405
Dev says "false DMCA" from Microsoft got their sandbox game removed from Steam over apparent Minecraft copyright, all because of a screenshot of birch trees (www.gamesradar.com)
submitted 9 months ago by to c/games@sh.itjust.works
115 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Unomelon, the developer of Minecraft-inspired sandbox game Allumeria, says a DMCA from Microsoft, evidently related to Minecraft, got the game removed from Steam.

"The Allumeria Steam page is currently down because Microsoft has filed a false DMCA claim on it," Unomelon said on Bluesky on Tuesday. "They sent an email earlier today claiming that this screenshot infringes on their copyright. I am taking a moment to figure out what my path is going forward, will update soon."

The screenshot in question (above) is a simple wide shot of a forest filled with birch trees, what look to be oak trees with green and autumnal leaves, and a few pumpkins and weeds checkering the grassy dirt. There are definitely some similarities to Minecraft; if you told me this was a screenshot of a Minecraft mod, I'd probably believe you, but that's true of many voxel-based games, including Hytale.

Direct link to the Bluesky post (Skylib)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] 25 points 9 months ago (4 children)

It does not matter that this is a Minecraft clone, there are hundreds of them and mojang has always been fine with them.

Minecraft itself is inspired and started as a clone of infiniminer.

The general rule has always been “as long as it does not use assets or code made by mojang” its fine and they wont care or sue.

Unless this tree is using a stolen texture from the game there is nothing that makes this more illegal then the thousands of cloned already out there.

Of course a doubt microsoft would respect such, they shown their hands when they presumed ownership over the now open sourced end poem.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 4 child comments
    •
  • [–] 9 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

    They have an AI tool that scrapes everything on the Internet until it finds copyright violations. The entire and only job of humans in this process is to press the big "C&D" button, so the barrier is just much too low, allowing for stuff like this to happen accidentally.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 1 point 9 months ago* (2 children)

    Generally in copyright law, it's applied when a lay person can or does misconstrue the new product for the old one.

    Like if you look at something and think it's the other one, that is copyright infringing.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
  • [–] 4 points 9 months ago* (1 child)

    I have no doubt that in law and the wealth of microsoft to argue in court that could indeed do that.

    But my point is that there was an established public agreement with mojang. It could be raised as a legal defence that you where given permission pre-microsoft.

    And also that this law is dumb as fuck.

    Here is a screenshot of infiniminer (2009)

    You could show that to people and they would say it looks like minecraft,

    If infiniminer has sued during the minecraft browser version days it would never even have gotten the chance to become what it is now.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
    •
  • [–] 2 points 9 months ago

    Oh yeah, for sure, by no means was what I said in dissent in any way to what you said. More of an aside or tidbit.

    The fact that they had an... established public agreement is just even more messed up when companies arbitrarily decide "nope, we're gonna fuck you in the ass suddenly now". Sometimes, companies even have explicit public agreements to or not do stuff. So when this type of thing happens against previous understanding for said company's self interest and they just happen to have more money than you do to back up what may even be a court case in your favor, but it would otherwise bankrupt you, it really paints a certain picture.

    It's the Microslop way.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent