Many of us have built something, gave it to a „friend” and then found out that it has been leaked to another, and another account, or even worse – it has been Free Modeled. It always bothered me that whatever I built, could not be given to anyone, to prevent it being FM’ed. I even managed to create a blockade that locks unions with error, so noone can edit its look and then claim it as theirs. In time all Free Models loose its origins being inserted and uploaded all over again by many players.
What if ROBLOX would have some „Creator Stamp” that would stick to the model at all time once the it has been set? Or even some “Terms of Use” that would allow us to set if a model can be only viewed meaning that it can’t be reuploaded either.
Terms of Use and Creator Stamp
Terms of Use would allow a Developer to set if his model could be edited (union actions, color changing, additional decals or textures) or not. These settings could only be changed by its creator, and would stick to the model at all circumstances. It could lock editing (as said above)or reuploading (so people can see how something is built without risk of it being uploaded by non-creator). These were my 2 suggestions, comment below if I missed something. I still don’t know whether it should be in Properties tab or somewhere else so please share your thoughts!
Creator Stamp would create an additional label in Properties tab with the Creator’s name. It could be set on a Model (which would stamp all parts inside it) or on a single part. Once it has been set, there cannot be another stamp from diffrent user. It stays whatever you do with the brick including union actions such as “Seperate”. If a Developer allows editing and someone would do it, he could put another stamp which creates another label with Editor’s name right below Creator’s name. Once it has been edited once by some user, it automatically becomes forever ineditable. Only the creator of the current version is able to edit it even if ‘edit’ is locked.
I hope I wrote all what I wanted. Share your thoughts, ideas or disagreements below!
Assume that this stamp property exists. If not writable, at the very least these properties would still be read-only, otherwise the objects become completely unscriptable and useless. Then, because the properties are read-only, someone can easily reconstruct a non-stamped part with the same properties by just copying those over from the stamped part. This works for everything except CSG parts and can be done with a script.
Aside from that, if the models can still be downloaded by someone, it should be trivial to write an exploit that undoes the stamping of the instances. Similarly, it’s unlikely that an exploit which steals the geometry of a game would retain the stamped properties of the parts consciously.
Even if they remain stamped, what’s the point if someone can still have your amazing building model in their game? Sure, they can’t edit it, but they can still use it in their game.
This is IMO not the right way to go about asset protection, even more so because it would add huge clutter (potentially adding X bytes to every stamped instance in the game).
All users that you replicate your assets to can be stolen, since the data has to cross the server > client boundary. There isn’t a fix for that.
Regarding assets from an outside-source.
Well the thing with us as developers is that we don’t always pay the artist. Look at sounds from all kind of sources, you have to pay the artist for an commercial license to use it at ROBLOX. ROBLOX states in his policy that you give them the asset for free.
When you do you agree that the investment that you actually made is now public domain for basically everyone. Well, that is something I don’t agree with. If you want to use Sounds, pay the author ! If you want to use Meshes, pay the author ! And don’t just say “Oh let’s see. Developer X has uploaded that asset, let’s use it.”. If you make around 2,500 an month (what is isn’t an exception in this community) you should have the decency to actually pay the 20 dollars for that asset.
Regarding assets that you create yourself on ROBLOX / your own creative work
I must say that I don’t like the fact that when you upload your content to ROBLOX (in any way, possible) that every single one can use it. Sharing work with friends is something I only do, when I know the developer for a long time and I know that I would at least get some kind of credit. In the early days of ROBLOX (When we used givers for Obbies, etc) there always was an little message put in Workspace, just to actually give credits to the author.
ROBLOX uses this mechanic to actually protect you from any lawsuits, when the find out that you actually stole designs / assets from other games. Since ROBLOX owns your content, they can actually say “Oh hi lawyer, you want it taken down. Sure ! But we have to protect our user, so no you are not allowed to have those details, but we will take action against him !”
Selling your assets and ROBLOX
The thing is we can’t sell Models / Assets / Sounds on ROBLOX. Why ? Because we don’t know the source that you actually got it from, so when you sell let’s say an decent amount and you stole the asset (from the original author) or you don’t have the correct ‘reseller license’ you are actually taking away money from the original author.
Possible solutions
An container in the model that holds the original author when you publish it to ROBLOX.com catalog and the boolean that allows you to “lock” the asset so that you can’t take it apart for example. (Only for CSG, Models)
An upload that accepts Links (instead of files) so that the importer can get the original author and license straight from the web.
Put an watermark on assets on the Website, honestly with Sounds there should be “ROBLOX” every 10 seconds, I know it is annoying, but it allows us to protect our assets. Images should have an ROBLOX watermark.
The original author should be able to actually tell ROBLOX which users are allowed to use the assets for free. (This happens with groups already, why can’t we have user privileges for each item or assign it to multiple groups)
Questions
When is something yours ? Let’s say you upload an model and I change it like 50%, is it your copyright then ? Or is it mine ? Isn’t innovation built on checking each others work out and change it ?
I was going to write almost a whole essay but then I got ninja’d by the two Dutch fellows above, so I’ll just add on to what they’ve already said. Once a client has downloaded an asset, there’s nothing that can be done to prevent it and in order to use or interact with an asset, it has to be downloaded. There’s no way around it unfortunately.
The ‘safest’ asset sharing method currently available on Roblox is uploading ModuleScripts called MainModule to the Roblox website. The reason why this is safe is because the client never gets to download the module’s contents. You can’t access or load it through the studio and a client can’t be told during gameplay to download it. The only instance that has the right permission is a Roblox server and that server cannot be accessed by anyone except from Roblox itself.
If you take a look at other game’s you’ll notice many animated videos on the internet which use character from Team Fortress 2, Overwatch and other games. It’s because even the big companies who own these games have no way to prevent you from using and editing their assets. This is why copyrights and trademarks exist, because it’s not possible to digitally protect your assets once they’re given to others. It’s the only ‘solution’.
I’m not sure, but I think you did not understand me. Only thing in properties would be an additional label, e.g. next to the “Name” is “Part”, so for Creator Stamp there would be “Creator:” - “[PlayersName]”.
Sure, properties would be visible and if someone would like to reconstruct something brick by brick, he could’ve done it. This is still to be polished. And yes, CSG would gain more protection that the normal bricks
Well, the Stamp would be visible by the Developer of the game, not a player.
I understood what you meant with my post above, this is what I’m replying to. If the data of the “stamped” instances (where your Creator Stamp label is filled) is available on the clients (which is always, whether they’re playing your game or have a model of your stuff which got leaked), then it should be trivial to undo that to make the instances “unstamped” again via an exploit.
It’s like I’m putting a locked door in just a door frame in front of your face of which I only have the key, and you just walk around the door because there is no wall around it.
Yes but your whole point is to protect your assets. If the stamped asset gets leaked, people can still use the stamped asset. Your idea doesn’t prevent others from using the asset even if the “Creator Stamp” is filled.
Well, copyright should always be on the first creator, maybe with some addition that it was changed by “certain user”.
I know my ideas may not work in some points, but they are just ideas. Those two options would allow us to leave a mark on our models or it’s editions. How should it be done? I don’t know, repeating - these are just ideas
Creator Stamp’s only purpose would be an additional label in properties. Those “Terms od Use” would define if model could be published into ROBLOX only. Only ideas.
None of which would work. There isn’t a way to accomplish what you want. Professionals have tried for years and software pirating is still big.
Wouldn’t work. Anything you suggest can be edited out of files, or the file could be recreated entirely. If you create a 2x4 part with your creator tag, all I have to do is create a 2x4 part with my creator tag and set all the properties to be the same as your’s.
