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How do you know your JAMMA PCB is legal?
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Driver-Man:
Ok, I agree with all that, thank you all. In summary, I find it interesting people care more about MAME legal warnings than about actual copyright of the game ROMs themselves. Anyway, we all concluded 60-in-1 PCBs can not be legal, but in reality we sure see they're quite "legal".

These 48-in-1, 60-in-1 are actually quite wide spread and freely sold and played everywhere, are they not? Even blatant MAME PC based 400-in-1, 1000-in-1... boards are sold everywhere and imported/exported freely, on-line and in retail shops. This is not smuggled and sold under the counter, these are actually taxed by the government, so they are in fact legal, are they not? If you can buy it in retail shop and get an invoice for it, then who can sue you for putting in it in your arcade cabinet and charge for the play? How were you supposed to know? Government took their profit there as well, so they don't seem to care too much? Who cares? Who sues?

There is obviously some discrepancy between what people say and what actually is, so I still reserve my doubts that any of the original copyright would really stand in the court. Was there any legal action in relation to any arcade bootlegs, ever?
Driver-Man:

--- Quote --- ...kindly advising you to drop this topic as you're likely going to just upset a lot of folks here if you keep pursuing it.

--- End quote ---

--- Quote ---Try not to be an jerk trying to justify something we all know to be true anyways. Show the hobby and market some respect.
--- End quote ---

Errr, ok, I hear you, but I have no idea what are you referring to. What are you two talking about, please? I see people on this forum openly saying to have thousands of ROMs, so that's not it, and at least I paid for my illegal machines, but that only makes me stupid... what else?

I kind of see where and how our view on the subject can differ, but I do not see there can be any disrespect to anyone. I'm sort of "MAME developer" myself, if that matters at all, but all the same I have nothing but respect for MAME and how it came to be, for all the people that contributed, and so on...


Interestingly though I was also responsible for couple of published Amstrad CPC games. I speak not only for myself, but many actual programmers when I say I would like my games to be played freely. I don't even know whether they are or not, it was never up to me anyway. I made those games so everyone can play it, that was my motivation and satisfaction, and I find it unfortunate that some lost copyrights stand between people and my games, that's not fair to me - the actual maker, the actual programmer, not the bloody company that would have my games buried in their ignorance. Games are meant to be played, and that's the most important thing here, not silly laws that would have them forgotten.


Where do we disagree, exactly?
WhereEaglesDare:
Hey, you're right! That's all abadonware, you should totally sell homemade cabs with mame and 200 games on them!  Make sure you put Ads up EVERYWHERE.  eBay, Craigslist, Classifieds, street poles, everywhere.  

Oh and you got to make sure you charge a ridiculous amount for what you didn't pay for.
Turnarcades:
All current multi-game boards are illegal. End of. The only reason they don't get pulled on ebay and places like that is because the people in charge aren't clued up enough - they're just PC's with emulation software and JAMMA connectors, but as they look like an ordinary PCB to the layman and aren't obviously programmable, the dolts regulating the sites don't delve further.

Why do you think links to them are banned here?

Malenko:
all of the X in 1 are illegal. The 60(+) in 1s because they use copyrighted ROMs and MAME, even the multiple CPS1/2s because they use roms (but no emulation) and the 120 in NeoGeo carts. I'm not entirely sure how illegal hacks are, like SF2 Rainbow, so long as its using edited data on legit boards.


As for buying , for example, a bootleg Frogger you thought was authentic. In the unlikely event you were prosecuted I dont really see you getting in much trouble (unless you some how made A LOT of money with it) especially if the board looks very legit. Sometimes I cant tell, I even had a bootleg puzzle bobble cart and a legit one side by side and other then a very small marking on the back of the PCB they looked identical
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