We have been working on a draft End User License Agreement that you may want to have a read of. The first draft has been posted here:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho..._id=16409&page=

Tom,Great Work! Again you show your excellent dedication to our hobby.Best and Happy New Year,Clay

Tom,Just curious - how does this stop someone like FSPlanet from just stripping the EULA from the package and putting it up without it anyway?

Maybe I am reading this wrongly but it seems to me that this will technically do away with freeware. Files implementing this EULA will carry a price tag. It just happens that the tag from certain "shops" will be zero but developers could change this in the future.Will it be a requirement that all developers will have to include this EULA in their uploads to Avsim?I think it could prove to be very expensive, if not commercially unviable, for a developer to try and enforce this legally.David

TomFirst off, thanks for taking this initiative.However, it appears that some folks are making this out to be something more difficult than it really is and that it somehow will affect or change the status quo with respect to freeware, etc.Perhaps it is worth pointing out that virtually nothing is being altered. Copyright is copyright....its always been there and if an individual wishes to sue when his rights have been violated, he can. Some of us have been including EULA's all along; although to be fair, nothing as substantial as your proposed text.

>However, it appears that some folks are making this out to be>something more difficult than it really is and that it somehow>will affect or change the status quo with respect to freeware,>etc.Well, the proposed EULA starts of by stating :"NOTICE:This package is NOT Freeware."This seems pretty conclusive to me. Any freeware uploaded to the Avsim library and implementing their proposed EULA will, by definition, no longer be freeware.>Perhaps it is worth pointing out that virtually nothing is>being altered. Copyright is copyright....its always been there>and if an individual wishes to sue when his rights have been>violated, he can. Some of us have been including EULA's all>along; although to be fair, nothing as substantial as your>proposed text.The proposed EULA would, in theory, give developers the right to pursue individuals and webmasters for a stated fee in respect of every download from an unauthorised site.So, let us consider that I am a developer here in the UK who has discovered that his project is being downloaded from an unauthorised website in, say, Australia. I write to the webmaster telling him he is to remove my files immediately and pay me whatever money he owes me. He refuses. So I therefore try and get my money from those people who have "illegally" downloaded my project, but how am I to find out who those people are? The webmaster isn't going to tell me, for sure, even if he knows.So my only recourse it to take legal action, which would be expensive bearing in mind that my project was freeware, I was not making any money out of it anyway, I am crossing international boundaries and might have to consider the law in another country from my own. I might have a good case, but I might not - who knows? And even if I could afford the costs and were to win the case how can I be sure that the website or webmaster has sufficient funds to reimburse all of my costs - he might not. Highly risky.The "industry" has so far failed to get rid of warez or fsplanet so what chance has the poor individual of succeeding in his pursuit of a rogue download site?The idea behind the proposed EULA might be a noble one but in reality it has little chance of achieving anything.Sadly, this hobby is not the one which I joined so many years ago.David

Hypothetical situation:Let's say IFDG used this EULA for their Airbus A320 model. If they suddenly come out and say "As of Monday, 3 January, 2005, the license to use our Airbus models is officially cancelled. Everyone using this model must ceast and desist immediately, and delete all traces of this product from their computers.", how many people would REALLY say "Oh, gee, so much for that!" and delete them?Just some food for thought.

Hi,I remember 5 years ago, when Eric Ernst and myself were ripped of (pirated) by Apollo in Germany. As far as I know, the first big piracy scandal in this community.We then started to raise an idea that the word "Freeware" should be replaced as "Borrowware" or such. Meaning that the software only was borrowed by the user, and by no means their property.This might sound strange today, but five years ago, when the word "Copyright" didn

Hrm. Will add-on authors be required to use this licence on anything they upload to Avsim?Dan

Interresting on the FPS test.Can you explain the results, since I dont understand your conclusion much.Johan[A HREF=http://jdserver.no-ip.com]Personal Server[/A]or..http://62.238.33.10

>>However, it appears that some folks are making this out to>be>>something more difficult than it really is and that it>somehow>>will affect or change the status quo with respect to>freeware,>>etc.>>>Well, the proposed EULA starts of by stating :>>"NOTICE:>This package is NOT Freeware.">>This seems pretty conclusive to me. Any freeware uploaded to>the Avsim library and implementing their proposed EULA will,>by definition, no longer be freeware.Pretty conclusive indeed.....if you use the term freeware; perhaps we need a different word. This still doesn't alter anything from what's been going on to date because as mentioned, 'conditions of use' have been included with freeware for months now, my uploads are no exception. Keep in mind that this EULA is under construction and phrasing needs to be ironed out. >>>Perhaps it is worth pointing out that virtually nothing is>>being altered. Copyright is copyright....its always been>there>>and if an individual wishes to sue when his rights have been>>violated, he can. Some of us have been including EULA's all>>along; although to be fair, nothing as substantial as your>>proposed text.>>The proposed EULA would, in theory, give developers the right>to pursue individuals and webmasters for a stated fee in>respect of every download from an unauthorised site.>>So, let us consider that I am a developer here in the UK who>has discovered that his project is being downloaded from an>unauthorised website in, say, Australia. I write to the>webmaster telling him he is to remove my files immediately and>pay me whatever money he owes me. He refuses. So I therefore>try and get my money from those people who have "illegally">downloaded my project, but how am I to find out who those>people are? The webmaster isn't going to tell me, for sure,>even if he knows.>>So my only recourse it to take legal action, which would be>expensive bearing in mind that my project was freeware, I was>not making any money out of it anyway, I am crossing>international boundaries and might have to consider the law in>another country from my own. I might have a good case, but I>might not - who knows? And even if I could afford the costs>and were to win the case how can I be sure that the website or>webmaster has sufficient funds to reimburse all of my costs ->he might not. Highly risky.>>The "industry" has so far failed to get rid of warez or>fsplanet so what chance has the poor individual of succeeding>in his pursuit of a rogue download site?>>The idea behind the proposed EULA might be a noble one but in>reality it has little chance of achieving anything.Have to agree with this! Putting any kind of "conditional use" in your upload will not deter those who choose to disregard your wishes unless and until one of these folks is successfully prosecuted. But it might have an affect on those who may not be quite so arrogant. It will also serve to disuade some websites; not all, from displaying questionable file sets.Once again: copyright is _still_ copyright. The EULA will merely reinforce this idea and perhaps change some peoples' attitude towards freeware.And obviously, the EULA will have no affect at all on those who don't bother to read the thing!>>Sadly, this hobby is not the one which I joined so many years>ago.>>DavidQuite correct, David.......there's a whole lot more people involved!! And we have to accept that not all of them are on the same moral highground.