Gamers in the US and elsewhere can rejoice as US Library of Congress has granted limited legal rights to those people who want to restore access to games that are locked behind defunct authentication servers, under the category of Fair Us. For instance, if Blizzard for whatever reason takes down the authentication servers that validate Diablo III or Starcraft II, gamers may legally create workarounds to allow them to play the games.
The ruling states that the conditions apply to any games that have been officially discontinued support by their publisher for six months or more. According to the Library of Congress, ”The Register explained that the inability to circumvent the TPM [technological prevention measures] would preclude all gameplay, a significant adverse effect, and that circumvention to restore access would qualify as a noninfringing fair use.”
However, the Library of Congress has maintained that restoring online content to discontinued games is still considered illegal, such as creating a private server for a defunct MMO or re-establishing online modes for games with defunct multiplayer servers, which includes restoring online multiplayer for the Wii and Nintendo DS. Players also may not jailbreak a console to get around authentication.
Museums may legally jailbreak consoles for the strict purposes of videogame preservation and study.
The Electronics Frontier Foundation had mixed reviews of the ruling, first stating, ”We’re pleased that the Librarian of Congress granted our petition to give some legal clarity to players, museums, and archives who keep old games running. This exemption will help preserve classic games in a playable form for future generations,” stated senior staff attorney Mitch Stoltz in an interview.
He added, ”We’re disappointed that the Librarian decided to limit the exemption to games that aren’t playable at all without an authentication server, because the heart of many games is online multiplayer mode, and preserving multiplayer play should not have to happen under a legal cloud. This exemption is helpful, but Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act is a disastrous law that’s badly in need of reform.”
In related news, the Library of Congress also deemed it illegal to jailbreak consoles for the purposes of playing homebrew software.
