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Laser Animation Piracy
By L. Michael Roberts

In December 2001, there was a discussion about animation piracy, people stealing other's laser animations, on the ILDA mailing list.  This discussion led to me to visit the web pages of some of the participants, where I was surprised to find images from an animation that I had created, were displayed.

    Laser animations are software and represent intellectual property belonging to the artist who created the animation.  As all laserists know, making a character animation is a time consuming and tedious process.  First one makes or locates the artwork, then digitizes it, cleans it up and then compiles it into a finished animation.  This process can take between 10 and 30 minutes per frame depending on the complexity and detail in the image.  Thus even a fairly short animation of 10 frames can represent between 2 and 5 hours of work to produce - longer animations can represent weeks or even months of work.
    The many laser animators who put in hours of work in front of their systems deserve to be fairly rewarded for the time and effort that they have put into creating the artwork  Without reasonable payment for this work, there is no incentive for artists to create animations for sale to the industry and we will all be forced back to the old days when we each created our own animations on proprietary systems that did not have interchangeable frame formats.
    The laser industry does not have a central licensing or publishing authority - like the record or motion picture industry has - which will collect fees and protect intellectual properly on behalf of the artists.  Most people in the laser industry are very honorable and we are all pretty much known to one another.  Artists and animators are in the position of having to enforce copyright and payment issues on their own.
   From time to time, someone finds and uses an animation which they have not legitimately purchased or obtained the rights to use.  Often they go out of their way to make sure they have the right to use the material.  Occasionally they go ahead and use questionable material without clearance - but when called on it, they do the honorable thing and pay the artist for the material.  After all, the possession of that material, laser frames, has allowed them to sell shows and receive payments from clients.

    When I found that an Australian laser company was using my animations... animations I had no record of providing to them, naturally I contacted them to clarify the matter and to locate the source of the animation in the event that one of my other clients had violated the license agreement; or they had perhaps obtained it legitimately from someone who had re-sale rights to the animation.
    What follows here are copies of E-mails that I sent in an attempt to find out where the company using my animations had obtained them.  Following that are copies of the E-mails between myself and the person who was responsible for taking my animations and re-selling them to benefit himself, and my attempts to collect my standard fee for re-sale rights on my animation work.

NOTE: Since I tend to reply to E-mails in-line, I have not reproduced every E-mail here as you can read the material I am replying to in the quoted section of the E-mail - quoted sections are shown in italics like this.
E-mails are reproduced as sent with no editing [except as noted]. Some E-mails have been edited - and the edits marked - only to protect third parties who did not wish to be quoted or involved.

05 December 2001

Greetings,
I am writing to you privately in regards to the recent discussion of artwork and laser animation on the ILDA and Pangolin lists. I noticed that on your "T2 Bazooka" web page there are images of a trade show stand for Elbex that clearly show a fame from my "Bad Guys" animation - http://www.oraclelaser.com.au/1024/t2bazooka.vagi
I downloaded the QuickTime clip for the Elbex trade show stand [www.oraclelaser.com.au/movies/elbex03.mpg] and it clearly shows the full "Bad Guys" animation in use as part of the trade show stand.
I have no recollection of ever licensing this laser animation to Oracle. I would like to know where and how you obtained the animation since it is not just a few sample frames, but the entire animation.
Yours sincerely,
L. Michael Roberts

Today I received the following reply:

Hi Michael

Nice to hear from you. You are going to laugh (maybe) but guess who made that animation for us ?

Terry Green made it for us using his own library. I instructed him to make us a cool show for the trade show and that is what I got. I was under the
impression that they were his frames, not that I particularly asked him regarding the origin since I had not seen these frames before.

I am more than happy to give you a credit on the corresponding web page now
that I know they are your frames, or I can remove it completely which would
be a shame since I thought it was a nice show !

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

07 December 2001

The statement I made in 99 and resurfacing in the Tim Hallmark post which began this new discussion...
"The world needs more LASER ART and LASER ARTISTS, especially in an industry as small as ours. The ART created by those few ,who have the time , patience and motivation should be displayed for the masses to enjoy, so that one day this format will be more widely accepted, only then will those ARTISTS receive the recognition they deserve." I still believe this..

read into it what you will but as a laser frame creator
Like you said, it was inspiring for you to walk into a club in Europe and see your animations displayed for all to enjoy... Personally I don't get out to see many lasershows but if I had that experience I would be grinning from ear to ear.

I have had in mind for about 18 months creating a online library like The new Lightspeed Ebay Site but for creators only have you seen www.yaga.com or LASERFX would be perfect.

In closing..

Michael if I do have animations made by you I apologise, this is the read me file in the Shows directory of my CDS

"The Graphics contained in these Shows were created by INTERNATIONAL LASER PRODUCTIONS, However there are a few files scattered throughout which were not created by INTERNATIONAL LASER PRODUCTIONS. Credit for the frames not made by INTERNATIONAL LASER PRODUCTIONS can be found in the Individual Frame Notes with each of the respective frames. If you have found any frames without frame notes that belong to you this is not intentional and we sincerely apologize for any grief this may cause you."

How would you like to proceed from this point on....

I look forward to further communication

Yours Sincerely

Terry


Terrence Green
Director
================================
INTERNATIONAL LASER PRODUCTIONS
The Art of Bending Light
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
Tel. +62 361 701-768
Fax. +1 707 885-4564
+44 870 139 2569
--------------------------------
E-mail info@internatlaser.com
URL I www.internatlaser.com
URL II www.micrommlaser.com
================================

At 01:33 07/12/2001 +0800, you wrote:

Hello Michael,

Nice to hear from you,

I thought your dialogue posted to the list " Laser Frames and Animation rip-offs ) Hit the nail most squarely on the head. beside the other serious discussions posted I am sometimes embarrassed to think I could be included in a community that resorts to such petty drivel.

Like you I keep myself busy in front of my PC in a procession of join the dot parades. I spent years with inferior systems in the 80s creating drawings/animations in my PC to then be digitized into the laser system. Intensive work as you know.
I still have reams of cells that these days are scanned into the laser prog . . I love it ...
Before Pangolin came along with LSD I was only aware of LM modules ( I bought a massive, 9 Imagen system second hand for 10 cents on the dollar in 88) and a few pictures from English animation textbooks.

I saw in your post the reference to the Video on the web page, Of course it was made by me no surprise there , I do all of Oracles programming and frame creation, have done for the past 2 years. I did not realize these frames were yours ... I got them in a download from a website in a demo package .. along with some others.

Greetings,
    Thank you for your lengthy response.... I am unfortunately pressed for time at the moment so let me say that I agree with your in general and would like to discuss this further in the future. I have had offers to do on-line commerce with frames and animations but hesitate to do so as there is no real way to enforce copyright and anti-piracy concerns.

    At this time. I am most concerned with finding out how the "Bad Guys" animation escaped "into the wild". If you can provide me with the web site and link where you got this material, then I will peruse the issue with whoever is responsible. If you can not provide this information, then we will have to reach a settlement as you have re-sold my copyrighted material and profited from my work - even though you believed you had obtained it in good faith.
   In the meantime, I would ask that you cease and desist from using this animation in any shows or re-distributing it further in any manner until we have resolved this issue.
    Thanks,
        L. Michael Roberts

09 December 2001

Hello Michael

I believe the animations were part of a demo download from Bob Ashes site .. included in his Full Auto Demo. SDX SHX extension from memory I got them a couple of years ago . . .

Greetings Terry,
    I have checked my records and as far as I can tell, I have never sold that animation to Bob Ash at NML. I also checked through the NML animation library on my system and the animation is not present there. I have written to Bob Ash to ask about this and I will get back to you when I have his reply.
    You should also be aware that converting other people's artwork from their in-house formats is a form of software piracy.
    Thanks,
        L. Michael Roberts

11 December 2001

Hi Michael

Definitely from that location the Zip file was named bigstuff.zip

I copy a lot of stuff from the net gifs etc

Although in a country where the connection speeds are so slow, its easier go down to the supermarket and buy a CD with full Windows 2000, the entire Corel clip collections.. etc. (the list is never ending ) for $3.50

Greetings,
    I have relayed your comments to Bob Ash. He is slow in answering his mails as he is a busy person. I will get back to you with the result of my discussions with him.
    I should point out that even though your country tolerates/condones software piracy, that still does not make it legal and ethical.
    Thanks,
        L. Michael Roberts

12 December 2001

Greetings,
I have had further correspondence from Terry in Malaysia. He says:

Hi Michael
Definitely from that location the Zip file was named bigstuff.zip

Now if that is indeed true, and you do have the animation from me, then I have less of an issue with him as you bought the re-distribution rights and can do whatever you want with the  frames. However, I would suggest that you then have an issue with Terry as he is stealing your product, intended for your users, and then profiting by re-selling it to others.
Please let me know if you did indeed make these frames available on the net, and what terms [if any] you placed on their use.

The only ones of yours that I THINK have ever been on our demo are:

Fred
Road Runner
VU Meter
Fashion Show

These are the same ones that are on the downloadable demo now. I can yank these at any time, and replace them with the new encrypted format that (as far as I know) is uncrackable. The bigstuff.zip comes with the purchased version, in X29 format, and is a SHOW including badguys, fashion show, lightshow.

As far back as I can remember, we have NEVER had any file other than "X29-Demo.exe" on the net, which is a self extracting demo with scenes and a tiny show.

I guess it is possible that years ago I may have sent this to someone via email, but back then it would have been a huge download (remember 24k?) so I doubt it. I never had any legal notifications as to the animations, and at the time (198X?) thought it unlikely that anyone would make a X29 to ILDA converter (like the Russian Anarchy program available now).

I intend to pursue this and make an example of him so as to discourage others from stealing/converting artwork.

Could be rough. He can always claim some excuse. Suing people overseas is expensive and usually doesn't work. You may want to try talking to him in a civil manner and just say it is copyrighted material in X29 format, and certainly was never meant to CONVERTED and sold. The nicer you say it, the more likely he is to comply. Just a thought. 

All new animations are in the new FA3 format which is REALLY encrypted well. It may not be completely un-crackable, but it is way more of a problem than it is worth, and every file is done differently.

Wish I had a better answer for you!

Thanks,
Bob

Greetings Bob,
There is no need to change your demo. You have every right to redistribute those frames.

Yeah, but I really don't want other systems using them for free!
So I will change the demo download soon.

That is what I recall as well. So in fact he has been caught with his "hand in the cookie jar" in that he converted material that was not licensed to him and sold it to others.

The main point here is that EVEN IF HE BOUGHT THEM, AND THEY WERE LICENSED TO HIM, he cannot convert and resell them.

 I have been very nice and polite so far and he has been cooperative. I don't intend to sue him as the lawyers  fees would cost a lot more than the animation is worth.
I am hoping to exert some social pressure to get him to  stop redistributing other people's work and claiming it as his own.

He has never said it was "his own". He says it's all basically "public domain". Obviously, it's only public domain if the author says it's public domain. Even if it was mistakenly (or on purpose) put on a public domain web-site, if the author subsequently informs the "distributor" that it is NOT public domain, they are required to stop distributing them. In the U.S., this could be a million dollar lawsuit.

Thanks for the info. I will correspond with him again and I am going to suggest that he purchase the redistribution rights to the animation at $5.00/frame as a settlement which will land up costing him around $600.00. However I wanted to know if this is OK with you as he actually stole the material directly from you, and so you should be entitled to some compensation as well [say 50%?].

No, you keep whatever you get, which I think will be nothing.

See Ya,
Bob

17 December 2001

Hi Michael

Definitely from that location the Zip file was named bigstuff.zip

Greetings Terry,
    I have had correspondence with Bob Ash and he did indeed have a legitimate copy of the "Bad Guys" animation which he made available to his users as part of a .zip file named "bigstuff.zip". The animation was intended for use by authorized X-29 users and were NOT in the public domain, or made available for use by anyone other than authorized X-29 users.

Bob says:
The bigstuff.zip comes with the purchased version, in X29 format, and is a SHOW including badguys, fashion show, lightshow.

He goes on to say:
It is copyrighted material in X29 format, and certainly was never meant to CONVERTED and sold. 

He further comments:
The main point here is that EVEN IF HE BOUGHT THEM, AND THEY WERE LICENSED TO HIM, he cannot convert and resell them.
He has never said it was "his own". He says it's all basically "public domain". Obviously, it's only public domain if the author says it's public domain. Even if it was mistakenly (or on purpose) put on a public domain web-site, if the author subsequently informs the "distributor" that it is NOT public domain, they are required to stop distributing them. In the U.S., this could be a million dollar lawsuit.

Therefore you are in violation of:

1] My original copyright on the material;
2] The grant of a license from Laser F/X to New Method Lasers to distribute the animation to their authorized users;
3] New Method Lasers grant of a license to authorized X-29 users to incorporate the material into their shows; and 
4] Converting New Method Lasers copyrighted format [for distribution of their material to authorized users] and making use of the converted material for your own sales and profit.

    To remedy this situation, you must immediately cease and desist from any further distribution of this animation and/or any other Laser F/X copyrighted animations; and you must provide compensation for your violation of the copyrights held in these frames by Laser F/X and New Method Lasers.

    I will give you 48 hours in which to make an offer of compensation for the violations of copyright as outlined above. If the offer is not satisfactory to us, we will notify you of terms and conditions that we feel will reasonably settle this infringement.

    I await your response,
        L. Michael Roberts

CC: Bob Ash - New Method Lasers

23 December 2001

[Quotation of E-mail sent on 17 Dec 2001 deleted]

08 January 2002

Dear Michael

Sorry for the late reply...
On the 11th of December I left for a overseas trip to make a successful New
years Eve Show and just returned late last night .
Glad to say no problems with the local authorities, I guess I didn't interfere with the locals too much or didn't upset cultural sensitivities.

Greetings,
    I am glad to her that your new years show went well.

in review of your last email I shall stop using (in your words cease and desist ) the frames in question in any public performances and as fillers of shows I make now it has been made clear to me that these frames do not come from the public domain. I hope this will settle your grievance once and for all .

    I am afraid that this is not sufficient. You have admitted to re-selling my animations and in this E-mail, to using them to "pad" your shows - shows that are selling to generating revenue fro yourself.
    I would be willing to accept my standard fee of $5.00 US$ per frame that I charge to anyone who wishes to have unlimited re-distribution rights to my animations as a private settlement, along with a brief announcement to the ILDA list that we have settled and that you are now legally in possession of the animation. That will cost you 214 frames X $5.00 US$ = $ 1,070.00 US$.
    I believe this to be a reasonable settlement as you have profited form my work in the past, and the payment will allow you to use this animation [and generate further income from it] in the future. I also believe it is reasonable as I have charged others who are in violation of my copyright $10.00 US$/frame - however this is an old animation.
    I await your response,
        L. Michael Roberts

16 January 2002

Michael

Hold on a minute...
I have never admitted that I have, per se, sold your animations...You imply that I have spotlighted YOUR works and said these are made by me Simply untrue.

Greetings,
    You have admitted in prior E-mails that you extracted my material from an archive circulated to NML customers and designed for their exclusive use. You further admitted that you used the material in a show and to "pad" your shows. I am also in possession of a video which clearly shows my work in use at a trade show for ELBEX, and the producer of that show, Oracle, has told me that you programmed the show and sold it to them. Thus you have admitted to theft of intellectual property, possession of stolen intellectual property and trafficking in stolen intellectual property for your own financial gain.

I have had the decency to be honest and admit these animations reside on my hard drive.

    Yes you have. Which is why am dealing with this privately and have not splashed it all over my web site and the ILDA lists.

They exist there because I got them in a download from the internet...many consider this Public Domain

    The Internet is not now, nor has it ever been Public Domain. Some people do make material available for free download and this that can be considered "public domain". Most people have copyright notices on their web pages... In fact, your own pages state:

"INTERNATIONAL LASER PRODUCTIONS
Last Updated January 17, 2002
© International Laser Productions 1996 - 2002 All Rights Reserved."

    Which shows that you obviously do not wish people to copy material from your site on the Internet.
Furthermore, Bob Ash has stated in correspondence to me that he had NEVER made that material available on his web site [which is copyrighted]... nor has he allowed any of his users to make the material available in the public domain. Furthermore he has indicated to me that the material was in a proprietary format, a format which you had to take the time and effort to decrepit and convert to ILDA format - thus indicating that you knowingly were extracting material that was in a proprietary format and converting to another format for your own use and profit.

I make shows, on ONE occasion I have used said animation for a show filler ( maybe 10 seconds worth )for Oracle

    I have seen the show... There are 293 frames of material in the show of which 214 frames is the "Bad Guys" animation - there is one other very basic animation of a fist holding a club that appears to be about 12 frames long... the rest of the show is text, stills and effects. My animation represents about 65% of the material in the show - hardly a "filler" but the majority of that show's material. Furthermore, this show was not run only once in a theatrical setting, but ran continuously in a repeating loop over the course of the trade show thus the animation was played hundreds if not thousands of times.

For that, to appease your grievance I have apologized profusely and stated that now the origin of these frames are clear to me they will not be included in my shows for sale.

    Unfortunately the damage has been done. You have stolen material [theft by conversion is recognized in legal codes] then taken that stolen property and re-sold it claiming it was your own work and you have profited from that sale. Since you have already been using my intellectual property without permission or compensation, and have profited from my work, it is only fair that I should be compensated. Since you have also demonstrated, by your actions, that you included my work in shows for sale without permission or compensation, the credibility of your promise not to do so in the future is nil.
    The settlement I am proposing gives you the re-distribution rights to the material, rights you should have obtained BEFORE selling my work for your own profit. It also eliminates the problem of the lack of credibility in your "cease and desist" promise as you were well aware that the material was NOT your work when you sold it to Oracle.

NOW you are reading into my replies somehow that I am using ONLY your animations to PAD my shows.. hey hey... I make animations also ...in fact 99% of my archive is original 

    I am not disputing that the vast majority of the material in your archive is original. However you did admit in a previous E-mails that you have used my material, material which you stole, to "pad" your shows.

I see from various e-mail and internet sites some large animation libraries
are now for sale One has 82000 frames included for auction... OK the reserve price is $3500 ... by my calculation that's about 23 cents a frame.
Ok since I have used your animation once please recalculate a new price for

    If you visit my site, you will see that I sell an animation library of 2,500+ frames for $250.00 US$ - that works out to be around $0.11 US$/frame. HOWEVER that price is based on ONE user using the animations on ONE system for their OWN shows only and does not give the user any right to trade, swap, give-away or re-sell the material. Re-distribution rights cost more as they allow the holder of the rights to make a profit from my work.
    I gather that you sell the CDs of your original animations to end users with the expectation that they will use it on their own systems for their own shows. You would doubtless be upset to find that people were copying your material and then re-selling it to others for their own profit without your permission and with no compensation to you as the owner of the intellectual property.
    I am offering a settlement that is in-line with the price that I charge to any and ALL laser companies who purchase my material for re-sale - $5.00 US$ per frame. Naturally re-sale rights are more expensive than single use rights as they allow the person purchasing the material to re-sell it as part of their shows and productions, or to provide it to their clients who own systems/installations they have purchased from the person licensing my material. In other words, the re-sale rights allow the holder of those right to make profits from my material without having to negotiate compensation to me with every re-sale of my intellectual property. 
    I am sure if you contact LightSpeed, who have their animations listed on E-bay, and ask them for the price of one of those animations with re-sale rights, you will find it is far more that $5.00 US$ per frame. My price of 214 frames X $5.00 US$ = $ 1,070.00 US$ stands as that is the same price I would charge anyone who re-sells my material.
    I await your response,
        L. Michael Roberts

26 January 2002

[Quotation of E-mail sent on 16 Jan 2002 deleted]

12 February 2002

[Quotation of E-mail sent on 16 Jan 2002 deleted]

26 February 2002

>I am STILL waiting for your reply to this last E-mail:

Hello Michael

Sorry I've not had time to respond to your request (again) My wife's best friend just got married in Jakarta and we got caught up in the major flooding there   worst in living history... Sad to see so many people (literally hundreds of thousands) in real life without very much
loosing what meager possessions they have.
I am NOT avoiding the issue..

    I don't believe that protecting my intellectual property from theft and re-sale is zealotry. Since I presently derive the majority of my income from creating laser artwork, I am simply protecting my ability to pay the rent and put food on the table.
You need not be a martyr.  What you need to do is own up to the fact that you obtained material that was not intended for you, converted that material from a proprietary format and then derived a profit from the material by re-selling it to another person.  You simply have to take responsibility for your actions.

I don't recall having paid anything for the download. Therefore it was free.

    Since the material was not made available for download, obviously there was no charge.  The fact remains, free or not, you stole animations that were not intended for your use, converted them and then earned income on them by selling them to someone else.

My thinking is like this, both for my website and my CD collection .  Once it leaves  my grasp I have no control over what end-users do with it. The circle with the c in the middle means I don't want people copying my site or works verbatim.

    Just as I do not want anyone who is not authorized, and who has not paid for my animations, using my works verbatim.

I like the idea that people are using things I have created, therfore I don't place restrictions on them, as stated in my text file that goes out with them " All we ask is that you do not reproduce and sell this archive in its entirety"

    That IS a restriction.  The user of you material may not reproduce and sell the archive.  I have different conditions on the use of my material.  Users must purchase the material under license and many not sell, trade, give away, swap, exchange or otherwise dispose of the material without my permission - they may only use it for their own projections.
    I have a separate agreement for those that wish to use my material in shows that are sold, lent or given to others.  It is a re-distribution license, such as the one that Bob Ash has, which allows them to pay a fee for the material and then distribute it as they wish.
    I am sure you would not be at all pleased if someone were to purchase your clip art collection on CD and then start selling that material into club installations or to other laser companies.  The reason you would not be pleased is because this deprives you of the ability to sell that material to the end users and to profit from the time you have invested in the creative process involved in making the material in the first place.  In a worst case situation, someone could purchase your CD and then start distributing the material to anyone who asks for it, thus depriving you of the opportunity to make any more sales - leaving you with the revenue from one sold CD which I am sure you would agree is a minuscule compensation for the time and effort you put into creating the material in the first place.

That utopian society where everybody is as pure as the driven snow does not exist, never will, man is the most despicable species on this planet, motivated by greed, money and power. Of
course this does not apply to all. My motivation was none of these it was purely creative.

    I would believe that if the show you created with my work was produced for a charity and you did not benefit financially from the show.  In the situation at hand, you SOLD my material, material which you had stolen [theft by conversion], and put the money in your pocket.  This is exactly akin to talking property of someone else, say a VCR, and the selling it to another for your own financial gain.  The fact that the property is computer data that, unlike a VCR, can be easily copied makes no difference.  You still sold something that you had no rights of ownership in, to a third party for your own financial gain.

Look at the bigger picture, The whole idea of regulation and licensing is a great way of getting residuals but stifles creativity.

    I do not collect residuals.  I charge a price based on the intended end use of the material.  If it is for use by a laserist on a single system, and will not be re-sold, traded, given or swapped with others, then I change a lower fee than if the material is being purchased for re-distribution [whether the end user is charged or not charged for the material by the holder of the re-distribution license].
    The surest way to stifle creativity is to have artists and animators slave away for hours to do the creative work, then get nothing in return.  Where is the incentive to create new artwork in that situation?  This is no longer the medieval times when rich patrons supported artists so that they could just create works and not worry about putting food on the table.  Artists must pay rent and other bills and thus need to be rewarded for the time and effort they have put into the creative process.... just as you reap the rewards of the time you have put into your artwork CDs.

Sure the market gets diluted,  but keep producing and updating, the process continues.. great for raising the awareness and consumer interest of a small industry.
Pettiness and bickering over miniscule matters damages a fragile environment especially to onlookers outside the industry.

    If I won the lottery and did not have to struggle to pay the rent and feed myself, then I would be more than happy to give away my works.  As it is, I gave away hundreds of hours of my time each month helping newbies by E-mail and phone, and producing and administering the web site.  I support that donation to the industry by the sales of laser animations.  Each animation that is stolen and re-sold to others takes food off my plate.
    People understand the concept of intellectual property and thus outsiders looking at the industry will not consider it "bickering over minuscule matters" when someone defends their intellectual property - especially in a situation where the fee involved is [a] very reasonable by industry standards and [b] represents a month of living expenses for the creator.
    I know you live in a region of the world where you can buy pirated software for 1/10 to 1/100 of it's original value.  Just because that software is openly sold in your region does not make it any less of a theft of intellectual property.  In fact, it raises the cost to those of us who must purchase the software legitimately since the software companies have to charge legitimate customers more to cover the loss of revenues from the theft/piracy.

Here's where  honesty comes into play for me... Bob has stated in correspondence   NEVER made available on his website....
I guess you've known Bob for a long time.... well... where the hell did I get that file from Hmmm it certainly didn't fall from the sky on a rainy day...who came down in the last shower.. here , I've attached the original zip file , you will note there is no read me file
or any text relating to copyright....nothing.
Again: I don't see any copyright information on the NML site. www.laser-light-show.com I downloaded the file ,  two years or so later suddenly someone is claiming rights and recompense.

    You claimed it was from the NML web site and Bob Ash has stated he did not place the material on his site.  Where you obtained the material is immaterial to the issue at hand.  An examination of the .zip file you sent shows that unzipping it converts it to "bigstuff.shx".  The .shx extension shows that it is in the proprietary X-29 format.
    In order to use this material you converted it to ILDA format and later to Pangolin format.  The legal principal here is called "theft by conversion" and is well established in international law.  You also knew full well when you obtained the material that it was not your creation.  Had you kept this for you own personal use then it would have not been a problem.
    Where the problem arises is that after converting the material, you then re-sold it to another company [Oracle] for your personal gain.  You made a financial gain from material that you know was not yours, and which you had no rights to use - you took food off my plate.
    The age of the material is also immaterial in this case.  International copyright conventions give the owner of the intellectual property certain rights, to whit:

• (1) The term of protection granted by this Convention shall be the life of the author and fifty years after his death - Article 7, BERNE CONVENTION FOR THE PROTECTION OF LITERARY AND ARTISTIC WORKS (Paris Text 1971)

    Since I am still alive, my rights in the intellectual property are protected and will continue to be protected for 50 years after my death.

NOTE>In my experience    when against the wall, Most will say anything to save their ass...  OOHH OHHH I never did that... take off those candy tinted spectacles.

    The problem I have dealt with before were all expeditiously solved when the person responsible for the theft of the material and it's unauthorized use, took responsibility and paid the appropriate license fee.

    Again, the time the animation ran is immaterial to the core issues.  My statement is correct that it was approximately 65% of the material [frames] in the show.
If a thief steal a car and drives it 10 Km or 10,000 KM it is still auto theft regardless of the mileage on the odometer.  In fact, the second case might be punished more severely as the thief made more extensive use of property that did not belong to them.

The principals and substance of my complain are as follows:

1] YOU took material in a proprietary format to which you had no rights since you are not an X-29 user and do not have a license from NML for the material.

2] YOU converted that material first to ILDA format and later to Pangolin format

3] YOU re-sold the material to a 3rd party

4] YOU profited from the sale of materials in which you had no legal rights

5] In all of the above, you did so with full knowledge that the intellectual property was NOT yours.
Those are the facts that would be put forward in evidence and it is almost an open-and-shut case as you have freely admitted to the theft and re-sale of the intellectual property in question.

I liked a statement that appeared in some text recently,

"so my advice to all you laserists , keep up the good work and who gives a rats who is using who's graphics ,is it not the whole idea to be seen."

    That is all very well and good if that is the policy of the person in question.  It is NOT my policy.  Obviously that person is not a "starving artist" who earns the majority of their meager income from the sale of laser animations.  I am sure that you will find that LightSpeed and other animations vendors do NOT agree with that statement as they, just as you and I, invest lots of time, effort and material into the creation of laser animations.

>For that, to appease your grievance I have apologized profusely  and stated that now  the origin of  these frames are clear to me they will not be included in my shows for sale.

Unfortunately the damage has been done.  You have stolen material [theft by conversion is recognized in legal codes] then taken that stolen property and re-sold it claiming it was your own work and you have profited from that sale.  Since you have already been using my intellectual property without permission or compensation, and have profited from my work, it is only fair that I should be compensated.  Since you have also demonstrated, by your actions, that you included my work in shows for sale without permission or compensation, the credibility of your promise not to do so in the future is nil.
        The settlement I am proposing gives you the re-distribution rights to the material, rights you should have obtained BEFORE selling my work for your own profit.  It also eliminates the problem of the lack of credibility in your "cease and desist" promise as you were well aware that the material was NOT your work when you sold it to Oracle.

Yes the damage has been done, in your opinion .Your sense of right has been wronged, once again I apologies. The question of my credibility is up to you and whomever you wish to  include, in either private or public discussion, if you wish to defame me over such a trivial  matter then so be it,

    I would hardly consider the ability to pay rent, power, phone, Internet and eat for a month to be a "trivial matter".  I would consider it a major matter as in my present circumstances since the amount in dispute comes to 1/12 of my annul income.  I am quite sure that you would not want to loose 1/12 of your annual income.

If my memory serves me well  when I sent the show to Oracle this was followed by the usual  telephone conversation with them . The conversation was about the Elbex show and the contents of the show. I believe the criminal animation was also mentioned, the gist of  ,how well it suited that particular project.
When asked if it was made by me , the answer was  a resounding no , It came from a download from NML.

    Again, that is immaterial to the issues at hand.  You stole animations you had no right to use and you then re-sold them to another company in the full knowledge that they were not your original work.  To quote Paul directly "I was under the impression that they were his frames, not that I particularly asked him regarding the origin since I had not seen these frames before."

I do not claim and never have claimed  any third party animations in my collection are made by me, why should I, I'm already proud of my own work. Shit  there are some amazing animations out there ALL CREDIT to those who take the time to create.
In a show sequence...just imagine... show stops!   frame flashes up... the next frame was made by ......I made the show for Oracle   I'm sure they didn't say ... OH YES   this show was made for us by International Laser Productions.
Many software packages include the option  to create a frame note, adequate space for  creating a credit. I do this on some of my frames and not others.... I guess I'm just lazy in that respect.

    That may be your policy.  My policy is to protect my intellectual property as it is my livelihood.

NOW you are reading into my replies somehow that I am using ONLY your animations to PAD my shows..hey hey... I make animations also ...in fact 99% of my archive is original

I am not disputing that the vast majority of the material in your archive is original.  However you did admit in a previous E-mails that you have used my material, material which you stole, to "pad" your shows.

I didn't STEAL them  I got them in a free download from the internet.

    A download that the owner of the site claims never existed... a download that was in a proprietary format... a download which you had to knowingly convert to other formats in order to make the material salable to others.
    Bob Ash has no incentive to give incorrect information.  He has purchased the re-sale rights to that animation and could, if he wished, put them on his web site for free download.  However, he has stated that the material was only provided to X-29 clients and the very .zip file you have sent me indicates as much as the material is in the proprietary NML format and thus only to be used by X-29 licensees.

I do not use your animations to "pad" my shows,

    In an E-Mail sent 20:30 08/01/2002 +0800, you wrote: ".. and as fillers of shows I make" therefore you have admitted to unseeing the material in more than one show as filler [another word for padding].

your reference to my immoral, sinful and illegal actions lead me to ask this question .... isn't extortion the same.

    I don't see any instances of extorting in the case at hand.  I could, if I were rich, hire a lawyer and take this mater to trial however that would be a very expensive and time consuming process even though you have admitted your guilt in several E-mails.  My only recourse is to the court of public opinion since my initial correspondence from you did not include you taking responsibility of the theft and conversion of my intellectual property or an offer for compensation.
    I am very aware of the "power of the press" which is why I have given you every opportunity to discuss this issue and settle it privately.  To date, you have not taken responsibility for you actions and have offered only an apology with no compensation for the theft of my intellectual property.  I hesitate to publish as I would prefer to deal with his out of the glare of publicity.... but failing that, I have only peer pressure to deal with these situations.

I see from various e-mail and internet sites  some large animation libraries are now for sale
One has 82000 frames included for auction...  OK the reserve price is $3500 ... by my calculation that's about 23 cents a frame.
Ok since I  have used your animation once please recalculate a new price for

        If you visit my site, you will see that I sell an animation library of  2,500+ frames for $250.00 US$ - that works out to be around $0.11 US$/frame.  HOWEVER that price is based on ONE user using the animations on ONE system for their OWN shows only and does not give the user any right to trade, swap, give-away or re-sell the material.  Re-distribution rights cost more as they allow the holder of the rights to make a profit from my work.
        I gather that you sell the CDs of your original animations to end
users with the expectation that they will use it on their own systems for their own shows.  You would doubtless be upset to find that people were copying your material and then re-selling it to others for their own profit without your permission and with no compensation to you as the owner of the intellectual property.

I know it happens,  companies buy my and other works and then redistribute it to their installations for profit,, seen it with my own eyes...again and again ,   Hey Ho take on the world,  I took off those cherry tinted specs long ago .

    If your license does not include re-distribution rights in installations then you must enforce that license.  Failure to do so only encourages others to rip you off.  If  you fail to enforce your license, that is not my concern.  If you do wish to enforce your license, then do as I have done and correspond with the individual/company that is stealing your material and give them every opportunity to make adequate compensation.  If they refuse to do so, send me the complete unedited correspondence in the matter and I will be quite happy to publish it on my web site [no matter what the outcome of the present situation].
    As you yourself said "..this industry does not or ever will have the resources of the rip-off record companies and big movie houses to really enforce any kind of copyright laws".   Therefore enforcement falls onto the shoulders of the owner of the intellectual property in question.  In North America this is not a big deal as there are many law firms that will be happy to take on the case since they can sue for considerable amounts of money as well as legal expenses.  In an international situation, then peer pressure and the "court of public opinion" are the best tools for enforcement.
    It will only take a few public examples for people to shape up and realize that they can no longer rip off the artists.  A good example of this is LaserMedia who had threatened to sue, or sued, people on occasions for software piracy.  In one case, a Canadian company, LaserLite, had to pay $100,000 for making illegal copies of their material.

I am offering a settlement that is in-line with the price that I charge to any and ALL laser companies who purchase my material for re-sale - $5.00 US$ per frame.  Naturally re-sale rights are more expensive than single use rights as they allow the person purchasing the material to re-sell it as part of their shows and productions, or to provide it to their clients who own systems/installations they have purchased from the person licensing my material.  In other words, the re-sale rights allow the holder of those right to make profits from my material without having to negotiate compensation to me with every re-sale of my intellectual property.
        I am sure if you contact LightSpeed, who have their animations listed on E-bay, and ask them for the price of one of those animations with re-sale rights, you will find it is far more that $5.00 US$ per frame. My price of 214 frames X $5.00 US$ = $ ,070.00 US$ stands as that is the same price I would charge anyone who re-sells my material.
        I await your response,
                L. Michael Roberts

I will state again, now I am aware of the origin of said animation, that was used only once, I do not want re-distribution rights, please recalculate a reasonable price for my indiscretion based upon these parameters.

    The problem that I have with this approach is that I only have your word to go on.  Pardon me if I don't mince words here, but how much credibility can one give to the words of a thief who has already taken your property, converted at and re-sold it for his personal gain?  Furthermore, how much faith can you put in said thief when he has not simply come out and admitted his guilt and offered compensation, but has in fact dodged and weaved while presenting many "justifications" for his crime?

Through-out our correspondence I have admitted all ,I have nothing to hide, Youve made your point, but you still are unable to negotiate a reasonable settlement based upon the facts I have given you .

    I feel the settlement is reasonable based on my prior policies.  In past cases I have charged the people the re-distribution price for the material when they were found to be re-distributing it - I am doing nothing different in your case.

Facts are the thumb tacks under the pneumatic tyres of theory.

    I believe that the facts are quite self evident in this mater - it is what most lawyers would call an "open and shut case".

It has been said:
There are people who think that everything  done with a serious face is sensible.

Finally
Please accept my apology and my offer for a reasonable recompense, albeit not the amount you are demanding.

I hope you can see both sides of the coin,

    I would have thought that you as an artist would have seen my site of the coin quite clearly.  You also derive income from creating artwork.  I am quite certain that if I obtained a copy of your CD and then made it available on my web site [public domain in your incorrect opinion] for free download you would be incensed and would most certainly take me to task.  Furthermore, if you discovered that I was re-selling your animations for my profit contrary to the terms of your licensing agreement, you would be equally upset.  In both cases, I would be taking bread off your table.
    Yet this is exactly what you have done to me.  I feel that I am seeing your side of the coin and am being reasonable in asking for the standard re-sale price for my material.  In a court of law, I would also be entitled to compensatory damages.  In a North American court, that sum in a copyright case could be considerable - as Bob Ash stated "In the U.S., this could be a million dollar lawsuit".
    In the laser industry, copyright has to be enforced by the copyright holder and in the court of public opinion.  If we allow cases to slide, then people will blithely copy our works.  I am enforcing my rights according to the grant of license that I give to users of my material.  If you wish to enforce the license you have given in regards to your material, then I am more than willing to assist you in publishing the details of the situation if you are unable to resolve it privately.

Looking forward to your response.

regards
Terry

PS attached is the original file  NEWDEMO73.zip that your animation was a
part of,  downloaded from NML in a DEMO
NOTE: [ NO COPYRIGHT INFORMATION ]

    I have examined the files and all of them are in proprietary NML and X-29 formats.  Therefore they are covered by the license granted by NML to it's X-29 users.  They were not intended for general distribution and are certainly not in the public domain.  You knew this in that you had to put time and effort into converting them to another format for use in the show.

I see BOB states in his correpondance to you.. " The only ones of yours I think have ever been in our demo are" :XXXX

    Bob is entitled to put any of my material he wishes into his demos as he had paid for the re-distribution rights.  However, as he has pointed out in his correspondence with me, "The main point here is that EVEN IF HE BOUGHT THEM, AND THEY WERE LICENSED TO HIM, he cannot convert and resell them."  That is exactly what you have done, converted the material and re-sold it to a 3rd party.  Bob has delegated his rights in this matter to me and thus I have not sent him any further copies of our correspondence.  If you wish, I can update him as it is his copyright and licensing agreement that you are violating.

    Since you have offered to pay compensation, please suggest what you consider to be reasonable compensation so that I can consider the matter.  In the interim, I will hold of on releasing the web page and frankly, hope that I never have to release it as I would prefer to work together with you to stamp out animation piracy.
    Thanks,
        L. Michael Roberts

27 February 2002

28 February 2002

01 May 2002

Greetings,
    You don't bother to reply to me... you don't seem to care about honoring your obligations or combating piracy in laser animations even though that is in your own interests.
    You continue to make use of the services I offer on my web site to sell your stuff.  I will continue to remove your listings until such time as you respond and settle the outstanding piracy and intellectual property theft issues.  I have given you every opportunity to deal with this and I am getting tired of waiting.
    My patience will only stretch so far.
        L. Michael Roberts

03 May 2002

[Delete references to a third party E-mail]

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04 May 2002

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