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Originally Posted by TheClaus
While a PAR set of EQEMU would be awesome(I am actually doing this for myself) I think that is still legally just as bad as sending out a zip file of the EQ Client files.
Besides even if it wasn't there is still the whole idea of people asking what is PAR and how to use it.
As for comparing this to WoW that isn't possible. WoW gives its patch file out to other sites to ease the load. That basically gives the emulator a site outside of Blizzard for others to grab the correct patch files. Even then those sites that hold the patch files might drop them after X amount of time making it not a solid solution.
Like mattmeck said a simple google search will find the files. I can tell you from personal experience I decided to try out EQEmu after being gone for a couple of years and with a little digging I am up and running.
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Since a PAR file has essentially the same information content as the files themselves, much as a ZIP file does, there would be no way in hell that distributing a PAR file would not be considered distributing the actual warez in the eyes of SOE, or in the eyes of any halfway intelligent judge.
Don't forget that courts interpret things in light of the Intent of the Law and the Intent of the Actions of the Accussed. Cries of "but I didnt distributed eqgame.exe!" mean zip when the intent is to distribute the file in breach of Sony's copyright.
Good thinking though.
On the other hand, I'm pretty sure that a binry diff file, that could be used to "backpatch" a valid (but wrong versioned) client would probably be OK as long as it didnt constitute greater than about 10% of the content of the original file (this number 10% is a fuzzy one... and read on for the nasty catch!).
But "probably" is a HUGE word, and I'd NOT suggest it be tried as there would have to be a chance that a judge could consider it to be evil in intent, even though it would be enabling a User to recreate a file that was once publically available and distributed by SOE. The fact that the explicit file that is the result of such a process is NOT publically available from SOE would PROBABLY mean that with the right lawyers and the right judge (the halfway intelligent one I mentioned before) the finding of intent would be that there was an intent to circumvent SOE's copyright - in particular their right to maintain particular versions in the marketplace.
Furthermore, all SOE has to do is to claim that at least one of the official patches between the Emu compatible version and the current live version was for Security purposes, and that this patch involved changing some level of encryption, and they could even invoke the dreaded DMCA, which would result in a very very short court case in my opinion.
So 10 points for good thinking about the PAR files, but minus 10 for not thinking it through like a money hungry corporate manager.
All opinions voiced above are based on my extreme age and experience in the business end of IT and gaming, and not in any way based on the state of the eqemu project or codebase.
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