> We received a similar notice from the same company in 2023 and successfully appealed against it. This company also filed a similar notice this year against an indie game with similar voxel art style by the name of Allumeria.
They'll backtrack and apologize - again.
At some point, the pathway for Microsoft to regain some of the goodwill associated with Minecraft is to fire the senior lawyer most responsible for sending out these notices.
Someone should copyright the American flag and popular advertised variants of blue/white/red and something alike and start DMCA'ing politicians, maybe that would wake them up to how bad the law is?
Fun part is that US legislative branch did not have much say in creation of DMCA.
US executive branch back then was just lobbied by major copyright holders and they literally bypassed much of legislation process around congress by creating and signing international agreements instead.
By the time DMCA landed in congress there was very little that could be changed because US already had to honour intetnational agreements it's already created and signed.
Except, of course, Luanti holds copyright over their own assets and app. Copyright is not something you get when you file paperwork with the government, it is automatic for creative works.
DMCA is punitive to platforms who do not correctly adjudicate the law and self enforce, which is why they err on the side of the claimant rather than the accused (or the side more likely to defend their copyright in court).
So, the law doesn't really favor copyright holders, it favors extremely conservative and risk averse behavior from large platforms, regardless of who would actually win a dispute over copyright.
>Luanti’s Android app is currently not available on the due to a baseless DMCA notice filed on behalf of Microsoft by Tracer.AI, alleging that Luanti infringes Minecraft’s copyright.
>Luanti is a voxel game-creation platform where anyone can make, share, discover, and play blocky games.
Doubt it. Microsoft probably just sees "voxel game" and files the claim, because they don't lose anything if it fails.
you doubt what? the claim they are filing is that luanti violates the copyright. that's the point of filing a DMCA notice. that means they are alleging that luanti infringes minecraft’s copyright. what else could it be?
If there are no consequences for filing a false DMCA takedown, what stops people or companies filing them all the time to take apps from Apple or Microsoft offline?
These de-facto monopolies such as "Google Play", must be
forced open by governments. It can not be that they continue
to turn a blind eye to these vile, ruthless and - most
importantly - extremely evil action by the giant that was
formerly known as Google (now known as adMonster).
I, personally, don't feel that "making money by doing business in a particular market" should be a right it is illegal to waive.
If it were inalienable, things like regional distribution agreements would be void, since you could sign away your ability to sell in a certain country and then compete with your distributor anyway.
Let's keep some perspective here - there is no "inalienable right to sell apps to smartphone users via a private commercial storefront".
> Let's keep some perspective here - there is no "inalienable right to sell apps to smartphone users via a private commercial storefront".
This is unacceptable in a world where governments and businesses are increasingly gating services behind those same marketplaces.
Something’s got to give here. We can’t allow people to create a captive, gatekept marketplace and then create/allow significant pressure that herds people into that same marketplace.
IMO, break up all the gatekeepers using antitrust and require that critical infrastructure and businesses (government, banking, utilities, payments, etc) allow alternate access paths that don’t require a smartphone.
Imagine the landlord of a library were to close the store just because someone complained that the library was selling stolen books. Would you consider this acceptable?
And we are talking about a landlord that basically own the city here.
I don't know in this particular case of Luanti, but this could be people's livelihood we are talking about, there should be some sort of legal due process.
I think this take holds up very poorly when the reality boils down to:
"Government policy and critical services have made it so there are functionally two markets for mobile software, each owned by the manufacturers and developers of the mobile OS and hardware"
This isn't like physical sales, where I can open up a store anywhere. This also isn't like classic software sales for windows/mac desktops, where I can sell you a program from any website or physical store.
---
Functionally - this is like these private companies revoking your business license at their whim. I don't find it a tenable position.
All rights should be inalienable, simply because if they are not then all corporations will put "you waive all your rights" into their standard legal boilerplate.
The consequences do not matter. Voiding regional distribution agreements is a small price to pay for actually having rights.
If all rights were inalienable, an employment contract would not mean I need to pay my employee, because I would have an inalienable right to keep my own property (cash).
Also nobody would offer the contract in the first place because the employee would keep their inalienable right to choose how they spend their own time (not working).
EVERY contract is about giving something up in exchange for getting something. In most legal systems a contract is void if either party gives nothing. So in a world where nothing can be signed away, no contracts exist at all.
They'll backtrack and apologize - again.
At some point, the pathway for Microsoft to regain some of the goodwill associated with Minecraft is to fire the senior lawyer most responsible for sending out these notices.
1) open source project publishes source
2) AI scrapes source
3) AI generates code for proprietary game similar to that of the source
4) AI tool scans jar files and finds similar code, triggers copyright violation
The sequence of events is:
1) US votes a law that is hilariously favourable to copyright holders
2) Copyright holders abuse it for a while with non-AI bots
3) Copyright holders abuse it with AI-bots
4) Copyright holders will continue to abuse it until the law is amended.
US executive branch back then was just lobbied by major copyright holders and they literally bypassed much of legislation process around congress by creating and signing international agreements instead.
By the time DMCA landed in congress there was very little that could be changed because US already had to honour intetnational agreements it's already created and signed.
Louis Rossman have a video on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0-j89LJysY
DMCA is punitive to platforms who do not correctly adjudicate the law and self enforce, which is why they err on the side of the claimant rather than the accused (or the side more likely to defend their copyright in court).
So, the law doesn't really favor copyright holders, it favors extremely conservative and risk averse behavior from large platforms, regardless of who would actually win a dispute over copyright.
>Luanti is a voxel game-creation platform where anyone can make, share, discover, and play blocky games.
Doubt it. Microsoft probably just sees "voxel game" and files the claim, because they don't lose anything if it fails.
It's great little tool to teach coding.
There is a cost to them for false negatives, if only just lost revenue.
The beatings will persist until morale improves.
If it were inalienable, things like regional distribution agreements would be void, since you could sign away your ability to sell in a certain country and then compete with your distributor anyway.
Let's keep some perspective here - there is no "inalienable right to sell apps to smartphone users via a private commercial storefront".
This is unacceptable in a world where governments and businesses are increasingly gating services behind those same marketplaces.
Something’s got to give here. We can’t allow people to create a captive, gatekept marketplace and then create/allow significant pressure that herds people into that same marketplace.
IMO, break up all the gatekeepers using antitrust and require that critical infrastructure and businesses (government, banking, utilities, payments, etc) allow alternate access paths that don’t require a smartphone.
I don't know in this particular case of Luanti, but this could be people's livelihood we are talking about, there should be some sort of legal due process.
It really feels like middle-ages kind of justice.
"Government policy and critical services have made it so there are functionally two markets for mobile software, each owned by the manufacturers and developers of the mobile OS and hardware"
This isn't like physical sales, where I can open up a store anywhere. This also isn't like classic software sales for windows/mac desktops, where I can sell you a program from any website or physical store.
---
Functionally - this is like these private companies revoking your business license at their whim. I don't find it a tenable position.
The consequences do not matter. Voiding regional distribution agreements is a small price to pay for actually having rights.
Also nobody would offer the contract in the first place because the employee would keep their inalienable right to choose how they spend their own time (not working).
EVERY contract is about giving something up in exchange for getting something. In most legal systems a contract is void if either party gives nothing. So in a world where nothing can be signed away, no contracts exist at all.