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MAME and the law.

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isucamper:
atomik:  Bringing up Nazis.  Thanks a lot. 

saint:  well... well... what do you know!! (please don't ban me)

saint:

--- Quote from: isucamper on May 24, 2010, 07:41:28 pm ---saint:  well... well... what do you know!! (please don't ban me)

--- End quote ---

Heh.  ;D

Patent Doc:
Saint

Good job on trying to teach the difference between laws and morality.  I have a six year old and trying to explain that laws can be made by bad people is a tough concept for him to get.  He innocently believes that teh definition of good and bad is whether you violate a law. 

Being an attorney, I feel obligated to not violate a law if I can help it.  does that mean I agree with all laws or think anyone violating a law is immoral?...of course not.  Many..not all...traffic violations have no moral aspect to them.  That's why there is no intent element to the crime.  You either did speed, run the traffic light, fail to yield, double park, or you didn't.

The moral issue comes in with things like theft and killing.  With copyright infringement...like it or not...it is theft.  Personally, I think the copyright term for computer programs is WAY WAY too long.  I'd actually like it to see the term for computer programs limited to its initial commercial life or prohibited altogether and patents for computer programs be the mode of inforcement.  In my mind there is no moral issue if my use of mame is not depriving someone of a potential sale...if the game isn't being offered for sale commercially, then it should be OK.  I guess that's just where my moral compass falls...the law doesn't agree with me, but not agreeing with a law isn't a crime...violating it is.  By the way, copyright infringement will never result in an arrest...possibly confiscation of a computer as evidence, but the penalty is a fine...a big fine, but a fine nonetheless.

Jack Burton:

--- Quote from: Mozee on May 21, 2010, 01:05:20 am ---many people put coin doors on their custom machines, and wire it to accept quarters/tokens. I would like to do the same things, not because I want to make money off of people, but me and my friends are really serious about recreating that old arcade experience at home, which includes dropping some quarters and playing a game. Is this drawing the line a little?
--- End quote ---

As long as you are the one supplying the quarters I don't have a problem with it. 

There are many other complexities to this issue, but as far as the coin door goes that's how I see it. 

If it really bothers you use tokens instead of quarters. 

kronic24601:
Everything is highly dependent on if you believe in universal morality or relative morality (Right vs Wrong is it universally true, or relative to the person/society).

What I think we are talking about here is Ethics, which have a more social context. And since laws come and go depending on the society (e.g in many countries there is NO law against ROMS) then I'm inclined to think this isn't a right vs wrong issue ... simply an ethical issue.

When making any ethical decision I always use the Jack Bauer test. If Jack would do it, it's probably ok  ;D

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