#SIMCITY 4 PROFESSIONAL#

Such a course of action is effectively plagiarism, and is a moral and ethical breach that, not surprisingly, constitutes a gross violation of site and exchange rules, and in many cases, also likely breaches the usually fairly permissive, royalty-free licenses that these sites often offer.ДЇor those of you who have been around long enough to remember the вЂњofficial exchangeвЂќ that EA Maxis hosted on their old SimCity 4 product site, rampant plagiarism was what turned it into a wasteland.

Think about itвЂ“if youвЂ™re a BATer, and someone takes your model and, instead of referring to it as a dependency, sticks it in their upload and acts as if itвЂ™s theirs, without giving you any credit whatsoever, youвЂ™d be upset, and quite understandably so. But if you are going to use someone elseвЂ™s model, it seems the logical and honest course of action is to disclose that the model is from someone else, and if possible, to credit the original creator. There are a good number of 3D models out there on these model library sites that would prove to make excellent additions to oneвЂ™s SC4 city, and they are made available on these sites with the intent that they may be put to use. In this case, the uploader not only disclosed his use of a third-party 3D model, he even linked to the 3D Warehouse account that uploaded it. He specifically notes in the file description that the building model is not hisвЂ“being part of a stock library, the actual attribution would be difficult to come by, but he is transparent to the greatest extent possible about the origin of what is included in his upload.ДЄnother fantastic case of reuse is the MGM Tower (Constellation Place) upload from edwardjeria on the STEX at Simtropolis.

#SIMCITY 4 PROFESSIONAL#

callagrafx is himself a capable 3D modeler, but in this particular case, he reused a model from a stock library he has permission to use in his professional work as part of a render test, liked the result, and decided to share it with the SC4 community. One situation that I view as a textbook case of appropriate reuse of a third-party model is the CAL Winterton Tower upload from callagrafx, on the LEX at SC4 Devotion. So, this of course begs the questionвЂ“ is it acceptable to use third-party 3D models as part of uploads to the exchanges? From my vantage point, the answer to that question is вЂњyesвЂќ, but qualified with some common sense caveats. Those recent discussions have really made it clear to me that this practice has long needed a closer examination, and to that end, I would like to give some of my thoughts on how best to handle these situations, from a practical and ethical standpoint.

The use of such вЂњpre-cookedвЂќ assets is one that has gone on for a long time in the SC4 community, ranging from small props to entire buildings, but there has been a noticeable lack of consistency in terms of how these assets are treated by those who use them, and by exchange policies. Recently, IвЂ™ve been involved in a number of discussions with people in the SC4 worldвЂ“both public and behind the scenesвЂ“about the practice of reusing third-party 3D models, obtained through various sites, such as 3D Warehouse, CGTrader, and TurboSquid, as parts of uploads to community file exchanges.

Simcity 4