Who "owns" Dumpshock?, IP on t-shirts. (hahahaha) Options

[eidolon]

So I'm sitting here getting a great idea for a Dumpshock t-shirt and it hits me: who owns Dumpshock?

If I wanted to put something up at a cafepress-type site and make it available to DSers, would that be possible? Assuming the poster gives me permission to use the quote (simple design, to be sure), who would I get permission from to include "forums.dumpshock.com" underneath?

(BTW, I'd be putting this up on whatever site I use at cost, I'm not out to get rich off the idea;). Besides, I'd have to ask the poster if I could quote him/her first anyway, since everything we post is our own IP according to the TOS.)

Is Dumpshock actually owned by any one person (or persons, as the case may be)? I know Dumpshock has Wizkids' blessing on use of content, but I'm curious as to what the structure is like. The design (if you can call it that) includes no direct reference to SR or any of its associated IP (barring forums.dumpshock.com somehow being their IP too...).

So, yeah. That's my questions.

[nezumi]

Anything we post on dumpshock belongs now to dumpshock. So if you get Adam's blessing to use dumpshock content (since I believe dumpshock is privately owned by Adam, not by Wizkids), any sigs and the like are available for you to use as well.

[Platinum]

The registration information on whois lists Mark Imbriaco.

[eidolon]

So I suppose we're waiting for Adam to chime in.

*begins humming a tune*

;)

[nezumi]

You're right. Most forums I've been on say they have the right to reproduce what you have written in part or in whole, and/or own all rights to it. There's nothing on here about that, so i guess the posters still own all copyright on what they right (woo, the right to say our trash isn't reproducable).

[Platinum]

I am no lawyer so I am not sure what the legalities of click contracts are. I am also sure that if someone posted something that I conjured up or wrote, I would be satisfied with credit, and possibly a copy depending on the amount that was contributed. IP law is very messy, especially when it crosses international boundries.

[Nikoli]

Actually, unless you copy righted it prior and have a signed agreement, etc. Anything up here does, by default belong to the person who owns DS. Check any game site, they make a point of putting it up to let you know ahead of time that they own it, just never been an issue here.

[eidolon]

Odd. I've seen exactly the opposite. It must just come down to whatever types of forums you frequent. For example, I've only ever seen one TOS that explicitly said "all your posts are belong to us", and that was Wizkids'.

[Platinum]

Well ... I know that in Canada eh, when you write something down, if that work has not been written before ... it is automatically copyrighted ..(sp??) and the IP is yours. There are a few places where the IP of what you create is not owned by you, and that would be in a case where there is a contract outlining that.

There are some places like in Japan, where if you invent something for someone, they are obligated to give you very generous portions of their profits. Like that guy that won a hundred million dollar settlement for inventing a process to make blue LED's.

In General I think that people like Mark and Adam are not idea-mongers but they just do not want to see people leach content and call it their own. At least that is the general impression I get from their demenour and posts.

Anyhow, anyone know how binding web agreements are? I have seen stories of both sides winning and losing.

[eidolon]

@ Plat: I'm fairly certain, contrary to what most people seem to believe, that it's the same case here. To my knowledge, getting a formal copyright is mostly to avoid having to prove "I was first" later (and obvoiusly, in the case of big business, this is a necessity).

In fact, straight from the U.S. Copyright Office website:

[Adam]

If you create and post something to the Dumpshock Forums, you own it. If you want to use something that some other person posted to the forums, you should contact them for permission.

Dumpshock isn't owned by FanPro, or WizKids, or me; the physical servers are owned by Mark Imbriaco/HTML.com, and Mark owns the domain name. The individuals that contributed content to the various non-forum sites own that content as appropriate. Dumpshock is not owned by any one individual.

If you want to use the logo or URL in some sort of product, contact Mark via PM at his Neuron Basher account.

[eidolon]

Awesome. Thanks much, Adam.

edit: Message away! I'll update this with whatever comes of it.