where you can download roms

[monkeychemist]

Ha, you thought this was a rom request!

no, my question is about the legality of sites that have roms up for download. I remember several years ago that it was always illegal, under any and all circumstances. Now i hear that there is a 10year limit to the copyright. Also, i have noticed that rom sites that used to get taken down quite easilly aer up and doing fine... like romnation.net for example. Am i missing something? is it now ok to own and / or distribute roms? could anyone put some up on their site? I know that the nintendo revolution is going to have free roms for download so is that why it is ok now?

Just curious. Thanks,
Jeremy

[hydr0x]

i have no idea, i only know the biggest and best site we had for the last couple of years closed it's doors a few weeks back because the maintainers lost interested, not because of any lawsuits though

[SirDrexl]

I haven't heard anything about a 10-year limit to the copyright, and I would seriously doubt it to be true.

As for Nintendo "giving away" their games, they probably are not going to just let you download whatever you want with no strings attached. They are likely to be used as bonuses for buying or completing games. Asking if it's okay to download roms of any of such old games is like asking if it's okay to download the Zelda games that Nintendo had on the bonus GameCube discs, which technically were free.

[Cryomancer]

As I walways say.

Rom sites are bad for you. There are several far superior options than sites.

[kirin jensen]

I only know a little about copyright law - and I am not a lawyer, but here's how (I think) it works:

Copyright is capable of lapsing into the public domain if not enforced. That's why companies are often so ferocious about protecting it. Software copyrights are to my knowledge enforcible only for the viable commercial life of the hardware carrying it.

Thus, games by companies that are now defunct (and were not bought out) may well be in the public domain.

It may be that one of the ways of continuing the copyrights on games still held by private companies is to rerelease them on plug'n'play devices and/or greatest hit software compilations.

That's some of the basics of what I think I remember - but if I'm wrong, I'm sure someone here knows and will correct me.

[Phosphor Dot Fossils]

Copyright is capable of lapsing into the public domain if not enforced.

Nope, that's trademarks, not copyrights.

[Flack]

Ha, you thought this was a rom request!

no, my question is about the legality of sites that have roms up for download. I remember several years ago that it was always illegal, under any and all circumstances. Now i hear that there is a 10year limit to the copyright. Also, i have noticed that rom sites that used to get taken down quite easilly aer up and doing fine... like romnation.net for example. Am i missing something? is it now ok to own and / or distribute roms? could anyone put some up on their site? I know that the nintendo revolution is going to have free roms for download so is that why it is ok now?

Just curious. Thanks,
Jeremy

The Nintendo Revolution is NOT going to have free ROMs for download. Nintendo has stated that there will be a fee. Whether it's a monthly fee or a per game fee remains to be seen.

It is not now nor will it ever be legal to distribute other people's copyrighted software. As we begin to see more and more companies trying to profit off of their older software libraries, you will see more and more ROM sites closed down.

[monkeychemist]

As we begin to see more and more companies trying to profit off of their older software libraries, you will see more and more ROM sites closed down.

Ahhh that is a very good point. Thank you

[Sniderman]

Rom?




P.S. Tip o' the hat to Lee Seitz for the image.

[kirin jensen]

Copyright is capable of lapsing into the public domain if not enforced.

Nope, that's trademarks, not copyrights.

Thanks PDF!

See? I knew someone would correct me if I was wrong.

[nate1749]

Copyright law also states (some latin phrase) that it is not interested in small instances of infringement. Kind of like professional judgement for cops.

Now most of those sites take it way beyond any interperation of "small," but from my experience I noticed that companies don't want to dedicate their resources if they aren't losing any money. If someone downloads 100 snes games why would nintendo care, you can't buy them legally right now even if you wanted. Now like someone said, they will probably care in the future once they do start selling those old games again electronically.

Also, in the past a company would send an e-mail to a host threatening to sue them because of one of their subscribers. The host would then immediately kill the account of out fear of some big company who could drownd them in legal fees. Recently though the courts have specified that they can't do this type of mass threating and they have to actually follow the legal procedure for handling this.

So now if Nintendo or whoever wants to shut someone down, they have to call their lawyer, their lawyer has to file all this paper work to the court etc. etc. Previously they could have had a 16 year old kid scanning the internet and pasting an e-mail threat letter to the host.

Nate

[Poofta!]

dont know what that 10 year thing is, Digital Media Copyright lasts for 95 years. so it will be a while untill it will be 'legal' and even then the company or copyright holder may apply for an extension (from what i understand)

[InsaneDavid]

Also, in the past a company would send an e-mail to a host threatening to sue them because of one of their subscribers. The host would then immediately kill the account of out fear of some big company who could drownd them in legal fees.

Sega of America sent me one of those once. ...and that was for Dreamcast cover scans, nothing else. I thought it was cool and got a good laugh out of it more than anything.

[kevincure]

Wow, misinformation. Copyright lasts 95+ years (actually, forever, because Congress and the EU keep lengthening the term so that nothing ever comes into the public domain). An infraction is an infraction - not such thing as "small violations don't matter." There is something called fair use, so you could potentially use a ROM to get an image for a book, for instance, but it's a major grey area.

Here's some common misinformation the other way, though. Someone said Sega sent them a letter for having cover scans? Tell them to fuck off. Not only is it not a copyright violation - that's clearly fair use - but it's actually illegal for a copyright holder to claim more rights than they have. If you have cash, you could take them to court and they would probably lose the copyrights involved. I wish people would countersue more often.

[SkiDragon]

I thought copyright was 75 years. Could be wrong, I guess.

[kevincure]

You remember correctly, but say hi to your new friend the Copyright Term Extension Act, aka the CTEA, Sonny Bono Act and "Mickey Mouse Protection Act." The bill, unsurpisingly, increaed the term of copyright 20 years, and was passed just in time to ensure that the earliest Mickey Mouse films didn't enter public domain. The bill even worked retroactively, giving another 20 years to works already created.

Now, you may say that's bullshit, since the Constitution requires that copyright be given "to promote the Public Good" and for "Limited Times", and giving extra time retroactively is not going to increase the number of works created in the past (since, like, it's the past and has already happened). A case named Eldred v. Ashcroft argued this very point to the Supreme Court last year, and recently lost on a 6-3 decision. Want to make a wager that copyright is extended again right around the year 2020? Jack Valenti, the head of the MPAA, did famously say that if the Constitution requires limited copyright, "forever less one day" would be acceptable to him. Looks like he's getting his wish.

There are a number of ROMs in the public domain, though (because the copyright holder placed them in the public domain), such as most of the Vectrex library. Download those at your leisure.

[nate1749]

An infraction is an infraction - not such thing as "small violations don't matter."

Sorry, you're wrong. I'll find the page, but my source is The Business Of Music - which is the industry standard guide for copyright and royalty laws. And it's not that they don't matter, it's that the law is not interested in minor infractions.

If it were, then why aren't there thousands of raids on everyone who has copied a tape, etc.? The only type of people who get in trouble are the people who go crazy with piracy.

In fact, can you find me one incident where someone has gotton in trouble for a minor infraction?

Also, what's your source?

Nate

[THATinkjar]

I download vintage roms from eDonkey/Overnet. Any of these P2P networks are great!

[InsaneDavid]

Someone said Sega sent them a letter for having cover scans? Tell them to fuck off. Not only is it not a copyright violation - that's clearly fair use - but it's actually illegal for a copyright holder to claim more rights than they have.

Uh, it was in early 2000 and as I said...

I thought it was cool and got a good laugh out of it more than anything.

It was more of a respectful request to please remove the high res scans of DC game art (front, back, insert, disc) which I had no problem in agreeing to. If they wanted to force the issue then it would be reproduction of copyrighted images. I only owned about 8% of the games I had scans for at the time just the same.

If you have cash, you could take them to court and they would probably lose the copyrights involved. I wish people would countersue more often.

That never fixes anything, just creates more muck. I think the world is sue happy enough as it is and why would I want to go after a company that was having problems as it was (I was with SoA for a short time prior) when they very professionally asked me to remove some copyrighted images?

If it were, then why aren't there thousands of raids on everyone who has copied a tape, etc.? The only type of people who get in trouble are the people who go crazy with piracy.

That's right, but I wouldn't say that those are the "only type" of people that get busted for that. Occasionally there's a slip and someone gets grabbed just out of dumb luck. ROMs aren't approved but they are tolerated to a point. It's the whole "they can't take us all" and while that's true, they are going to grab one or two of you a year. I've distroed the MAME romset under the FreeMAMERoms group years ago and as long as you're honest in answering questions when they come up, you stay current on the regulations that are ENFORCED, and are very open with your records (ie, you're not earning money from ad revenue on emulation sites - THAT should be illegal) then you really don't have much to worry about.

...aren't there about 100 other threads on ROM images this and that? The search function is your friend. I'll be glad when this one gets lost in the shuffle.

+50 Meseta to nate1749

[monkeychemist]

Thank you for this wealth of information. we can lock up this topic if you guys are getting bored of it :/