Copyright and ownership of Modding work

[StingRay68]

The information provided here on this website does not, and is not intended to, constitute legal advice; instead, all information, content, and materials available on this site are for general informational purposes only.

Recently, there have been several instances of online community members publicly/privately accusing other online community members of copying/ stealing/modifying their work and releasing it as their own. For most cases, this is simply a morals based issue.
While we may try to look into properly supported claims, it is a courtesy and is not any moderators' responsibility to investigate claims nor enforce any punishment demands.

Please refer to the original game's licensing.
In general, if a mod is created for a given game, it would be considered a derivative of the original game.
For Madden this would include roster files, franchise files, portrait packs, and other files that can be imported, modifying the original files.
The original game would hold a valid copyright, derivatives would not.
It could be argued that anyone taking a given player's portrait from a website and creating a file for use with madden, may be infringing upon the copyright of the source website, as well as the person who originally took the player's photograph.

Anyone creating modding work of a derivative nature, and believing they have some sort of a legal claim to it, is most likely misinformed.
Anyone believing they can threaten legal action against an online community, moderators, and/or its members regarding "unauthorized usage" of their modding work is incredibly naive.

The only possible copyright infringement cases in regards to online modding communities would involve those that have created stand alone apps/tools that are not derivates of the original game, but allow users to modify their own files, rather than provide the end result files that a mod would generally contain.

If you are going to accuse someone of stealing your work, you should create an unbiased, unemotional PRIVATE message to a moderator that contains clear and concise examples of what is being copied from your work and how any given moderator could verify the claims.
If a request for examples is declined and/or accusations cannot be verified, the matter will be considered closed.

Do not make public/private accusations to, or about, another online community member! Forum rules still apply.