Recently, the author of no$gba began charging a fee of $2.50 to download new releases of his Nintendo GBA / DS emulator. Some mentioned that because the cost was so low, surely nobody's ideals could get in the way of "donating." I beg to differ. To those who truly have ethical reservations about this, the dollar amount is completely irrelevent. I also take issue with emulating hardware that is so new to market.
That of course brings up the questions: why do I have a problem with an emulator author charging money for his software, and how do I define what an adequate period of time is before emulation is ethical?
Certainly, the law is very clear. Emulation in most countries is legal, regardless of the age of the system in question. So why do ethics even matter? They don't. They're really nothing more than opinions that someone happens to believe in and follow themselves.
And that's all this article is. It's a collection of my opinions on these two subjects. Nothing more, nothing less. You are of course free to disagree. If you wish to purchase emulators, or download emulators in place of buying actual hardware, then by all means, please continue to do so.
For what it's worth, I do practice what I preach. You can see that in the fact that I create emulators for older systems, as well distribute them and their source code free of cost.
If someone writes software, aren't they entitled to profit from it?
Certainly, this makes sense. Of course someone should have the option of being compensated for his work, if he so chooses. So why take special issue when an emulator author chooses to do so?
Unlike with developing a software program from scratch, or building off of a general existing idea, an emulator is merely a clone of an existing idea -- in fact, that's the whole point. It may have additional features, but it's only as useful as it captures the specifics of an existing hardware design.
Clearly, an emulator would be worthless if it emulated non-existent hardware. The reason an emulator is popular is due to the research, development, manufacturing and marketing of the company who made said hardware, and who both made and contracted with other companies to produce software for it. If you were to place yourself in the shoes of said company, how would you feel if someone attempted to profit off of your ideas in this manner?
In truth, there is little difference between this and other categories, such as translation. If someone wishes to copy a book, but into his native language, he must seek approval from the book author to do so. Otherwise, it is a violation of international copyright law. The Berne Convention, to be exact. But no such law applies to hardware creations.
Specifically, this is due to the differences between copyright and patent laws. But again, it's more a technicality than anything. Both represent creative works and should benefit from equal laws.
So why is the creation of any emulator ethical?
Because of the continued abuse of law to extend copyright into perpetuity, despite much research suggesting that the optimal length of copyright is roughly 14 years. Rufus Pollock, the author of said research, puts up a fantastic argument against the maddening lengths and extensions of worldwide copyright, arguing that the length of copyright should decrease as the ease of innovation also decreases. I strongly encourage you to read over his research papers for more information.
Myself, I've always felt similar. Waiting ~100-170 years to emulate a hardware console is completely absurd. By then, the hardware would long be impossible to obtain, and would be in non-functioning order regardless. And that's if anyone alive even remembers the hardware. Current copyright laws are clearly a disaster for the preservation of cultural heritage.
I also take other issues with copyright, such as believing they should be overridden when there is a great advantage to the public to do, such as is the case with many pharmaceuticals. But that merits a different article all together.
But not just that, I also weigh heavily a hardware manufacturer's support of a console in determining if a system should be emulated. If the manufacturer no longer sells hardware or software to those wishing to purchase it, that clearly increases the ethics of creating an emulator for said hardware. It is abandonment, pure and simple.
But what about companies taking advantage of emulation to resell games on newer consoles, such as Nintendo and their Virtual Console service? I really don't feel it's the same thing. First, emulation and game images are digital. And at that, you are purchasing licenses to use digital bits. Second, you've most likely already purchased both hardware and software, and now you are expected to purchase them again. No effort is made to support those who already own said software titles. And as soon as the Wii is replaced by the next generation successor, you'll almost certainly be expected to purchase all of your favorite titles yet again. And there's also the issue that most Virtual Console titles emulate systems and games well beyond ~14 years old.
Emulators provide an important role here in continuing to support the physical property said manufacturers have abandoned. I believe this also applies to other categories, such as translation that I mentioned above. Clearly, if the authors are given sufficient time to sell you a product but choose not to, they've shown neglect and should not be entitled to perpetual copyright.
Ideally, copyright should require registration, which includes commitment and support clauses that benefit the public interest, in exchange for the government-sponsored monopolies granted by it. No copyright should ever be granted if an author has no intention of ever supporting a certain geographical location, nor should any copyright continue to be enforced once an author has abandoned their work by refusing to sell it to any interested party.
So what about charging for an emulator for hardware older than ~14 years?
In truth, I still take issue with profiting from emulation in general, but it would certainly be much less of an issue for me at that point. And certainly, a hardware-based emulator would be required to charge a fee.
Again, my opinions are largely irrelevent, as it's clearly legal to create and even sell emulators, regardless of the age of a system, so long as reverse engineering efforts are fully legal. But the law is often not in sync with what is right, and I believe this is a good example of that.
Unfortunately, due to the abuse of copyright, it would be even worse to "fix" the law, as that would make virtually all emulation impossible -- a far worse fate. But if copyright laws were balanced, I strongly believe it would make sense to afford more protections to hardware manufacturer's intellectual property rights.
Lastly, please look at this as a compromise between the interests of corporations and consumers. It's easy as a consumer to prefer that copyright not exist at all, such that everything could be copied for free, but that would seriously damage the creative contributions to society. Just as current copyright length terms are doing right now.
Piracy is an unfortunate and unavoidable consequence of emulation -- despite all of its otherwise good uses. Such rapid emulation of commercially viable hardware is only hurting the profitability, and thus life and future development of said hardware and software. Charging money for said emulators just adds insult to injury.
Though it bears no relation to this article, it's worth noting the increased uselessness of purchasing closed source software. Rather than contributing to general human knowledge, it serves only to benefit the authors, as any further research will be deemed meaningless once said software is discontinued.
© 2007 byuu - archive.is/mRSix