The Ban on LEGO Media Books

[emily]

Recently I've been wondering why this rule is in place. I understand that uploading the Rock Raiders books and their contemporaries is forbidden more out of a "better safe than sorry" mentality rather than any real danger, and that's perfectly fine. But it seems like the rule isn't evenly applied in all situation where it would make sense.

 

- jamesster and Sadie Meowsalot have both scanned and linked to books released by LEGO Publishing that were marketed and sold in the 1980s.

- Multiple members (including myself) have uploaded LEGO magazines that were distributed on a subscription, meaning that they had to be paid for to be read.

- Discussion of and linking to leaked 2015 LEGO set information is allowed. This was the biggest deal to me, as LEGO specifically asks sites to not do this (even though they are usually ignored). Perpetuating info on future LEGO products, unlike old promotional material, has the potential to actually harm LEGO, as they rely on the confidentiality of their upcoming products to ensure that competitors don't have time to create a rival product. Even so, LEGO continues to provide official support to fan sites that allow discussion of leaks (namely, Eurobricks and Brickset).

 

I don't want to challenge the policy, you guys have your reasons for the rules being as they are and I respect that. What I was hoping for was some clarification as to why LEGO books from ~1998 onward are banned, specifically.

[BobaFett2]

I've uploaded scans of six 1990's/early 2001's LEGO books myself.

[lol username]

What I was hoping for was some clarification as to why LEGO books from ~1998 onward are banned, specifically.

Are they? I hadn't heard anything about this until now. If they are, that seems like a rather odd inconsistency, seeing as we've been linking to and discussing the other things you've mentioned for years now.

[emily]

Are they? I hadn't heard anything about this until now. If they are, that seems like a rather odd inconsistency, seeing as we've been linking to and discussing the other things you've mentioned for years now.

Going off of this topic.

[lol username]

The topic there seems to be discussing uploading scans of the books straight to the RRU wiki - where does RRU stand on linking to content hosted elsewhere, such as with the magazines and comic books (usually hosted on Brickshelf)?

 

Also, some other notes:

• Only three of the 1980s LEGO comics were released and sold, and of those, two have been scanned and uploaded to Brickshelf. One of those (The Robber Baron) had hardly any evidence of its existence online until I tracked down a copy, scanned it, and posted it on Eurobricks. Its topic lived a nice life, and no issues came out of it - and Eurobricks is frequented by more than a few LEGO employees.
• The rest of the 80s LEGO comic book materials Sadie has scanned and uploaded were never published, and are mostly unfinished. They were given to Sadie by their original creators, for her to share, since LEGO never did anything with them.
• A somewhat less obscure LEGO comic is The Golden Medallion (1989), scans of which have been available online for years now, on multiple websites well known among LEGO fans (such as Peeron.com and Brickfactory.info - hard to directly link to it due to how the site works), and in multiple languages. The comic was sold along with a couple of minifigures and bricks. It's been discussed and linked to on many forums. LEGO doesn't give a darn. Oh, and Sadie was given scans of an unpublished sequel.
• Most LEGO magazines are free - the only paid ones that come to mind were LEGO Adventures! and the Brickmaster magazines. Both are dead now, and LEGO doesn't seem to care what happens to them.

The only thing LEGO seems to really care about and hunt down are leaked pictures of upcoming sets. Eurobricks' policy on leaks is "don't embed or host leaked pictures, but if they're somewhere else, you can link to and discuss them". And as said, LEGO supports and engages with Eurobricks, despite Eurobricks becoming a sort of go-to place for discussion of the latest leaks (if a leak is found by somebody, you can bet it'll be on Eurobricks within an hour).

 

tl;dr version: LEGO seems to mostly only care about things regarding current and upcoming products, and if they have a problem with something, they go to where it's hosted, not to where it's discussed (they continue to support Eurobricks despite it being a sort of central hub for discussion of leaks). What this means as far as RRU goes still needs to be discussed.

 

I do recall something about RRU once hosting a mirror of the old LEGO Interactive website, which LEGO didn't like - what exactly happened there?

 

Also, what about the countless databases of LEGO set instruction and catalog scans, such as Peeron? Where do they stand as far as copyright goes? Peeron doesn't publish scans of set instructions until the set is three years old, but their FAQ seems to state it's just some sort of tradition, rather than some requirement from LEGO.

 

Oh, another thing - LEGO Idea Books. Again, these weren't free, but scans are plastered on plenty of well known LEGO-related sites, and LEGO doesn't seem to care. For example, the iconic 6000 Idea Book, from around 1979:

http://www.peeron.com/scans/6000-1/

http://lego.brickinstructions.com/lego_instructions/set/6000/LEGOLAND_Idea_Book

http://bricks.argz.com/ins/6000-1

[Cirevam]

I think this would be lumped under this rule, from the global rules:

 

DO NOT Post or Upload Illegal Material
This refers to posting any form of pirated materials such as applications/games, including posting of links to such materials. Rock Raiders United DOES NOT support piracy.

 

Whether these books are illegal or not is worth discussing. Given LEGO's track record that jamesster provided, I'd think we'd be fine if we hosted the books elsewhere (mediafire, for example) and linked to them here. Cyrem doesn't like hosting potentially iffy content on his own services since that increases his liability.

 

Perhaps it's time to reevaluate this old, unofficial rule.

[TheDoctor]

Great news everyone.  There's this magical website called imgur.com which lets you put images on the internet.  Even better, there's this awesome bbcode tag we have called , which lets us link images here!  Unless you are mentally incapacitated, I don't need to explain the rest!  This means that the content isn't on cyrem's servers, and any DMCA's issued against RRU can simply be ignored or redirected to imgur.

[Cyrem]

I don't remember saying anything about a year.

 

We're going to discuss this internally and come back with a new policy.

 

---

Ok, after some discussion we have finalized with the following for content uploaded to RRU (this applies for both forum and wiki).

You may upload:

- Scans of Catalogs/Advertising
- Scans of Magazines
- Scans of Instructions
- Scans of Bonus Comics
- Partial scans of Books

 

Under the condition:

- Scanned material is not tampered with.

- Uploaded content on RRU must have the LEGO copyright text added: "©<publication year> The LEGO Group. All Rights Reserved." as outlined in the Fair Play policy on the bottom of the image if there is no other copyright text already present in the scan.

 

You may link to:
- Content allowed above.
- External full book galleries or downloads of content older than 10 years for the purpose of discussion about the book linked only. This is so that old, obscure and historical content can be found, shared and discussed.

 

We will respect any removal request from TLG. Hopefully this clears this up. If you still have questions, just ask.

[BobaFett2]

After 75 years, if I'm not mistaken, the books become public properly unless re licensed or something like that.

[noghiri]

After 75 years, if I'm not mistaken, the books become public properly unless re licensed or something like that.

https://copyright.cornell.edu/resources/publicdomain.cfm

 

Most if not all the books we'd care about should become public domain by Dec. 31, 2047, or in 33 years.

[Cirevam]

Don't forget to take Disney into account. They've been bribing lobbying Congress to extend copyright laws so they can keep their stupid mouse out of the public domain. Currently copyright is life + 75 years if I'm remembering right. They'll try to make it until the heat death of the universe if they can. That affects LEGO's books too, so don't assume that we have 33 years until these works are public domain.

 

Luckily, LEGO is pretty lenient compared to other companies.

[BobaFett2]

Don't forget to take Disney into account. They've been bribing lobbying Congress to extend copyright laws so they can keep their stupid mouse out of the public domain. Currently copyright is life + 75 years if I'm remembering right. They'll try to make it until the heat death of the universe if they can. That affects LEGO's books too, so don't assume that we have 33 years until these works are public domain.

 

Luckily, LEGO is pretty lenient compared to other companies.

 

The whole copyright system is out of date. The internet and copyright do not go along well.

 

Good point, though. Fortunately TLG really doesn't care about old stuff being available to fans, since there's no profit for anyone in preventing the distribution of these books through the internet.

[Crystal Miner 1]

After 75 years, if I'm not mistaken, the books become public properly unless re licensed or something like that.

I don't think we might be around in 75 years

[Fluffy Cupcake]

*steps out from the crowd of glaring eyes*

Yes, likely correct, though that was besides the point.