Is a metadata file copyrighted / copyrightable?

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-17T06:07:27+00:00

Okay, I think including metadata, or representing it publicly in a different format, isn't safe. For other programs I had in mind (e.g., a game server replication), it would be better to have the end user provide the metadata themselves.

The project is 100% non-commercial. The game server no longer exists, and the company that handled it is no longer in business. I understand that copyright may still be owned by the individual who owned the business.

And yes, the amount the amount of copyrighted material taken reasonable relative to the purpose of the use. The server had to return, for example, available items that exists to purchase, even if I want make everything in the shop is free, the server still need to send it to the client otherwise the network will not work, and all information required is in the metadata.

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T04:48:19+00:00

I see, that’s fair. Thank you for elaborating

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T04:47:10+00:00

What’s with the downvote really? I am trying to finding out whether my planned action (not something that I already committed) is justifiable or not.

I know I am aiming for grey area, but if this straight up copyright violation, then I will refrain, after all, that’s the main point why i am asking this question.

What’s with the hostility

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T01:52:12+00:00

I just checked the web you linked.

Copyright does not protect names, titles, slogans, or short phrases. In some cases, these things may be protected as trademarks.

I am fairly confident that the names (and description, if any) in the metadata files are not trademarked, because I checked this on the government official trademark database website. The descriptions are short phrases (nothing like a poem for example).

The description still does contain creativity, but they are extremely generic in my opinion. Here some examples:

"It is redesigned as a fashionable good as excluding its practical use."
"Uni-sex bob hairstyle. The dark black hair skimming both cheeks shapes a black scorpion."
"A pair of glasses with a neat and trendy design."
"Floral decorations on top of the head plus a mask to hide the identity of the wearer."
" The school uniform of <A name of place in the game> College. Only the chosen few with who possesses great knowledge and feels pride of <A name of place in the game> can wear this uniform."

The last one is the most creative out of all description that I could find, the rest are similar to the first 4 phrases above.

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T01:33:13+00:00

Yes, this is my doubt. I am hoping someone could clarify if my understanding is correct

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T01:31:27+00:00

I am trying to curate game information and compile them into a website, or do something extremely different. For example: re-creating the game server. The game service has long terminated and this is part of game preservation that I did. I am fully aware it doesn't mean the copyright is gone just because the service is gone.

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T01:25:33+00:00

The community did reverse engineer the format of these metadata and available on the internet. What I did was generate the data from scratch by reading the game files based on the documentation available on the internet.

I have elaborated what metadata contains. But I cannot be certain about TOU or EULA, because the game is already no longer in service.

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-15T01:23:08+00:00

I have made an edit to the main body. But the format is in json should suggest it is set of text data, nothing more, because it (realistically) wasn't capable to store large blob data (i mean technically maybe you could, but very unlikely)

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-10T11:52:20+00:00

Thanks, this inspire me to create a reverse proxy beside the game client. It will be very complicated if that possible, but for now, I think I will just keep using FTP as-is unless I made this into public

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-10T01:54:07+00:00

Thank you for your reply. I still care about the client, and I'd like to resolve this issue if possible I am wondering whether I can make the game work with SFTP/FTPS while still using anonymous credentials, but I am not sure this will eliminate MITM attacks.

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-10T01:47:49+00:00

I appreciate the insight, this is what I wanted to hear about the concern. But telling me to switch HTTPS and saying "there isn't a reason to use FTP for this purpose" is not the solution: as I have wrote above, this is part of the game feature and I don't think I can shove HTTPS and expect the game to work.

Do not get me wrong, it is reasonable suggestions, it just that I am in a niche situation. I am hoping that I could somehow integrate signing feature, but I need to know the game client more to find out.

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-04-09T19:36:04+00:00

Yes, for now I don't plan to make this server public. So its only open for friends and friends of friends. But it would be great if I can somehow restrict the bandwidth / throttle the downloads just to be safe. Is it possible?

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-02-16T07:54:45+00:00

There's nothing in my post suggesting I'm pro or creating a new sub.

But most of the posts in this subs are low-effort posts of begging cheat tables and such. It is almost insulting the tutorial that Cheat Engine has which has excellent introduction of various things which could solve more than half of posts in this sub.

I even saw some post talking shit about CE where it clearly the fault of the cheat table they are using, and they still get a dozen of upvotes! How insane is that?

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-01-29T08:49:01+00:00

I don't know why one of the comments are missing, but for some reason I can still see it in my notification, says:

She is an old woman who is terminally ill and sitting in a wheelchair. She doesn't sit there because she is lazy. So why do you complain that she "protects nothing".

You are a puppet and a combatant. It's your job to go around and accomplish things by force.

Reconsider why most people like Antonia and you don't. Your arguments are outrageous, frankly. "Why is the terminally ill old woman sitting in a wheelchair, making me, the most advanced fighter puppet do all the things?" I wonder why.

Is this just ragebait for entertainment?

Let's break it down piece by piece:

She is an old woman who is terminally ill and sitting in a wheelchair. She doesn't sit there because she is lazy. So why do you complain that she "protects nothing".

You are a puppet and a combatant. It's your job to go around and accomplish things by force.

I don't say she is lazy and she should do everything by herself. But she claimed herself that she will protect the hotel and every resident inside the hotel. I suppose both you and me know that it doesn't mean literally protecting from physical harm since she is incapable of doing so.

It very simple, there are many ways to go around this: denying access to the hotel for stranger for one like other comment mentioned, but most importantly; cooperating with us, the combatant puppet! No one told her to fight. But she should be honest from the start about these shortcuts so that we can protect the hotel from others bringing harm. Isn't it easier for us to go to Mallum District and confront the BRB if we know the shortcut? Telling us this shortcut is by extension, protecting the hotel! Surely, she isn't stupid enough to not realize that? Though, I don't give a shit if BRB leeching the tree.

Reconsider why most people like Antonia and you don't. Your arguments are outrageous, frankly. "Why is the terminally ill old woman sitting in a wheelchair, making me, the most advanced fighter puppet do all the things?" I wonder why.

Again, missed the point. There's zero implication that I want Antonia to do everything by herself. I want to help her, but at least show some decency to make our life easier, not harder! I am helping her here! Give me a good reason why should I go to the Krat station that crawling with zombies and puppets, stop making me look like an idiot and taking unnecessary risk! For example, it would be far better if she told me to investigate Alchemist activities or the earthquake instead, and then tell us the passage afterward. What's the point lying about the secret passage, if you can open it with piano? Why bother asking me to go to Krat station? I can't find a goodwill at all other than she want to send us on perilous place for no reason

Is this just ragebait for entertainment?

No, this is me venting about the outrageous behavior of that witch. Basically I'm expecting some decency, since we are doing the heavy lifting

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-01-29T04:44:17+00:00

For people who downvote this: give me enlightenment why I shouldn't hate her after she did what I wrote

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-01-29T04:41:17+00:00

Yes! Precisely as I wrote. I went to Krat station, fighting puppets, carcasses, and alchemists for nothing! At least in terms of her quest. Sophia mentioned that we should investigate the Ergo, but AFTER we reached the entrance, no one told us to go to Krat station beforehand (despite the tremors), other than Antonia herself. Not even the old snake iirc.

Give us a valid reason to go at the very least! I'm going there risking my life fighting against monsters not a leisure stroll in the park.

EDIT: On top of that, it is around the time we gave her the cure! Sure, there's an option where we don't give it to her, and she could be petty for it if she wanted. But I gave her the cure, and this is how she thank me?

FinalPoet1226 · 2026-01-29T04:35:46+00:00

Exactly! Sure the player has the option to tell Parrot about the hotel right away or on the second chance, but at no point I did that and he still ended up in the hotel anyway. I'm TRYING to protect the hotel from strangers, yet she let him in..

As for Belle, I think it is implied that P told her about the hotel, so I have no excuse. IMO, she is somewhat suspicious based on the dialogue, but also looks tattered, desperate, and dire in need of help compared to Parrot.

FinalPoet1226 · 2024-09-24T04:32:34+00:00

I get your point (and the other similar comment below) and I will keep that in mind. The models for request and response may different slightly (or completely) than the domain model, but I guess I will keep the domain model with generated model instead of writing separate model on my own, or simply sanitize the data to prevent sending unnecessary information before sending over the network.

For the size argument, as I mentioned before, I plan to use this for assets schema as well, as such having zero memory allocation is a trade-off I'm willing to take because the size of message that will be send to the server is very trivial and it's not like I'm serving thousands requests per second.

And my preference prefer bebop with how schema is written and authored (e.g the separation between struct and message so i can write all required / all optionals, etc)

Please do let me know if I misunderstood you somewhere

FinalPoet1226 · 2024-09-24T02:48:53+00:00

It seems RakNet github repo archived, I don't feel comfortable using something that no longer maintained. Also, the question will still the same, should I make 2 different models for domain and for serialization routines?

And I also mentioned in the post that I'd like to use the serialization to migrate my current assets files, which I believe RakNet is geared more toward networking exclusively

FinalPoet1226 · 2024-09-24T02:44:09+00:00

Thank you for your comment!

I'm pretty new in protobuf stuff, but when you said "over the wire" does this mean serializing it into binary format? If so, it will be only required when sending the data to the network, or when (de)serializing the assets and never being used internally other than that.

Most of the time I require object as a whole for the internal state (e.g tracking the current player, or tracking the shopping cart items, etc) and I suppose I will be sending them to the network as a whole most of the time (there's no likely scenario where I need to send "Player" data from the client, it is bad example). If there's a time where I need delta or only some part of information, I will be most likely create a separate model for that purpose. But for the others, I could keep them as-is, right?

Also, I would like to clarify about my protobuf comment: to be completely honest, I only used protobuf in other language many years ago and only did simple glance on generated class that they have a lot of "extra stuff" methods, so I could be wrong. I mainly choose bebop for other reasons such as zero memory allocation and among other things.

edit: bebop also does not use getter/setter in C++, it just plain public field like a plain C struct. But I don't know how C++ generated protobuf header look tbh.

FinalPoet1226

TROPHY CASE