Flare on Desura?
Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - 10:52
Hey, could publish Flare on Desura (release then update it regularly) for free, but I need developer's permission first.
If developer could reply to this thread and tell his opinion / whether he agrees, it would be nice.
Also, are any people here interested in Flare being distributed on Desura? Quite a few free games are on Desura but they are pretty hidden and hard to find b/c there is no "free"/price range filter at all.
I've been asked before to put Flare on Desura.
I declined in the past for several reasons.
1. I don't know if the terms of service are actually compatible with the GPL. Note that Flare is not owned by 1 person (all contributors keep copyrights to their work), so I can't give you additional permissions not already granted by the GPL. I'm not even sure that I can put the game on Desura. I think other GPL games have landed on Desura, so you'd want to talk to them about their license decisions (e.g. Wesnoth).
2. I didn't have time to support the Desura builds at the required level. E.g. I think the terms say that Desura needs to get builds on the same day that other systems get builds. I think there's some support requirements like same-day response time. I personally can't commit that kind of time.
3. We're still in Alpha on the Engine. We haven't started production on the actual game. I'm not sure an alpha tech demo belongs on Desura.
If anyone is able to grant permissions for Flare like this, it'll be me. I don't know you (yet), or your qualifications for taking this on. If I'm going to hand Flare off to Desura to someone, I need to know they're going to do it right. So drop me an email to talk further about this.
1. They totally should be. Desura only requires minor rights to promotional material (screenshots, trailers) to actually be able to promote the game, as well as it requires games to simply have unique and quality content (original IP, own copyrights).
2. Actually, I'm a freelancer working for DesuraNET (company behind Desura) and publish some free/freeware games from time to time, so I will be updating the current game version with the latest build if either I get notified about it or myself check it. We only need the original developer's permission to publish the game on the service, legal reasons purely. DesuraNET has no rights to your content whatsoever, not per se or any other way.
3. That is hardly a problem. For example we have an alpha/demo build of the game titled Holyspirit on Desura.
Contact e-mails: feillyne@desura.com feillyne@yahoo.fr
Your game looks awesome in its current state. Would be definitely watching its development and updating it on the service.
In that case, based on your clarifications, it sounds like Flare could be a candidate for Desura.
I'll drop you a private email to discuss further.
From http://www.desura.com/terms-of-use : "In particular, Desura may use, reproduce, modify, create derivative works from, distribute, transmit, broadcast, and otherwise communicate, and publicly display and perform the Content and other works which are based on them (including by way of adaptation or derivative works) in any form, anywhere, with or without attribution to you"
The problematic point seems the right to create derivatie works, without any indication of adhering to the licences - e.g., this would be incompatible with any use of CC BY, since they could create a derivative work that used a CC BY material, and not give attribution.
Possibly I've misread this, and this is only talking about other kinds of content - in which case, do you have a URL to the terms for anything distributed through Desura?
mdwh, that looks like the terms of use for the site (e.g. forums, comments, etc) and not the game publisher's agreement.
Specifically, I'm looking at my copy of the Desura Application Store Terms and Conditions and it doesn't contain that language.
Here's the most similar clause; note it doesn't have the "with our without attribution" and the uses are much more fairly limited:
The licence permits Desura to make any use of the Publisher Content for an Application in the course of advertising or demonstrating the System or in the course of advertising or demonstrating the Application to third parties
Yes, as pointed out by Clint Bellanger, Terms of Use http://www.desura.com/terms-of-use are terms of use is for users and user-made content (comments, forum posts, etc), for community members.
DesuraNET has only the right to advertise/demonstrate/promote the game as detailed in the publisher's (developer's) terms of use - rights to screenshots, trailers, and use of logos & trademarks when advertising/selling games.
So as it was already pointed out, there's a huge difference between:
Terms of Use (user agreement)
Desura Application Store Terms and Conditions (publisher agreement)
This whole confusion arises due to language used and a lack of explanation it seems.
Thanks to feillyne, Flare is now on Desura!
Flare blog post: http://flarerpg.org/blog/20120926
Flare on Desura: http://www.desura.com/games/flare/
Very exciting!
Actually, credit goes to sakuramboo - he spotlighted Flare first in this thread here: http://www.desura.com/groups/desura/forum/thread/flare
so it's all connected. ;-)