Sonic 4 Contest "Rules" and how Users followed them
I'm posting this before semi-finalists get announced so it doesn't seem like a bitter loser.
Anyway, I submitted a video for the Sonic competition. I strived to follow all rules to a T regarding the competition. So, I look at some of the videos that I am/have competed against, and it disgusts me.
From the official rules here:
Your Video Submission: (a) must be totally original, not have been previously published or appear anywhere else and CANNOT contain any third party copyrighted or proprietary material (including but not limited to music, voices or artwork) or otherwise infringe on the intellectual, property or other rights of a third party;
Am I wrong with interpreting this rule as that you cannot use images, media, or anything of Sonic the Hedgehog unless you created it yourself? E.g., all of the people who used "Sonic the Hedgehog" music sountrack for their games would be disqualified because it infringes on the rights of a 3rd party, e.g. Sega? I'm going off of the assumption that "first party" includes yourself and "third party" is everyone else.
I'm stating this because the rules don't state that you can use Sonic music, unless it was clarified elsewhere on a forum post or something. Because the official rules state that you can only use the Sega logo, but not the sound clips ("Sega!" or the SEGA scream). Even if you weren't infringing on Sega's copyright - and they could be indeed included as a first party with your submission - you'd still get disqualified.
Because the ever witty-and-nifty concept of you playing the theme song to "Emerald Beach" over your video ignores the fact that it WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED 11 YEARS AGO. You're violating the "not been previously published line" of the rule I mentioned above.
Now, there could be caveats to this rule. By my own definition, I could be disqualified for briefly showing me reading a Sonic the Hedgehog comic book for no more than 5 seconds. However, there are differences between copyright law for images and audio.
*Audio you can use only for fair-use for no more than 30 seconds. And it has to be for educational use. The exception to this rule (and it took the courts to decide this) is that if the audio was a part of your original recording by coincidence versus added during post-production.
For instance, if you film your child blowing out his birthday cake and "Oops I did it again" plays on the radio, and you post the video on YouTube, you're in the clear. However, if you purposely played "Ooops I did it again" with intent to record it as part of your video - or you added it in post-production - you're not in the clear. You need to license it then.
*Much like audio, video and images you can use typically as long as they're at a quality low-enough to where another person couldn't make facimilies out of them for their own personal gain or use. The whole "30 second maximum" applies to situations where the video and it's content is currently the primary focus.
E.g., my comic book in my submission. You can tell that it's a Sonic comic book. You can see blurry images of Sonic. However, you the viewer cannot use the image in any meaningful way. As in, you cannot read, understand, or reproduce the page on your own accord. It's too low-quality for you to sit there and read the speech bubbles or to gain context of what is occuring. And because of that, I am within fair-use rights and am not violating copyright at all.
NOTE:And yes, I technically broke the rules according to my own definition as the comic book was published prior. Which is why "context" and "usage" is so important when it comes to copyright law as well.
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I guess my primary focus of this rant is that people are stupid and didn't get the official rules and guidelines, and focus of the contest. My rage is fueled at the fact that your submissions were supposed to be original and user-created. Sure, there might be arguments about whether or not parading around as Sonic the Hedgehog around town is considered "original", but if you created the costume yourself, it's 100% percent your own.
But buying a Sonic suit, using Sonic music, ripping out "official" Sonic graphics - without making your own user-created facimile of it first - and parading around with cutouts of it or pasting it into your video - to me defeats the whole purpose of the competition.
Who am I to say what SEGA - or the company running the competition - is looking for. But if I was a judge, I'd certainly take a hell-of-a-lot more stock in a little kid's video of her making and displaying an old-school "turn the pages" flipbook and watch a simple hand-drawn animation of Sonic running then watch fully-grown jackasses fooling around in Sonic costumes they purchased while jamming out to the soundtrack they stole from a game.
To me, the contest was to be original and user-created, not to see who does the best job of stealing assets from Sonic games and reassembling them into the most derivative piece of work.
I put 30-to-40+ hours into my five minute video dammit. And besides the short passing clip of me reading a Sonic comic book, my video contains no externally created Sonic references. I'll more than likely lose, but it better be to someone more worthwhile then me, and not just a bunch of asshats.
/end rant
EDIT: Multiple edits featuring small grammar issues.
EDIT: I'm a copyright junkie. I have done video editing before, and I've paid more attention to copyright law than your average consumer/citizen. Hence, I make a big deal out of it. Which is why my video is copyright-issue free dammit.
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Originally Posted by anwserman
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