would this be breaking the rules?

[Cammygirl192]

Would you still get banned for asking for ROMs which aren't commercial (demos, homebrew etc.), or not?

If anyone asked for a game which was homebrew or for testing purposes and not a commercial ROM, which is very unlikely anyway but blarg, it still could happen.

Besides, why do people ask for ROMs? There's something called 'Search Engine', choose one and search for 'snes roms' and there you go. Now it's up to you whether to decide to get a bad ROM or a good one.

Then again, the public's stupidity thanks to the media brainwashing everyone and making them too incompetent to use a search engine, or making them use Google Chrome, isn't surprising to me.

[odditude]

Public domain material is acceptable. Copyrighted material with a non-permissive license is not. If there is any overlap or uncertainty between the two, we err on the side of caution and disallow it.

[Gil_Hamilton]

Note that several ROM images typically identified as "public domain" are not. Most infamously the test cartridge, which is BLATANTLY copyright Nintendo.

People have a tendency to file everything as either "sold for money" or "public domain", which is not reflective of reality.



The number of ROM images with an identifiable presence in the public domain or "permissive license" is very slim. So odditude basically said "no" in a very long-winded way.

[Cammygirl192]

Public domain material is acceptable. Copyrighted material with a non-permissive license is not. If there is any overlap or uncertainty between the two, we err on the side of caution and disallow it.

Yup, I meant public domain, since homebrew is a good way to find new games and test emulators with as well.

Technically it can be classed only as public domain if everything is ORIGINAL though, no stolen code or such, so it is slim as Gil_Hamilton says.

Note that several ROM images typically identified as "public domain" are not. Most infamously the test cartridge, which is BLATANTLY copyright Nintendo.

People have a tendency to file everything as either "sold for money" or "public domain", which is not reflective of reality.



The number of ROM images with an identifiable presence in the public domain or "permissive license" is very slim. So odditude basically said "no" in a very long-winded way.

Oh yeah, I don't understand how that could be considered public domain, it is clearly by Nintendo, it SAYS (C) Nintendo, how can people miss it? Oh wait, this is the public, they're known to be stupid because of the media (because people here are actual people, not brainwashed things that somehow pass for human). :sigh:

A reason people might ask for roms tho might be because some games have bad dumps distributed everywhere, this is why I downloaded the goodsnes 3.23 set, because I don't want to download individual games and find them broken. Although usually it is because people are lazy.

[Gil_Hamilton]

Technically it can be classed only as public domain if everything is ORIGINAL though, no stolen code or such, so it is slim as Gil_Hamilton says.

And if the author explicitly releases it into the public domain. The state of law in the US, and most countries, is copyright is registered automatically and you have rights to your creations unless you sign them away.

Oh yeah, I don't understand how that could be considered public domain, it is clearly by Nintendo, it SAYS (C) Nintendo, how can people miss it? Oh wait, this is the public, they're known to be stupid because of the media (because people here are actual people, not brainwashed things that somehow pass for human). :sigh:

Wellllll...

A reason people might ask for roms tho might be because some games have bad dumps distributed everywhere, this is why I downloaded the goodsnes 3.23 set, because I don't want to download individual games and find them broken. Although usually it is because people are lazy.

GoodSNES used to list the test cart as public domain.

As well as the entire Vectrex library, because the binaries and documents were made free to copy for non-commercial use. Note that in addition to the non-commercial clause, Smith Engineering did not have rights to the trademarks involved in much of the library and therefore could not release the games into the public domain even if they wanted to. (It's highly debatable if they could legally authorize non-commercial distribution of unedited copies of games like Star Trek and Pole Position, but whatever, who cares?)