\"Ethics and Trust in Critical Thinking Decisions\" Please respond to the follow
ID: 369997 • Letter: #
Question
"Ethics and Trust in Critical Thinking Decisions" Please respond to the following:
No matter what type of company, businesses are known to take measures to lower costs and this is evident throughout the video game industry.
In the 1990's there was a semi-popular video game series called Earthworm Jim. The game has struggled, over the years, to relaunch itself and has changed between several different owning companies. In 2010, Interplay released an HD remake of the title; however, in many of the game's menus, they used an impressive fan-art rendition of the title character without attributing or compensating the artist.
So, here's the question: What should Interplay do in this situation. The art was unlicensed to begin with; however, Fair Use laws (where you can use an image to parody or create an homage) is still in effect. So, is there someone truly in the wrong here? Should there be some type of compensation or acknowledgement? Discuss your thoughts below and respond to at least one other student.
Explanation / Answer
Before getting into the discussion of what should Interplay do in this situation, let us first understand what is Fair use and the factors that are considered by the courts while determining the copyright infringement. In United States, fair use is a law that provides restricted usage of a copyrighted material where in the person or company can use a particular copyrighted content in a restricted manner without having to take the permission from the copyright owner or holder. Fair use law which actually means "Freedom and Innovation Revitalizing United States Entrepreneurship” is an act of the year 2007, the objective of fair use is to promote innovation while preserving the exclusive rights of the copyright holders over their creations such as paintings, movies, books, posters or any other creative content.
There are several factors that governs the decision of a court when it is faced with a copyright infringement case. These factors, as discussed below, enables the court to identify whether the usage of the copyrighted content falls under the fair use or not.
Now, in the given case, Interplay has used a fan-art rendition of the title character without attributing or compensating the artist. The case says that the Fair Use laws, where you can use an image to parody or create an homage, was in effect. However, it should be observed that the objective of using the fan-art creative was not for non-profit or educational purposes. The intention of Interplay is clearly of commercial purposes where in it will gain short term and long term monetary benefits from the purchase or download of the video game and the usage of the fan-art creative of the title character in many of the game menu’s might contribute in the acceptance of the video game by its users. Also, it is not sufficient for the Interplay to simply acknowledge or give credits to the designer in the video game titles and credits because it will still be considered as unfair usage.
For example, it will still be considered illegal, if someone goes to a movie theatre and prepare a DVD of the whole movie to sell them and earn monetary benefits and simply gives credits or acknowledgement to the original film maker.
Therefore, Interplay is definitely wrong here and it should compensate as well as acknowledge the original artist of the creative that it has used in the video game. By doing this, Interplay will set an example of an organisation that abides by ethics and trust in taking critical thinking decisions.
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