Frogster: Soon on trial?

[Muddy Waters]

This is the question at hand as charges are being pressed against the publisher for copyright infringement.
Because Frogster is using smileys on one of their bulletin boards that are copyright protected from being used by third parties. This was noticed by an unknown internet user who even called Frogster’s attention to it, according to his own statement. A criminal complaint by the graphic artists could now be in order.

“The internet is not a legal vacuum.”

According to Axel Schmidt, chief executive for public relations at Frogster, during an interview on the lawsuit against elitepvpers.com.
But if Frogster is indeed taking law seriously, how comes they seem to be involved in a copyright infringement?

The supposedly ripped smileys are said to be available on the Runes of Magic board since 2009, though Devianart.com explicitly prohibited their usage.
Dr. Hans M. Wulf, an attorney from Hamburg who specializes in IT law, assesses indemnification claims in copyright law regarding pictures as follows:

“If pictures were taken from a third party’s website, recourse on picture fees can be carried out according to ‘Mittelstandsgemeinschaft Foto-Marketing (MFM)’. The latter rates the appropriate fee for providing a digital photo in order to be included it in a website with 130.00€ per month. So if a photo is taken from an external website for one’s own website without the copyright owner’s approval, the damage for a usage over 4 months amounts to 520.00€.
The general circumstances of the law violation must be taken to account when estimating the damage. To begin with, the period of use is relevant. […]
If the unauthorizedly copied work has been accessed a considerable amount of times on the website, damage compensation might be correspondingly higher. It is assumed that – beside the mere number of pirated smileys – the extremely long period of use and the high number of daily visitors will definitely affect the amount of the claims.”

“They deserve it”, according to the person who is pressing the charges. When he first called Frogster’s attention to the matter, he was ignored and after that, he was told by Frogster’s support that they weren’t responsible for it, though it probably wouldn’t have been too difficult passing on the complaint internally.
Doesn’t Frogster feel any remorse? However, screenshots proof that the pirated emoticons can be used on the publisher’s board to this day.

Source: Frogster: Bald vor Gericht? by Awi'

[cyberoox]

Holy **** who cares about fking smileys? This guy who brought it up can't have much of a life...

[ReggeGandalf]

Or he searched for it, to kill Frogster 'cause they blame other for "illegal stuff" on the Internet and do it theirselves.

[Muddy Waters]

Though I do find this story a little funny myself, I must say that I do get that dude in some extent. Even if it's just some emoticons, it still is someone's work and intellectual property. You just wouldn't want your intellectual property being used by someone else without your approval. And in this case not only just without your approval, but despite the fact that you explicitly prohibited any use of your work.

If you ask me, there is more point to this complaint than there is to the lawsuit against elitepvpers.

Kind Regards
Muddy

[Vaidas B]

Frogster imagines itself to be a big company that can get away with anything, even something little like emoticons. I personally enjoy the fact that they got into trouble, it's a small crime, but it's a crime. And I also think it's funny that they were warned by this guy, I don't think it was the first time they were warned though, only this guy actualy did something about it.

[¼S†a†icConfig¼]

lol im glad...this lightened my mood....what goes around comes around i always say :P

hope they get hit hard!

[danizmax]

haha servers them rigth, they are known to ignore requests and warnings, I've seen it myself.