User blog:DocTrain/Copyright

Idrillan asked a great question about copyright here on the Trainstation wiki. I thought I'd put my answer here, in case others have the same questions.

Hi Idrillian.

Just taking a moment to follow up on your question about copyright. I'm not a lawyer, but I'll give you my opinion. This is an important question, and I'm glad that you took the time to ask.

The most important thing is that Wikia is based in the US, and anything regarding copyright is covered by US law. US law makes very specific exceptions for our kind of activity here - it's called Fair Use. There are 4 criteria used to determine if copying something is Fair Use or not:

Pixel Federation has sent us information about some of the rare engines and wagons in the game - the Leopold K5 page is a prime example. All of the information on that page was provided by Pixel Federation, and they have been sent links to the Wiki. They are aware of the Wiki, and haven't contacted me, Mhommer or Wikia to ask us to shut down our site.

Keep up the excellent work!