A request to all users caring about supporting developers

**ulao** · (This post was last modified: 09-25-2013, 06:37 AM by ulao.)

" That worked fine for a few revisions but he noticed soon enough." -- Yeah that is just it though you can try but "they" will always get around it. Bottom line is this is an open source project and its not ethical or right to protect it in any way. There will always be selfish people like that around to steel from us. There is only one way to beat this guy and its to take the hits back. How? Well there are many ways to do this the best way is to feed the crawlers. Post the domain dolphin-emu.org EVERYWHERE!. If you find a site with the bad name make absolutely sure to add the "dolphin-emu.org" domain. In other cases try to get admins to change it, let them know that is incorrect and give them the right name. I'm an admin on a few board and I will start a clean up.

DEvs may want to look in to Google options like the transparency report, but it may again be hard to explain what is going on. We are not copy righting here we are lefting.

there is also this http://preventdomaintheft.com/ or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycvCvpOJU0k&noredirect=1 but again, was it not his domain?

**neobrain** · (This post was last modified: 09-25-2013, 06:40 AM by neobrain.)

Fyi, note that as far as I'm aware randomly spamming our homepage URL without actual content won't help us. Replacing incorrect links, on the other hand, will (or will at least have a better chance of helping).

Also, yes, mamario owns his URL and has always owned it.

***Shonumi*** · 09-25-2013, 06:42 AM **#23**

@xemnas - I meant thr GPL only concerns itself with legal matters pertaining to code (and at that, matters of copyright). Things like documentation and images, and even trademarks need different licenses on usage. People suggested hitting mamario with a GPL violation; I was hinting that there could be other avenues to pursue.

**ulao** · (This post was last modified: 09-25-2013, 07:08 AM by ulao.)

As long as you establish credit to the original source you may profit from this code. Nature of GPL.

Looks like emulator-zone not only has lots of bad link the actual home page link points to the wrong place, I'm an admin there i'll get it fixed up.

The only for sure way to protect this is to close the source... but that is not something we really want to see. I would hope mamario or whatever realizes what he is doing.

rokclimb15 · 09-25-2013, 07:09 AM **#25**

(09-25-2013, 06:42 AM)Shonumi Wrote: @xemnas - I meant thr GPL only concerns itself with legal matters pertaining to code (and at that, matters of copyright). Things like documentation and images, and even trademarks need different licenses on usage. People suggested hitting mamario with a GPL violation; I was hinting that there could be other avenues to pursue.

This was going to be my two cents. If someone within the group wants to copyright the Dolphin logo and trademark the name (completely different from a GPL codebase) it will be easier to issue some DMCA paperwork to 1&1 and shut the other site down. Might be worth collecting some money from the community to accomplish. He can still distribute GPL code legally and collect ad revenue, but without the official logo. The domain name is more complex, but could still be acquired with a U.S. registered trademark. With a trademark that post-dates the registration of the domain it will be harder.

xemnas · (This post was last modified: 09-25-2013, 07:28 AM by xemnas.)

(09-25-2013, 06:42 AM)Shonumi Wrote: @xemnas - I meant thr GPL only concerns itself with legal matters pertaining to code (and at that, matters of copyright). Things like documentation and images, and even trademarks need different licenses on usage. People suggested hitting mamario with a GPL violation; I was hinting that there could be other avenues to pursue.

I don't see any copyrighted images in his website. Maybe there are but I don't know that they are copyrighted. Anyway, if anybody hit him with that, he could simply remove/replace the images. The website shows a screenshot but I highly doubt that it requires permission to display a screenshot of a GPL software. Regarding the trademarks, it's not illegal to just mention them. For example, nobody needs to get permission to say "Dolphin is a Gamecube and Wii emulator."

Also, in case Dolphin is not trademarked before he owns the domain name, he has the right to use that domain name. Recently, Nintendo has lost a case similar to this (wiiu.com).

rokclimb15 · 09-25-2013, 07:41 AM **#27**

It's true that it is hard to win an ICANN dispute with a trademark registered after the domain name. Was this case with Nintendo before ICANN or a U.S. court? ICANN's resolution process is one avenue, but U.S. courts also have jurisdiction if the parties and registrar are U.S. entities. The point is that there was an arrangement in place and he didn't choose this domain name on his own coincidentally. I don't know how formal the arrangement was, but he certainly can't claim that he happened to choose that name long before the existence of Dolphin as a project.

**AnyOldName3** · 09-25-2013, 07:41 AM **#28**

On the TOR network, there're supposedly assassins you can hire with bitcoins. Has this avenue been pursued?

rokclimb15 · 09-25-2013, 07:44 AM **#29**

(09-25-2013, 07:41 AM)AnyOldName3 Wrote: On the TOR network, there're supposedly assassins you can hire with bitcoins. Has this avenue been pursued?

I fully support this. I'll make that bounty bucket #2 alongside the one to rewrite the Wii Zelda microcode.

**AnyOldName3** · 09-25-2013, 07:49 AM **#30**

I suppose I'll have to start bitcoin mining again (last time I did it I did it for my cousin for a few days and made him £5-10 (which he has yet to pay back), and then the bitcoin crashed, so we couldn't be bothered). It could take ages before I can afford a real assassin.