Others will provide a detailed breakdown soon, but for now, here is a highly simplified explanation:
CC BY means "Use it for free. modify it even. but give me (the artist/author) credit."
CC BY SA means "Use it for free. Modify it even. Give me (the artist/author) credit. Furthermore, please share the modifications you make under these same terms."
^what DezrasDragons said. In other terms: lets say air is CC0. Everyone can breath it for free. Joeshmoe could put it in bottles and sell that air. That would be allowed. People might even buy it. But they don't have to. I'll just continue getting my air for free. Joeshmoe can't stop me from breathing just because I didn't pay him. In essense, Joeshmoe isn't charging for the air, he's charging for the bottle the air is in.
Someone could take your cc0 works and sell it in a commercial game, but they can't tell everyone else they aren't allowed to use your cc0 works. Everyone will say "no, chasergaming put it on OGA for free before that game came out. I'm going to download it from OGA for free instead of paying for those art assets."
There are several sets, from several artists, belonging to the LPC collection. Most are released with more than one license. You can use any of the available licenses. What you need to do to be in compliance depends on which license you are using and, to a lesser extent, which author produced the particular set of LPC assets you're using.
Most of the LPC stuff is licensed CC BY-SA and GPL, and most of the original stuff is from Sharm and Redshrike. There are other submitters, but those are the two most prevalent LPC artists.
So, to narrow down the answer, which specific collections are you planning to use (link?) and of those collections, which license do you plan to use?
If you never share or distribute any of the graphics you've made changes to (eg you keep them all on your own computer, never releasing them in a game) you don't really have to distribute them.
However if you do use them in a game or any other thing you share with even one other person or put on a website even if no one downloads it, yes you must "share alike" the recolored graphics.
I find this very helpful already. It remains nebulous (and it probably always will, as legal scenarios are almost never subject to generalization) but I feel I have a better understanding of CC BY-SA.
I beleive bart has intentionally left interpretation of this license up to both the asset user and asset producer to some degree. Because it is so situationally specific, each artist and each developer have to assess if this license is appropriate for their specific project.
As mdwh pointed out, only using SA stuff in open source games doesn't really safeguard you against the pitfall we're asking about, but I feel (moreso now than ever) that the pitfall is not as deep or dangerous as expected, and is only really risky in some rather fringe-y cases. But that still means you have to assess your project to see if it is one of those fringe cases.
I have spoken to an IP expert about my own project about this license. The information I was given is very specific to my project so I can't really share it in a general sense, but I'll give the basic gist of it:
<Standard-Issue "I Am Not A Lawyer" disclaimer />It is highly unlikely (read: "Fringe-y") that game code is a derivative of artwork assets, so code is unlikely to ever be considered subject to the SA clause.
However, if artwork is fundamentally inseperable from the code, i.e. it could not be considered the same game if you subsituted that artwork for some other similar-but-not-derivative artwork, then the code may be considered a derivative of the artwork because it absolutely relies on that specific artwork in order to exist as a game.
e.g. A game called "Yo! Van Gogh! Can you hear me yet?" where you pin the ears on Vincent van Gogh's portrait; substituting some other portrait work of art like the Mona Lisa would pretty fundamentally change the nature of the game. Subject to judgment by the court, but risky still. (I think both paintings are public domain now, but it illustrates the point)
In addition, CC's response to Capbro's questions indicates to me that combining two separate assets where one is licensed CC BY-SA will probably require both assets be licensed -SA, but not the mechanism that combined them. e.g. Using the SpriteDisplayerPro website to animate a rabbit sprite and syncing a rabbit-hopping-sound with the animation would probably mean both the rabbit sprite and the hopping sound are derivatives of each other if you wanted to share the results, but SpriteDisplayerPro's web code would not be a derivative.
Furthermore, a bunny-hunter sprite would not be a derivative of the bunny sprite or the bunny hopping sound even though all three assets appear in the same game... Because the hunter asset is never combined with the bunny hopping sound effect, just displayed in a similar environment. Just like displaying two photographs in the same book doesn't constitute a derivative of each other.
Others will provide a detailed breakdown soon, but for now, here is a highly simplified explanation:
^what DezrasDragons said. In other terms: lets say air is CC0. Everyone can breath it for free. Joeshmoe could put it in bottles and sell that air. That would be allowed. People might even buy it. But they don't have to. I'll just continue getting my air for free. Joeshmoe can't stop me from breathing just because I didn't pay him. In essense, Joeshmoe isn't charging for the air, he's charging for the bottle the air is in.
Someone could take your cc0 works and sell it in a commercial game, but they can't tell everyone else they aren't allowed to use your cc0 works. Everyone will say "no, chasergaming put it on OGA for free before that game came out. I'm going to download it from OGA for free instead of paying for those art assets."
Have you checked out the Liberated Pixel Cup set? It's very FFIV, FFV, FFVI and seems to have most of the things you're looking for: http://opengameart.org/content/liberated-pixel-cup-0
How about Makrohn's Universal LPC spritesheet character generator? http://gaurav.munjal.us/Universal-LPC-Spritesheet-Character-Generator/#
Collaboration by lots of artists!
hey thanks!
There are several sets, from several artists, belonging to the LPC collection. Most are released with more than one license. You can use any of the available licenses. What you need to do to be in compliance depends on which license you are using and, to a lesser extent, which author produced the particular set of LPC assets you're using.
Most of the LPC stuff is licensed CC BY-SA and GPL, and most of the original stuff is from Sharm and Redshrike. There are other submitters, but those are the two most prevalent LPC artists.
So, to narrow down the answer, which specific collections are you planning to use (link?) and of those collections, which license do you plan to use?
If you never share or distribute any of the graphics you've made changes to (eg you keep them all on your own computer, never releasing them in a game) you don't really have to distribute them.
However if you do use them in a game or any other thing you share with even one other person or put on a website even if no one downloads it, yes you must "share alike" the recolored graphics.
@capbros: Good idea. They've all got a credit and license file in each package now.
Your latest revision for the FAQ entry looks good to me.
I find this very helpful already. It remains nebulous (and it probably always will, as legal scenarios are almost never subject to generalization) but I feel I have a better understanding of CC BY-SA.
I beleive bart has intentionally left interpretation of this license up to both the asset user and asset producer to some degree. Because it is so situationally specific, each artist and each developer have to assess if this license is appropriate for their specific project.
As mdwh pointed out, only using SA stuff in open source games doesn't really safeguard you against the pitfall we're asking about, but I feel (moreso now than ever) that the pitfall is not as deep or dangerous as expected, and is only really risky in some rather fringe-y cases. But that still means you have to assess your project to see if it is one of those fringe cases.
I have spoken to an IP expert about my own project about this license. The information I was given is very specific to my project so I can't really share it in a general sense, but I'll give the basic gist of it:
<Standard-Issue "I Am Not A Lawyer" disclaimer />It is highly unlikely (read: "Fringe-y") that game code is a derivative of artwork assets, so code is unlikely to ever be considered subject to the SA clause.
However, if artwork is fundamentally inseperable from the code, i.e. it could not be considered the same game if you subsituted that artwork for some other similar-but-not-derivative artwork, then the code may be considered a derivative of the artwork because it absolutely relies on that specific artwork in order to exist as a game.
e.g. A game called "Yo! Van Gogh! Can you hear me yet?" where you pin the ears on Vincent van Gogh's portrait; substituting some other portrait work of art like the Mona Lisa would pretty fundamentally change the nature of the game. Subject to judgment by the court, but risky still. (I think both paintings are public domain now, but it illustrates the point)
In addition, CC's response to Capbro's questions indicates to me that combining two separate assets where one is licensed CC BY-SA will probably require both assets be licensed -SA, but not the mechanism that combined them. e.g. Using the SpriteDisplayerPro website to animate a rabbit sprite and syncing a rabbit-hopping-sound with the animation would probably mean both the rabbit sprite and the hopping sound are derivatives of each other if you wanted to share the results, but SpriteDisplayerPro's web code would not be a derivative.
Furthermore, a bunny-hunter sprite would not be a derivative of the bunny sprite or the bunny hopping sound even though all three assets appear in the same game... Because the hunter asset is never combined with the bunny hopping sound effect, just displayed in a similar environment. Just like displaying two photographs in the same book doesn't constitute a derivative of each other.
Pages