Original graphics on YouTube

[AncientDraqon]

Hi,

I recently acquired the original cd rom. While I can now officially play with the original graphics, can I also use them while recording YouTube content?

I searched on youtube in this forum, and found enough hits, but not on this topic.

Kind regards,
Richard a.k.a. AncientDraqon

[jfs]

As far as I know, nobody have been punished for doing so. But technically you'd have to ask the copyright owners (I believe that's Atari now?) of the original game, I doubt anyone here can speak on their behalf.

[vear]

Nobody using TTD graphics at least, as Nintendo has been known for requesting takedowns of videos featuring their copyrighted material now and then.
Anyway, while recording gameplay might be technically slightly out of the "right to quote", I would be very suprised if anyone pursued a youtuber for abusing TTD graphics in that manner.

[pickpacket]

Master Hellish uses the original graphics for his TTD series. No problems for him so far.

I wonder if there isn't precedent for this. I know that, for example, making videos where your barbie dolls are doing unspeakable things is totally fine. Mattell lost a case against a creator doing that; they may own the brand but the creator was doing dumb things with dolls they owned, not with Mattell's brand.

Of course digital assets could be different, but *if* a case was to be brought against it and the creator be found in the wrong it would effectively kill *every* game streaming channel out there. I personally wouldn't worry about it. You're not distributing the actual graphics files.

[Pyoro]

Just for fun, since it's obviously not going to be an issue: in Germany it'd definitely technically be a violation of copyright ("public playback" - UhG § 69c Nr. 4 Alt. 1). This applies to all video game streaming sooooo ... yeah they all could have content being blocked/taken down for Germany by the respective publishers. Obviously this is not happening so you can shrug and just do it. But if any rights holder wants to come after you they definitely can.

It's a ridiculous situation but that's what happens when laws aren't adjusted to new situations ...

[jfs]

In case you haven't seen, the project has had this page for a few years: https://www.openttd.org/content-creators
(I wrote the majority of the text on that page.)

The short version is that for all the game code and data given under a free open-source license, there is also a permission to use it for all purposes without limitations.
For everything else, you need to check with whoever owns the copyright and what license they offer.

I guess that technically, you could argue that if you display OpenGFX graphics in a video, you need to make a written offer to anyone viewing that video to get a copy of OpenGFX and the sources for it, because the video might be considered a "compiled version" of the GRF file. In practice, everyone would probably be happy with a link to www.openttd.org.