Technically you can't copyright any skin unless you have permission to use the sponsers/decals.

I am not saying anybody would be that extreme, or should be. I am just saying that as a graphic designer, I own the copyright on any of my designs, until the copyright is sold, given away or made null in a public statement. If I design a skin, I own the copyright of that skin until one of the above happens.

Quote from hmmmz :

I think you are the wrong one. I agree Orange boy, the only way to prevent people to use your skin is to take the patent of your artwork but i suggest you to take the international one , then when people use your skin you can have rights on courts Will you struggle with this?

By default, the person who produces a design owns copyright on that design. Patents are something completely different, and don't affect copyright at all.

For example, the copyright for LFS is owned by the development team. They would be able to patent the methods used in their physics engine if they wanted to, and this would stop other developers using similar methods in their physics engines, but this has no impact on the fact that they own the copyright of this design.

Please tell me if if you still don't understand, and I will explain it to you with a simpler example.

I know this thread is old and pretty much useless now but you saying you would sue some one for taking your skin. If so who would take such a case?

nice job with that skin i think i have seen that skin somewhere driving AROUND lol sucker

why not stick a big " DEMO SKIN" sticker across the pic of the skin so they cant steal it and if they do it will annoy them atleast ( pritty useless idesa but its a start) alto a skin protection system should have been set-up ageas ago

Mine is simple, my skin is that:

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/16/32323wyn0.jpg

And they only see that:

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/1121/sanstitre212qm5.jpg

The only thing from the original skin is the exhaust pipe

Now Ive seen it all......

I just wonder what some people are tying to protect.....

But for example, if i see someone driving my PRIVATE or PRIVATE skin of some of my friends. I make skins for me and friends , i write PRIVATE SKIN , Made by : Kirill.D ,then my mail and in the end : Exclusivly for : name of person who am i making it for.

And if someone stole my private skin and i see it. If i report to LFSTech is it possible that they can block account for some time. Its just i saw multiple TAG steals (not only of my team) also skinstealers. I really would make skin if he wants but stealing my hard work is pretty crappy thing.

So my point is : Can LFS developers/admins/tech support block tag/skin stealers account for some period of time if i have mpr or pic proving of he driving my private skin ?

Thats example of my work : http://www.minupildid.ee/main.php/users/KirillDr/Skins/ ,ive made also Coca-Cola (FXR, XFR) Fanta (XFR) ,Pepsi (FXR) ,and Emergency Service skins (XRG-RB4-FXO-FZ5) ,Police skins for 2 LiveToCruise officers and they all are pretty hard work.

If you don`t want other people to see your skin, or be able to abuse it and use it for their own use, simply don`t upload it to LFS world. Then you are the only one that can use and see the skin.

And as a lot of people allready has said in this topic, you canot claim that you have some sort of copyright on it, because of a lot of decals and such that is not your work again.

But don`t misunderstand me, I don`t agree or justify that some people take your skin and use it, and at least not when they deside not to take it off when you ask them to do, but remember this, and remeber it well - when you have given something out on the internett, like LFS world etc, then you allready are doomed to that people will use it if they like it.
Just look at the high-res skies that were used to other games, someone found it on the internett, liked it and putet it in a game they liked, so... sadly I just have to say - get over it. If you want to keep your skin for yourselfe, don`t upload it.

Quote from The Very End :

If you don`t want other people to see your skin, or be able to abuse it and use it for their own use, simply don`t upload it to LFS world. Then you are the only one that can use and see the skin.

And as a lot of people allready has said in this topic, you canot claim that you have some sort of copyright on it, because of a lot of decals and such that is not your work again.

But don`t misunderstand me, I don`t agree or justify that some people take your skin and use it, and at least not when they deside not to take it off when you ask them to do, but remember this, and remeber it well - when you have given something out on the internett, like LFS world etc, then you allready are doomed to that people will use it if they like it.
Just look at the high-res skies that were used to other games, someone found it on the internett, liked it and putet it in a game they liked, so... sadly I just have to say - get over it. If you want to keep your skin for yourselfe, don`t upload it.

What about skins that really are persons own work without commercial decals? Or those that do have permission to use some company logos ?

Quote from JTbo :

What about skins that really are persons own work without commercial decals?

I know, not good, but there is no good solution for that, the only way to prevent that would be not to upload it to LFSWorld, so he was the only one who could see it.

And again, I guess there is not much we really can do, maybe you just should be happy that someone liked your skin that much, that they wanted to race with it?

Quote from The Very End :

I know, not good, but there is no good solution for that, the only way to prevent that would be not to upload it to LFSWorld, so he was the only one who could see it.

And again, I guess there is not much we really can do, maybe you just should be happy that someone liked your skin that much, that they wanted to race with it?

No, it is not that way, it is not trying enough that allows this situation

Digital signature of skin binded to LFS username and LFS would not allow to load it to player car with other username or demo, problem solved, they just need to desing minor details of it

I have a better idea. You upload your skin to LFSW. Then, you go into LFS itself, and you can only use skins that you uploaded to your LFSW. Then, skins are just re-downloaded each time.

Quote from JTbo :

No, it is not that way, it is not trying enough that allows this situation

Digital signature of skin binded to LFS username and LFS would not allow to load it to player car with other username or demo, problem solved, they just need to desing minor details of it

Digital signature would maybe work, tho I don`t have a clue on how it could be implented

Quote from The Very End :

Digital signature would maybe work, tho I don`t have a clue on how it could be implented

Not too difficult really.

You can store some extra information to picture files, some can use it for encrypting, sending secret messages etc.

Idea is that when you upload skin to lfs world, server runs script that adds digital signature, one part of it would be racer name/id.

In LFS when you choose skin for car, there would be checkup routine, that checks your lfs username to match signature if signature is found and allows skin to be loaded only when there is match or no signature.

There is of course some small details that are need to be taken care of, but it is really not too big task for any system, very simple method will do.

Of course it is possible to go around of this but it would require some extra work and I would think that it would stop majority of cases.

That would maybe work, tho I`m not sure if that would be good, or if it just takes up too much time and effort for the dev`s to implent.
Guess we just have to face it that skins will allways be stolen when they are puted on the internett, not much we can do about that :/

Quote from The Very End :

That would maybe work, tho I`m not sure if that would be good, or if it just takes up too much time and effort for the dev`s to implent.
Guess we just have to face it that skins will allways be stolen when they are puted on the internett, not much we can do about that :/

Don't fall into despair, we must stand strong in front of evil that tries to get our choices of freedom under it's control, stay strong my brother and believe ways of good, evil ones will never succeed

Quote from JTbo :

Of course it is possible to go around of this but it would require some extra work and I would think that it would stop majority of cases.

Open up GIMP, save it as a BMP, and then save it into a jpeg file. Yeah, real difficult.

Quote from wheel4hummer :

Open up GIMP, save it as a BMP, and then save it into a jpeg file. Yeah, real difficult.

But how many skin stealer is going to bother? Lazy people those are, copying skin from one folder to other is perhaps most intensive task they ever have managed, now doing something with multiple phases certainly is too much for most.

Also might be that their intelligence is not enough to figure such thing out until told how to do it

i think a simple solution for this should be server side...

in lfsworld skins can go along with a flag to set the skin to private....
if the skin is private, the game downloads the skin directly to the memory, not to the hard drive, when you leave the race, the memory resets, problem solved, really easy from a certain point of view...

it might be a pain to code it that way, i don't know.

i forgot to add... if for some reason the reciever has a really low end computer, a friendly message should appear:

"not enough memory for private skins... skipping"

Quote from vf1-xj220 :

i think a simple solution for this should be server side...

in lfsworld skins can go along with a flag to set the skin to private....
if the skin is private, the game downloads the skin directly to the memory, not to the hard drive, when you leave the race, the memory resets, problem solved, really easy from a certain point of view...

it might be a pain to code it that way, i don't know.

i forgot to add... if for some reason the reciever has a really low end computer, a friendly message should appear:

"not enough memory for private skins... skipping"

Not a good solution because the traffic to the skin server would increase. More traffic costs more.

Don't see signature files as a viable option either because it would be problematic with team skins and if you upload your own public skins which are meant to be shared, it could be optional of course. But as it's the team skins which are stolen in many cases, signature wouldn't change anything.

very true... but i don't know if the traffic would increase that much... remember all the people that flushes constantly their skins directory, along with clean installs... the traffic will be affected slightly...

stepping the costs aside, i think it's the most viable solution, because of it's end user simplicity, yet, there is still people that belives that the LFS project won't do better with more funding.. :\

Ok how about YOU pay for it?
every time someone else downloads your protected skin, your account gets charged for it.

The public can see but not save it, everyone wins right?

Meh.. if you see someone driving round with your skin, make one that's pink with 'I STEAL SKINS' daubed down the side and re-upload it with the same name. Then re-upload your real one with a different name and use that.