repack this for you, and you can thank me later (if ever)" situation.

His views about achieving community unity through mutual copyright respect/playing it safe (using a very conservative interpretation of where it should apply) are understandable, and adequate for people already inside the Doom (or more restrictively, the DW) community that may appreciate them or react promptly to their violations.

However it leaves "outsiders" in a limbo of sorts, which they might never be able to leave. Perversely, instead of bringing them and their work closer to the community, it keeps them away.

[Archy]

I wish the "Q" key did not quit the game wile recording a demo.

[Airman266]

Gez said:

Further, it is highly hypocritical to be, on the one hand, perfectly okay with blatant copyright infringement (characters, sprites, textures, sounds, items, concepts, etc. ripped from other games or even different media) as long as it's stolen from "outside the community", and on the other hand to enforce grotesque considerations such as "hmm, they probably only wanted their mod to be played on a 486SX16 with 2 megabytes of RAM, a warezed install of MS-DOS 5 and a keyboard whose space key had worn out and only works half the time; so if you don't have such a system then don't play their mod, it's only fair".

Yeah

[DuckReconMajor]

Archy said:

I wish the "Q" key did not quit the game wile recording a demo.

Alternatively, I wish more source ports would have kept it in. It feels so stupid doing F10 Y while recording a demo.

[Vermil]

Some ports allow you to bind keys to starting and stopping demo recording.

[myk]

Maes said:
However it leaves "outsiders" in a limbo of sorts, which they might never be able to leave. Perversely, instead of bringing them and their work closer to the community, it keeps them away.

My position? On the contrary. Their work may remain a bit less accessible sometimes if contact fails (this WAD we're talking about can be installed by anybody following the required steps) but without the attitude I'm advocating, people simply do not try to contact the old-timers or have less reason to do so. In fact, some will avoid them on purpose just in case they really wouldn't want their stuff modified, exemplified by occasional "don't contact id Software" comments.

I view it more as an "I'll repack this for you, and you can thank me later (if ever)" situation.

This misses the point of what I'm saying because you don't know that such an action will elicit a "thanks". That is why you're asking.

You can't know who an "outsider" really is, anyway, unless you're implying that because they don't respond, they don't care. Again, that's an assumption being made for their part.

[Graf Zahl]

myk said:

I've explained repeatedly that I favor copyright here for community reasons. It keeps us together in a humane fashion because it's based on what the people who made the stuff we can use said. It encourages us to respect and contact each other instead of acting without consideration as if we dealt with things we take for granted. A few WADs may become harder to install or get for this reason, but this is offset by a valuable form of interaction.

That's bullshit.

And why is this bullshit?

Like someone before said, if you take such a hard stance on copyright you need to remove every single WAD with resources taken from a commercial game from the archive.

Let's face it: A significant portion of /idgames is technically illegal.

And the thing that makes this discussion particularly interesting is that Doom's original license put severe restrictions on derivative works which if taken literally all 1994/1995 WADs violated making them all illegal if one would respect that license.

So you are basically arguing yourself into a corner where we'd have to eliminate the majority of /idgames because none of these WADs were made under legally valid conditions hence making any copyright claims on these mods and all conditions based on these claims fishy at best.

So what now? Either we take a more relaxed view on copyright or we'd have to nuke the archive. What do you choose? You can't have both! Most importantly you can't ignore the rights that are clearly violated and selectively respect only those which are dubious to begin with!

[Maes]

Graf Zahl said:

So what now? Either we take a more relaxed view on copyright or we'd have to nuke the archive. What do you choose? You can't have both!

He'd probably reply "mu".

[Super Jamie]

You know what someone could do? Release something themselves, called OWUFIX.ZIP or similar. Explain in the text file that it requires OTTAWAU.WAD and runs some sort of script or batch file which makes the convoluted original playable in modern ports.

Of course, this is probably hampered by lack of commandline WAD tools for Windows (obviously the largest target audience of idgames). I know there's that wadtools library for Linux, though I've never looked into what it can/can't do. If you have to run the fix in DOSBox, you may as well just continue with the original file.

[Maes]

Super Jamie said:

You know what someone could do? Release something themselves, called OWUFIX.ZIP or similar. Explain in the text file that it requires OTTAWAU.WAD and runs some sort of script or batch file which makes the convoluted original playable in modern ports.

Check the package again. All resources except the map itself are in BFDIFF patch files meant to be used against DOOM.WAD and DOOM.EXE (v1.9) with a particular version of BFDIFF.

As such they won't work with Ultimate Doom or with an unified v1.9 EXE. In theory -and that's very in theory- as long as one has those files he could still patch it by using an utility compatible with BFDIFF on his platform.

Making a different script for another platform and with other utilities is still a platform specific, stopgap solution, and no better than running the original installer under emulation.

The only way to break this vicious circle is for some poor soul to extract the modified resources from DOOM.WAD once installed, make a normal PWAD, and distribute it.

There would still be a problem with the modified .EXE, since I don't know if it's possible for DEHACKED to constuct a .DEH file based only on the alterations of a DOOM.EXE file, without a .DEH to start with. The other more painstaking way would be to reverse engineer the changes made to DOOM.EXE by hand (by using FC, a pointer table, etc.) and coding them once and for all in a DEH file.

I know this sounds like a nightmare to myk, but hey, it's the only way to go if someone really wishes to do the community a service, and not yet another fucked up scheme. All the rest is pure mental masturbation.

[Super Jamie]

Wow, that really is messed up. This is all stupid, someone should just ask Ty for permission to fix it. We can argue back and forth with fake legalese till the cows come home but at the end of the day - despite all valid arguments for and against - it's his decision as archive administrator.

[myk]

Graf Zahl said:
Like someone before said, if you take such a hard stance on copyright you need to remove every single WAD with resources taken from a commercial game from the archive.

This is incorrect. Ty does not allow stuff by community authors to be used without permission on the archive. The archives stance toward non-community stuff used without permission is that he'll take action if any complaints are raised by copyright owners.

What I've been saying all along is consistent with how the archive works.

I never said anything about removing Aliens TC from the archive or any such thing.

Unless you're incapable of reading, you'll also note my position has reasons beyond mere literal legality, which I already explained. The same community sense guides the archive maintainer in deciding what policies to take in regard to add-on copyrights.

[Creaphis]

During this whole gigantic derailment, has anyone here contacted Ty? If he's already getting prodded for answers then I don't want to bug him, but if not, then I volunteer to send him an email. I can resist my bias and ask a neutral question when I must.