MiSTer FPGA Forum

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:17 am So this is piracy, but you have to pay for it, but the money goes to the wrong person? This is so weird to me…

Give it a bone mate. This is supporting a strong, active dev and as a thank you, being given early access to his work in developing cores for an open source project. It all becomes free when the work is complete. This (optional) money goes to EXACTLY the right person.

Any ideas how keys will be distributed to patrons? Couldn’t see anything about it on patreon. Looks a good idea to me, but I do see a lot of people asking why core x doesn’t allow them to play it

XtraSmiley wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:42 am

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:17 am So this is piracy, but you have to pay for it, but the money goes to the wrong person? This is so weird to me…

No, he's creating a core through reverse engineering. The money goes to him to help develop these cores. He's the right person, if you want to support him. It's only weird because you are trying to be a smart-ass about it, but you shouldn't.

If you are downloading shit that you don't own, you might be a pirate! Arrrr matey!

The script is downloading copyrighted files that you have to pay Jotego to use, but those files copyrights do not belong to Jotego. How is that not paying for piracy?

Do note, I don’t give a crap. I am strongly in favor of piracy in all aspects, but piracy shouldn’t be for profit.

The piracy angle is really not the issue here.

I'm all in favour of supporting Jotego for his stellar work, but including these locked cores into the main update script is an ill-advised move. It's shouldn't really a big deal from an user viewpoint (for me at least), because it's only gonna be a few files among countless other roms, but it still doesn't sit well with the whole "open" MiSTer ethos, and looks like an advertising gimmick.

If there's an opt-in flag in the script that'd be fine, but it shouldn't be enabled by default.

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 10:39 am The script is downloading copyrighted files that you have to pay Jotego to use, but those files copyrights do not belong to Jotego. How is that not paying for piracy?

Do note, I don’t give a crap. I am strongly in favor of piracy in all aspects, but piracy shouldn’t be for profit.

Because get this you're not paying for the rom's. It's entirely legal to sell an Emulator in most countries which is essentially whats going on here. Jotego can legally charge for his work he can't charge for, or distribute, the roms to use his work.

Think of JT as an excellent bong maker. There is nothing illegal about making and selling bongs. What you use those bongs for is up to you, and it's not JT's fault if you use his magnificent bongs to smoke illicit substances.

ByteMavericks wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 10:26 am Any ideas how keys will be distributed to patrons? Couldn’t see anything about it on patreon. Looks a good idea to me, but I do see a lot of people asking why core x doesn’t allow them to play it

I am so sure I replied to this already but I can't see my post... well from what I understand patreons will still have to go and download a new key and put it on their SD card for every new beta release, so this is not going to automate them getting and being able to play the cores by running update all. There is still a manual download step for them.

Sorry if it’s been said already , when the change implemented? Ran Update all can’t see any beta as yet ?

Shuffle7 wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 11:48 am Sorry if it’s been said already , when the change implemented? Ran Update all can’t see any beta as yet ?

It is supposed to be this week. As JT releases beta versions on Friday it could be the day.
This Friday some Sega System 16 arcades should be in beta.

Fantastic! Sega golden axe anyone ?!

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 10:39 am

XtraSmiley wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:42 am

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:17 am So this is piracy, but you have to pay for it, but the money goes to the wrong person? This is so weird to me…

No, he's creating a core through reverse engineering. The money goes to him to help develop these cores. He's the right person, if you want to support him. It's only weird because you are trying to be a smart-ass about it, but you shouldn't.

If you are downloading shit that you don't own, you might be a pirate! Arrrr matey!

The script is downloading copyrighted files that you have to pay Jotego to use, but those files copyrights do not belong to Jotego. How is that not paying for piracy?

Do note, I don’t give a crap. I am strongly in favor of piracy in all aspects, but piracy shouldn’t be for profit.

You're either very slow on understanding or being a troll. Jotego's (and all MiSTer developer's) scripts are perfectly legal. It is NOT illegal to create an emulator. People get paid to create emulators all the time. It is legal and you can pay someone to do that work, via Patreon for example.

Downloading ROMs you don't own, or doing so without paying the copywriter holder is illegal.

This update will allow you to download Jotego's cores for free. If you want to access the use of the cores, you'll have to join his Patreon or wait until he releases it for free, which he has always done!

I'm not sure what is so hard to understand about this?

gibs wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 7:12 am

XtraSmiley wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:42 am

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:17 am So this is piracy, but you have to pay for it, but the money goes to the wrong person? This is so weird to me…

No, he's creating a core through reverse engineering. The money goes to him to help develop these cores. He's the right person, if you want to support him. It's only weird because you are trying to be a smart-ass about it, but you shouldn't.

If you are downloading shit that you don't own, you might be a pirate! Arrrr matey!

https://reverseengineering.stackexchang ... s-old-game

19 year old video games typically don't have EULA in software, additionally just because something has an EULA doesn't mean the EULA is legally binding. IANAL either, but I have just kept up with this stuff for a couple decades. Honestly, every single person patching a game hasn't been sued as far as I can tell, ever, except for the early pioneers (Missile Command difficulty hack done by modders in the 80's who were selling their modding services to arcades, and they weren't going to lose the lawsuit anyways).

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 10:39 am

XtraSmiley wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:42 am

C-R-T wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 4:17 am So this is piracy, but you have to pay for it, but the money goes to the wrong person? This is so weird to me…

No, he's creating a core through reverse engineering. The money goes to him to help develop these cores. He's the right person, if you want to support him. It's only weird because you are trying to be a smart-ass about it, but you shouldn't.

If you are downloading shit that you don't own, you might be a pirate! Arrrr matey!

The script is downloading copyrighted files that you have to pay Jotego to use, but those files copyrights do not belong to Jotego. How is that not paying for piracy?

Do note, I don’t give a crap. I am strongly in favor of piracy in all aspects, but piracy shouldn’t be for profit.

You are confused.

Jotego develops a reverse engineered hardware emulator of the system that a video game runs on. This is not illegal to do. Reverse engineering of game systems and even games has been publicly litigated in multiple countries and the overwhelmingly majority of times has sided in favor of the person reverse engineering it... And the specific way he's doing this (not looking at source code, etc...) allows him to be basically legally in the right.

He does not supply the roms. The roms are the copyrighted content. If he were, then your comment would make sense, but he's not, so your comment doesn't make sense.

Forget the Patreon. Let me introduce to you supporter system designed specially for the JT Cores:

• JT Beta cores can be DL'ed free.

• Playing with cores will be mandatory to input your credit card.

• Every coin in the core charged as $1 via your credit card.

-

• JT Final cores can be DL'ed free (like always).

• Playing with cores will be mandatory to input your credit card.

• Every coin in the core charged as $2 via your credit card.

-
Every JT fans should support this system. I believe it's fair in aspects of both original playing methodology and supporting JT. BTW, JT can change the rates anytime he wishes, please don't panic if you think rates are too low in terms of the supporting JT.

As a Patreon supporter of Jotego's work, I have to admit, I'm partial to the mindset that if it isn't broken, don't F with it! The current method just keeps everything neat & tidy. Why introduce more hassle?

dawshan wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 2:34 pm Forget the Patreon. Let me introduce to you supporter system designed specially for the JT Cores:

• JT Beta cores can be DL'ed free.

• Playing with cores will be mandatory to input your credit card.

• Every coin in the core charged as $1 via your credit card.

-

• JT Final cores can be DL'ed free (like always).

• Playing with cores will be mandatory to input your credit card.

• Every coin in the core charged as $2 via your credit card.

-
Every JT fans should support this system. I believe it's fair in aspects of both original playing methodology and supporting JT. BTW, JT can change the rates anytime he wishes, please don't panic if you think rates are too low in terms of the supporting JT.

Wow! Jotego is implementing a cycle-accurate recreation of the coin system in arcades???

/s

Pulsar wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 3:32 pm As a Patreon supporter of Jotego's work, I have to admit, I'm partial to the mindset that if it isn't broken, don't F with it! The current method just keeps everything neat & tidy. Why introduce more hassle?

The current system before this change is technically more of a hassle than this beta key version, to the end user. Manually going in and deleting the previous core, manually updating the _Arcade folder, and all that is more work than just updating the key file in /games/mame/

I used to quite like faffing with all the beta stuff though. Made it seem as though I was getting something for my trouble. I don't use update all anyway. First time I did I didn't realise the name.txt was going to overwrite my own edited one and since then I like to be in control of what gets overwritten. Just me though I guess.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but Jotego's updater doesn't actually grab the ROMs, right? It's the update_all script, which integrates his updater.

As nice as the update_all script grabbing the arcade ROMs is, I do think it's problematic that it does so. Much like emulators, the scripts should only be distributing the cores.

what about if someone has paid patreon for let's say 6 months and then decide to stop, he will loose access after eol of the beta.zip file (I read 1 time per month) because udpate_all script will overwrite things ?

today we can stop but continue to use beta things we got so far and that seems fair for me ortherwise this is not just an update method change but that'll become a pay as a service economical model.

hear hear,

This is a marketing type of stunt surely, which might increase his Patreon income but is a risk, as I see many people jumping ship at the same time.

I for one, being already JT's patron, resent the prospect of the update_all script messing up my storage, as he is known for setting his particular folder hierarchy (see: _Alternatives to _alt for example).

Also, this peculiar introduction of a DRM scheme to the MiSTer project, shall not end well regarding things as a whole

As I understand it Jotego is working with theypsilon to integrate this as an optional feature into the update_all script - defaulting to off. As such it is not going to affect a non-Patreon, unless they specifically turn it on themselves. It's just there to make the whole beta process simpler for his patrons (me included to be clear).

@taz07rx I do see your point about the enduring access - but all Jotego's cores seem to have ended up public eventually, so I think long-term it's not a big deal for me.

Sarge wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 6:35 pm Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but Jotego's updater doesn't actually grab the ROMs, right? It's the update_all script, which integrates his updater.

As nice as the update_all script grabbing the arcade ROMs is, I do think it's problematic that it does so. Much like emulators, the scripts should only be distributing the cores.

But this is the purpose of update_all. If you don't like a script downloading the roms you can use another script. Update_all is the script that besides combining different core updater scripts also updates the arcade roms.

You are free to use the normal update script and the jotego update script these scripts won't download the roms.

You can use the update all script and disable mame and hbmame getters as the script provides an easy menu to do that. For example on my MISTer I disabled BIOS Getter and Names TXT Updater.

I like the functionality, and yeah, the options to disable the download are there. From a legal standpoint it's not great, but I didn't realize that the MAME-GETTER stuff is also a separate script that's part of it, like Jotego's stuff. Good to know in the future.

So basically, yeah, if you use the update_all script, just be aware of what you're getting into.

License key for FPGA cores? This kinda makes me want to end my support on Patreon

[Edit] Don't thank me.
I also retract my statement.

Sarge wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 6:35 pm Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but Jotego's updater doesn't actually grab the ROMs, right? It's the update_all script, which integrates his updater.

As nice as the update_all script grabbing the arcade ROMs is, I do think it's problematic that it does so. Much like emulators, the scripts should only be distributing the cores.

Yes. Update-all is just a meta-script that downloads and runs other scripts. one of those is the jotego updater script.

I don't know why people started talking about jotego's script downloading roms in here, it doesn't.

darksakul wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 9:41 pm License key for FPGA cores? This kinda makes me want to end my support on Patreon

Effectively how is it any different than the way it was before? This is just for the beta cores which were already behind a paywall on patreon. You previously downloaded the beta core from patreon, now the beta core is downloaded with jtupdater and the key to unlock it is downloaded from patreon.

The only thing I don't like about it in all seriousness is the adware functionality redirecting people to patreon.

aberu wrote: ↑Fri Jun 11, 2021 4:24 am now the beta core is downloaded with jtupdater and the key to unlock it is downloaded from patreon.

The update_all script needs this to be disabled by default and "opt-in" by the patreon support themselves .. so these beta cores that require a key are NOT downloaded by default.. put up instructions on the patreon page how to turn it on and opt-in and setup your key ..

ericgus09 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 11, 2021 4:34 am

aberu wrote: ↑Fri Jun 11, 2021 4:24 am now the beta core is downloaded with jtupdater and the key to unlock it is downloaded from patreon.

The update_all script needs this to be disabled by default and "opt-in" by the patreon support themselves .. so these beta cores that require a key are NOT downloaded by default.. put up instructions on the patreon page how to turn it on and opt-in and setup your key ..

And this is exactly how it is done:

https://twitter.com/topapate/status/1403215950548197379

"You will be able to download betas via the update_all script. But you will have to enable the feature manually.
Thanks to theYpsilon for adding support to this on his script."

darksakul wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 9:41 pm License key for FPGA cores? This kinda makes me want to end my support on Patreon

How is this any different to paying patreon to unlock access to beta cores?

Jotego says this option is disabled by default. It can be enabled from the Jotego cores section in update_all. If you run the script via SSH, be sure to run this before update_all.sh command: Otherwise update_all.ini new settings will be saved in the current directory (/root) and will not be applied when the script runs.

Nemesis2k wrote: ↑Fri Jun 11, 2021 7:23 am

darksakul wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 9:41 pm License key for FPGA cores? This kinda makes me want to end my support on Patreon

How is this any different to paying patreon to unlock access to beta cores?

It is about the spirit and philosophy associated with MiSTer and FPGA cores.

I absolutely agree that each contributor should be free to monitize their work. I also agree that reverse engineering is not the same as paying someone for access to core ROMs. So all good there.

What I do disagree with is embedding, what is effectively, digital rights management into the actual cores that will be physically present on hardware; and then distributing it as such via the MiSTer update script. I, for one, do not want to "pollute" my system with cores I need conditional access to.

I'm also working on my own core (admittedly a long term project based on work, family and study commitments) but once done, I will freely contribute it as "payment" for enjoying the work of others. Which I believe is in the spirit of the MiSTer project.

For those who cannot build their own cores, if they wish to support particular developers....well, there are ways to do that other than a digital rights management feature.