SW Adventure journal downloads?

[Reaper63]

I did a quick search of the net to see if I cold find the Adventure journals in a downloadable form, but everything I found kicked in my anti Virus.

Does anyone know where I could find a safe version of them? if possible.

thank you
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[cheshire]

Hey, Reaper. Though it is pretty well understood that PDFs are widely used game resources, the admins have a policy of not advocating the distribution or discussion of pirated books. There is too much potential liability of posting links to copyrighted books in public forums.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[Reaper63]

no worries, thanks for the heads up
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[CRMcNeill]

Stormtrooper: "we're looking for a post about illegal file sharing."

Jedi: "this is not the post you are looking for. Move along."
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[vanir]

PM's are a wonderful invention, I once had the author of a rather pricey specialist military piece about a particular german warbird send me a bunch of his research info via PM at an aviation forum for a flight modelling project, I don't think his publisher would've been too thrilled since it saved me a few hundred bucks and a lot of time. You know some artists have actually distributed materiel against the wishes of their signatory copyright holders (artists must often sell their intellectual property rights to a company to get public distribution, for a royalty fee but nothing like the profits the company makes off it).

But whilst see no, hear no, speak no evil is a valid point...that one cannot say what goes on behind closed doors, extremely costly lawsuits and criminal prosecutions are brought to bear over what happens in front of open ones. Some P2P sharers got jail time recently in Florida IIRC, the bulk of the music files they shared hasn't been newly released since the 80s (I'm talking Phil Collins here) and they still got jail time.

Weird that highly arguable profit recovery systems involve more seriously penalised crimes than violent criminal assault but there you go.

I'm fairly ambiguous about it all, I'm not paranoid about it or anything, but I just don't care enough about file sharing as opposed to collector purchasing to bother risking some potentially serious legal action, taken against the site or its members (especially not myself). Some sites have been shut down for file sharing copyright material and the webhosts prosecuted.

Internet laws are still being developed and may not be perfect, you may find yourself overly prosecuted by an imperfect set of internet criminal law, as part of the very process to evolve those laws more completely, if some authority somewhere has a bee in their bonnet.
Thing about copyright law is being part of an international agreement between most developed nations, so you can and will be extradited to face copyright lawsuits in the US from Belgium or wherever you are. Because big US multinationals are happy to foot the bill of an inconvenience to secure wider markets as a result of protective legislation.

A Perth guy got extradited to face a copyright infringement in the US, that was in the news a few weeks ago.

I don't think it's all that serious, but the people with the guns disagree.

[Nico_Davout]

[Darth Ginzain]

Which makes me wonder what is the status of the WEG books seeing as WEG doesn't even exsist anymore.

[cheshire]

[CRMcNeill]

It seems odd to me that they would bother. Unless WEG has some sort of backstock of Star Wars product, the only books in circulation are used ones, sold through independent sellers and used bookstores. WEG only derived a profit from the original sale, not subsequent sales of that product to third parties. If someone were to post the books on line for free, WEG could sue for copyright infringement, but lawsuits cost money (lawyer fees, court costs, etc), and spending money to defend a copyright on a product which is no longer turning a profit is not a smart use of available capital.
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[cheshire]

Though I sincerely doubt Eric would have the capital and the motivation to actively pursue a case, it still doesn't change what the law is. Right now, it's just a terribly impractical law. Copyright law is like that, ESPECIALLY electronic copyright law. What makes the issue even more confusing is the fact that D6 has gone to Open D6.

One might reason that the system is open, the Star Wars IP doesn't belong to WEG, and there's no way to make money off of the books anyway, ergo it's ought to be legal to distribute. But it just doesn't work like that for several reasons. The first of which (which is VERY likely to confuse most of everyone) is that even though the general system is open, the books released under the system are not necessarily. Only a select few books have been released as open, namely D6 Space, D6 Fantasy, D6 Fantasy Creatures, D6 Space Ships, etc. It does not apply to the previous books released under IP licenses. Even if there are general mechanics in there that work throughout all D6 books, and some that are special rules that apply to a particular book. That is to say, if I want to write an article for The D6 Magazine about Martial Arts, and I want to borrow specific language and mechanics from The Rules of Engagement, I will have to write and ask permission from Eric. He'll likely say yes, but I will have to include certain legal disclaimers. You may object that I essentially did this without permission with my article on whip techniques. Indeed, it is obvious that I borrowed certain concepts, but not enough unique similarities to the original work such that it constituted a violation of Eric's rights as a copyright holder.

In the end, though common sense does not bind these books, the frustratingly complex system of copyright (and the even MORE complex system of electronic copyright) does have a legal choke hold on us.

Even if Eric wouldn't do anything, there is still a legal liability, believe it or not. Suppose Eric sold the copyright tomorrow to Disney, and Disney also bought FFG, and then merged the WEG and FFG into one company. The new parent company could shut the site down for sharing their intellectual property and sue for damages since they could conceivably re-release the books.

Now, again, this is so horribly improbable that we'd be better off waiting for a hitherto unseen asteroid to smack into the earth tomorrow. But the problem of legal liability is not always a matter of probability but of potentiality.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[CRMcNeill]

But wouldn't that also imply that, for instance, if I were to write a paper for a college course and wanted to use a published book as a resource, I would have to contact the author and receive his permission? Unless there is some legal distinction between the two, I would think all you would need to do in the case of your example would be to include a bibliography with properly cited references with your article, especially since you aren't profiting from publication of D6 Magazine.
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[cheshire]

[CRMcNeill]

[cheshire]

Though I'm talking to WNG right now and there might be a possibility that they way I want to use the rules in Rules of Engagement might fit under fair use.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[Grimace]

It's also important to note the following:

In the Star Wars books, including the Adventure Journals, there's a line that states:

®, TM, and © [year] Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL). All Rights Reserved. Trademarks of LFL used by West End Games under authorization.

So not only are you distributing materials published by WEG, something that could get you in trouble even if you're dispersing it for free, but you can ALSO be pursued by Lucasfilm Ltd. because all of the Star Wars material within those books belongs to them and you're dispersing it without permission. I believe more people are perhaps afraid of LFL than they are of WEG when it comes to being told to cease and desist or else!

So Copyright law is a bit more complex than common sense, as cheshire pointed out.