Do you think it's necessary for BIS providing lockable binPBO?

[Baff1 0]

It's not the likeness we're contesting but the data and the expressive component that goes into creating it. If I write a program that describes a simulation of two galaxies colliding, I don't imply any claim to own any galaxies or the concept of galaxy collision.

If you write a program that describes a simulation of two galaxies colliding, you only own the IP to it, if it is your original work, and not a reproduction of someone elses.

The design of a car or an aeroplane is art. It can be copywrighted. So in the case of an ArmA model for example, the config is your IP, but the model's shape and outward apprearance is not.

@ Carl

Intellectual property extends well beyond a trademarked name.

If you make a guy who looks exactly like Spiderman and call him Webboman, Marvel will still shut you down. It's not just his name they have protected. It's his image.

When you model an MP5 and call it an MN5, it's still not your original creation. It was created by someone else and you just copied it.

So the guns in Crisis are not only not called "AK-47" but they look a little different to them too. Perhaps...about 10%.

Doing so just avoids the whole issue completely.

(Although it doesn't attract the realism heads in quite the same way).

The Mona Lisa is beyond the 50 year statuatory copywright limit. It's too old to have any form of copywright whatsoever.

(I'm not sure if the limit is still 50 years.. I know all the old duffers have been pushing to get it moved up to 75 these days).

Edited November 1, 2010 by Baff1

[dmarkwick 261]

It's not the likeness we're contesting but the data and the expressive component that goes into creating it. If I write a program that describes a simulation of two galaxies colliding, I don't imply any claim to own any galaxies or the concept of galaxy collision.

That's because a galaxy isn't subject to copyright. If you wrote a simulation of two Ford cars colliding and tried to sell it, you might come unstuck. Although a few pages back I was sort of coming around to the notion that models were different in some way in the whole creative process, I have changed my mind now. As marvelous as some modelmakers are, they are copying existing designs in the final analysis. So in my mind, no encryption at all is the best way, IMHO :)

It's the openness of the community and the addons that encouraged me to start modding in the first place, and encryption would merely become a huge barrier to new talent. Model theft is not an ArmA2 problem, it's a larger problem, and I wouldn't like to see the community gradually fold up under the notion that "original" work must be protected.

[max power 21]

That's because a galaxy isn't subject to copyright. If you wrote a simulation of two Ford cars colliding and tried to sell it, you might come unstuck. Although a few pages back I was sort of coming around to the notion that models were different in some way in the whole creative process, I have changed my mind now. As marvelous as some modelmakers are, they are copying existing designs in the final analysis. So in my mind, no encryption at all is the best way, IMHO :)

It's the openness of the community and the addons that encouraged me to start modding in the first place, and encryption would merely become a huge barrier to new talent. Model theft is not an ArmA2 problem, it's a larger problem, and I wouldn't like to see the community gradually fold up under the notion that "original" work must be protected.

Right, but it's not the design that we're trying to protect. There are certain active defenses and other legislation designed to limit the power of copyrights. Like I said earlier, I don't think that creating a model or sculpture of something else that exists is necessarily copyright infringement, but creating derivative works from the data of others is. If it was otherwise, BIS couldn't defend their work.

[Baff1 0]

This is civil law, so it takes more than acting illegally to get into trouble over it, someone has to find out and come after you.

The real limitiation to the power of copywright is that it is not a crime. It is a civil offence. Someone must take you to court and that costs time, money and effort and if you are some small fry game modder, you can't afford to cover the court costs even if they win easily.

So they never will.

As far as I'm concerned none of these concerns has any place in an amateur community. Mods should exist under the radar of this sort of thing.

Edited November 1, 2010 by Baff1

[max power 21]

Clearly if you modelled Henry Moore sculptures, he might get upset about it. Esepcially if you started mass producing and selling them. Sculptures are in every way copywrightable.

It's only copywright infringement if the model or sculpture has been copywrighted. If someone has attempted to protect it.

Also this is civil law, so it takes more than acting illegally to get into trouble over it, someone has to find out and come after you.

But as long as you copied it, it can never be your IP. You can't copywright it, or if you try your attempt to so so can be contested.

As far as I'm concerned none of these concerns has any place in an amateur community. Mods should exist under the radar of this sort of thing.

Now we are getting to some intelligent discourse! Thanks very much Baff1 for transcending the previous 20 pages of nonsense.

I think you can copyright transformative works. For instance, I think you can copyright and sell a parody. Taking the design of a real world object, designed for aesthetic and saleable reasons, and transforming it into a 3d object for simulation and entertainment reasons I think is enough.

[Baff1 0]

All I can tell you is that many people have been successfully prosecuted for copywright infringement for doing exactly that.

3D models of cars on poster adverts... 3D models of cars in video games. All examples of being successfully sued for breach of copywright by car manufacturers.

I still don't think it's something your average gamer should worry about. More in the realm of company execs.

Edited November 1, 2010 by Baff1

[max power 21]

All I can tell you is that many people have been successfully prosecuted for copywright infringement for doing exactly that.

You have to change the design, reproducing it in a different format is still just reproducing it.

Making 3d model of a truck isn't reproducing a truck. There is no truck in the computer.

Please link me to the appropriate laws and / or cases. From where I'm standing, it seems like it falls under fair use.

[Baff1 0]

recent opinion from the District of Utah, Meshwerks, Inc. v. Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A., Inc, 2006 WL 2623935 (D. Utah Sept. 13, 2006), may be an example of how an overemphasis on technology can blind courts to a more fundamental issue, in this case the nature of originality. I have excerpted below the relevant parts of the court's opinion, so I won't repeat them here. In essence, plaintiff was hired to make computerized, animated 3D models of several Toyota cars for an ad campaign. A dispute broke out, plaintiff sued for infringement, defendants claimed the models weren't protectible, court held for plaintiff.

http://williampatry.blogspot.com/2006/10/not-model-decision.html

"The US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit has affirmed (PDF) a ruling that a plain, unadorned wireframe model of a Toyota vehicle is not a creative expression protected under copyright law. The court analogized the wire-frame models to photographs: the owner of an object does not have a copyright in all images of the object, but a photographer may have a limited copyright over a particular image based on artistic choices such as costumery, lighting, posing, etc. Thus, the modelers could only copyright any 'incremental contribution' they made to Toyota's vehicles; in the case of plain models, there was nothing new to protect. This could be a two-edged sword — companies that produce goods may not be able to stop modelers from imaging those products, but modelers may not be able to prevent others from copying their work."

There's one.

I'm not willing to trawl google endlessly for these things but if I can pluck another out quickly I will.

Here's a related one about Turbosquid...not a court case..

In recent months, 3D model repositories such as TurboSquid have been served with DMCA takedown requests for 3D models of a variety of commercial and military vehicles based on trademark infringement for the vehicle names. This came to a head near the end of March when Lockheed Martin issued a takedown order for models of a B-24 bomber modeled by John MacNeill. TurboSquid complied, but now the Electronic Freedom Foundation has stepped up in MacNeill’s defense, issuing an open letter to Lockheed’s licensing agency in an effort to get his models back up.

http://www.blendernation.com/2008/04/30/eff-goes-to-aid-3d-modelers/

Edited November 1, 2010 by Baff1

[Sekra 10]

Argument:

"The community has always been allowed to edit other peoples addons."

Fact:

It is currently tolerated to look at other peoples work, not edit it. But every now and then something pops up where it has not been just looking. Just because something has been tolerated or allowed in the past doesn't make it any more acceptable. Humanity has smoked pot for thousands of years, is it legal now? White people used to haul people from africa to work as slaves, was that ever morally right or legal now? (Sorry I couldn't think anything about Hitler this quickly.. :rolleyes: But at least your counter arguments now have something to cling to.) And clearly people even in this thread admit that they edit and distribute (please take special note of the word AND. According to logical operations my argument is valid only if BOTH booleans are true) other peoples addons without permission for their own events and clans.

Argument:

"BIS shouldn't spend time, money or effort to develop this kind of system."

Fact:

They don't have to since it already exists and is being used with the already released BAF DLC and will be used on other upcoming DLC's aswell. The only question is about allowing the community to use this locking too. Also you did notice that BIS bought 3 other studios just a few months ago? That really sounds like a company that is going through economic hardship.

Argument:

"If you lock the pbos someone will just make a pbo unlocker so why even bother."

Fact:

This is probably the case. But the difference to anything that has been done before is that the only reason to lock a pbo would be to protect the content from unauthorized use, ie. DRM. Binarisation is meant to be a system to enhance the performance of the addon ingame and while it did provide some sort of protection for models until the 2-click ripping tools came out, protection was not its main purpose and in that respect would not be a rock solid ground for a law suit for example. Releasing a pbo unlocker publicly would effectively be a tool to circumvent DRM and a valid ground for a law suit for any such person distributing such software.

Argument:

"The Arma 1 MLOD's don't show you how to do everything and thus we need to be able to poke around user made content."

Fact:

Well you already have hundreds if not thousands of addons to poke around and learn from them. Giving the option of locking future addons does not magically make all the released addons disappear. Although it does escape me how you would learn to make a Scud launcher addon by editing the RKSL Typhoon for example but I guess it could happen too.

Argument:

"Modding should only be a fun project."

Fact:

For some people doing stuff seriously is fun (I for one and its my right to do so if I so choose).

Argument:

"You only have rights to your work if you sell it." or "Anything that is released for free can be freely modified by anyone any way they want."

Fact:

Wait, what?!?

Argument:

"I release all my addons with all my sources freely available to everyone and locking the pbo's would kill the modding scene."

Fact:

Giving the community the option to lock their stuff doesn't force you to do so. You still can freely continue to release everything the way it was.

Argument:

"Locking PBO's wont allow me to 'tinker' anymore."

Fact:

It is the right of the addon maker to choose if he wants to allow even tinkering or not. He could easily just pack the models as one locked pbo and the configs and scripts as one unlocked pbo.

And now I will end this post with a small story!

Once upon a specific coordinate in the fourth dimension, person A. created a script for an awesome game called fArma. It was a very good yet simple script that was included in a mission he had made for that game. Person B. was also making a similar type of mission and played the mission that person A. had made and found that the script was almost perfect for his mission too. Almost. Person B. tinkered and edited the script to suit his mission better and never included any credits for the original author of the script. For any number of reasons person A. never played the mission made by person B. Then comes along person C. who is making yet another mission of the same type (of come on! how many times do we have to blow up those Tunguskas in different places!) and this person (C.) only played the mission made by person B. Person B. being a great fan of sharing information freely on the internet provided a license in his mission to allow anyone to use any of his scripts freely and modified even without credits. Well, person C. being an honorable person decides to still include credits for "Ãœberscript originally made by person B.". A friend of person A. plays the mission made by person C. and recognizes the script and looks in the credits, informs person A. about this, person A. gets mad, calls person B. a liar and a thief publicly on the forums, a flame war starts, everyone gets angry and get banned and no one lives happily ever after. THE END.

This short story is © 2010 by Sekra. All characters, games and scripts appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, games or scripts, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

[dmarkwick 261]

See, part of the problem is that some people don't understand what a fact is. We can all make up little stories that support our view, I doubt that fictitious scenario has convinced anyone. Tinkering and adjusting, then releasing without credit, is clearly wrong. Don't try to lump all actions together without any attempt at context.

Edited November 1, 2010 by DMarkwick

[soul_assassin 1723]

See, part of the problem is that some people don't understand what a fact is. We can all make up little stories that support our view, I doubt that fictitious scenario has convinced anyone. Tinkering and adjusting, then releasing without credit, is clearly wrong. Don't try to lump all actions together without any attempt at context.

really cant think of a story where the community dies after I lock my work :s I can however imagine one where community dies after all the addon makers ciese to release stuff out of fear of theft.

[xxbbcc 6]

Not long Maruk suggested to take a closer look on licenses:

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=105256

So I actually took the time to go through this thread. It's kinda hilarious how the people in this thread keep saying "All the examples/references one could need were already provided by BIS, no need to look at user-made pbo-s." These very same people in the above thread complain about such material not being available/complete/useful.

Let me see if I can find the right word for that...

I love the hypocrisy of the people against having locakable pbo's:

I didn't specifically write names but I can if someone really thinks it's necessary.

The only thing this proves to me is this very same group of people continued to enjoy the benefits of content being available for review from other users (with or without permission) but now they - for their own selfish reasons - wish to lock down the content from everyone else.

Now, to give a bit of context, I'm a software engineer for 15 years now and I made some pretty complicated software in the past. I can tell that the docs on the BIKI are... lacking. I can see no one learning to create missions/mods only from those docs - especially, since I know how those docs used to be - nowadays they're hundred times better from how they used to be.

I know I had to look through missions made by others to understand how things work in Arma - I used missions and sometimes even mods from all over the place, always from people whose work I highly regarded.

I have a very hard time believing that someone could've learned this material strictly from that documentation when it wasn't even as good as it is now.

I really don't care if models get encrypted, since I hardly ever download new models to begin with - me and my group only ever play missions that don't require any addons beyond a specific island, a few extra weapons, Arma 1 SF and the Tier 1 ops.

I'm very much against locking entire .pbo-s since that basically makes accessing config/script code impossible. All I see the locking would do is generating a massive amount of PM-s for the source files when someone wants to tinker with something and in my experience in the past, such requests are simply ignored.

I'd also like to know what the solution would be to people leaving the community with addons widely used. A locked addon couldn't be maintained anymore - CAA1, NWD, and a bunch of others are prime examples of this issue.

[dmarkwick 261]

really cant think of a story where the community dies after I lock my work :s I can however imagine one where community dies after all the addon makers ciese to release stuff out of fear of theft.

Then you're choosing to imagine a scenario that exists right now - only everyone has long left. Only it hasn't happened. However the example of dozens of games that do lock their content and has no modding community outside a few experienced programmers means nothing?

[nuxil 2]

I'd also like to know what the solution would be to people leaving the community with addons widely used. A locked addon couldn't be maintained anymore - CAA1, NWD, and a bunch of others are prime examples of this issue.

A verry good point to not lock the pbos

[soul_assassin 1723]

A verry good point to not lock the pbos

yes. so dont lock it. why cant i have the choice to lock mine if the need arises?

[gossamersolid 155]

yes. so dont lock it. why cant i have the choice to lock mine if the need arises?

What need would that be? We've been over the same argument over and over and over again in this thread. People are just reposting what they said 10 pages ago.

IF YOU POST IT ONLINE, THERE IS A CHANCE IT WILL BE STOLEN. IF YOU DON'T WANT TO TAKE THAT CHANCE, DO NOT RELEASE IT!

If it's THAT important to you, use it with your community and don't publicly post it.

[dayglow 2]

Argument:

"The community has always been allowed to edit other peoples addons."

Fact:

It is currently tolerated to look at other peoples work, not edit it. But every now and then something pops up where it has not been just looking. Just because something has been tolerated or allowed in the past doesn't make it any more acceptable. Humanity has smoked pot for thousands of years, is it legal now? White people used to haul people from africa to work as slaves, was that ever morally right or legal now? (Sorry I couldn't think anything about Hitler this quickly.. :rolleyes: But at least your counter arguments now have something to cling to.) And clearly people even in this thread admit that they edit and distribute (please take special note of the word AND. According to logical operations my argument is valid only if BOTH booleans are true) other peoples addons without permission for their own events and clans.

Argument:

"BIS shouldn't spend time, money or effort to develop this kind of system."

Fact:

They don't have to since it already exists and is being used with the already released BAF DLC and will be used on other upcoming DLC's aswell. The only question is about allowing the community to use this locking too. Also you did notice that BIS bought 3 other studios just a few months ago? That really sounds like a company that is going through economic hardship.

Argument:

"If you lock the pbos someone will just make a pbo unlocker so why even bother."

Fact:

This is probably the case. But the difference to anything that has been done before is that the only reason to lock a pbo would be to protect the content from unauthorized use, ie. DRM. Binarisation is meant to be a system to enhance the performance of the addon ingame and while it did provide some sort of protection for models until the 2-click ripping tools came out, protection was not its main purpose and in that respect would not be a rock solid ground for a law suit for example. Releasing a pbo unlocker publicly would effectively be a tool to circumvent DRM and a valid ground for a law suit for any such person distributing such software.

Argument:

"The Arma 1 MLOD's don't show you how to do everything and thus we need to be able to poke around user made content."

Fact:

Well you already have hundreds if not thousands of addons to poke around and learn from them. Giving the option of locking future addons does not magically make all the released addons disappear. Although it does escape me how you would learn to make a Scud launcher addon by editing the RKSL Typhoon for example but I guess it could happen too.

Argument:

"Modding should only be a fun project."

Fact:

For some people doing stuff seriously is fun (I for one and its my right to do so if I so choose).

Argument:

"You only have rights to your work if you sell it." or "Anything that is released for free can be freely modified by anyone any way they want."

Fact:

Wait, what?!?

Argument:

"I release all my addons with all my sources freely available to everyone and locking the pbo's would kill the modding scene."

Fact:

Giving the community the option to lock their stuff doesn't force you to do so. You still can freely continue to release everything the way it was.

Argument:

"Locking PBO's wont allow me to 'tinker' anymore."

Fact:

It is the right of the addon maker to choose if he wants to allow even tinkering or not. He could easily just pack the models as one locked pbo and the configs and scripts as one unlocked pbo.

And now I will end this post with a small story!

Once upon a specific coordinate in the fourth dimension, person A. created a script for an awesome game called fArma. It was a very good yet simple script that was included in a mission he had made for that game. Person B. was also making a similar type of mission and played the mission that person A. had made and found that the script was almost perfect for his mission too. Almost. Person B. tinkered and edited the script to suit his mission better and never included any credits for the original author of the script. For any number of reasons person A. never played the mission made by person B. Then comes along person C. who is making yet another mission of the same type (of come on! how many times do we have to blow up those Tunguskas in different places!) and this person (C.) only played the mission made by person B. Person B. being a great fan of sharing information freely on the internet provided a license in his mission to allow anyone to use any of his scripts freely and modified even without credits. Well, person C. being an honorable person decides to still include credits for "Ãœberscript originally made by person B.". A friend of person A. plays the mission made by person C. and recognizes the script and looks in the credits, informs person A. about this, person A. gets mad, calls person B. a liar and a thief publicly on the forums, a flame war starts, everyone gets angry and get banned and no one lives happily ever after. THE END.

This short story is © 2010 by Sekra. All characters, games and scripts appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, games or scripts, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Well then person A seriously needs to get the stick out of his ass and stop being a cry-baby whiner.

I mean, seriously, is this what it's all about? Wow. Some people need to let go.

Back in 2003 I created an AI suggestion thread where I said suppression should effect the AI. I've yet to receive credit for that idea as it works now in ArmA2. I demand attention for my brilliant idea

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=26337

Edited November 1, 2010 by DayGlow

[nuxil 2]

@ Soul_Assassin why should you?

surly you have only good intentions. but how can we be sure you havent included and voilated someone elses code that was cc by-nc-nd

it lets you hide your theft behind a encryption.

Edited November 1, 2010 by nuxil

[Sekra 10]

I have to hand it to you guys.. 25 pages and the first proper reason for not locking pbo's by nuxil at post #243... It have to admit that it would make unauthorized usage of scipts hard to verify. But wait.. if the original author of the script who doesn't want his scripts to be used anywhere else had the option of locking the pbo, the person could not even obtain the script.

And how many times does the point that the locking of PBO's (maybe even just addons in using BinPBO to pack stuff?) would be OPTIONAL. If you don't want to use it on your mission, addon or whatever you don't have to!!! How hard is this fact to grasp, O-P-T-I-O-N-A-L?? You can if you want to, but don't have to! And if you still don't understand it you can read more at: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/optional

Argument:

"If you release it you take the chance that it will get stolen"

Fact:

I own a car. By owning it I take the chance that it will get stolen. Now the possibility of my car getting stolen or anything inside it increases dramatically if I leave the doors unlocked. Plus my insurance company would not compensate anything I lost if the door were left unlocked. (Hey its the famous "you wouldn't steal a car would you" argument!)

Edited November 1, 2010 by Sekra

[nuxil 2]

@Sekra

Locking the the pbo will not solve the problems with models getting stolen. i guess less models will be stolen until a decrypter arrives.

but Locking a pbo just adds another problem to this situation.. so now we have 2 problems instead of 1.

example-. i release a script pack for mission makers. where i use licenses simelar to the one above.

now if i make my script pack as a addon. it means people neeed to download it. and some mission maker do not want to rely on some addon pack for there mission. they purly want to have there scripts in the mission. so i dont do that

So now PlayerX plays this fine mission with all its script functionalitys. and is thinking, hey that function was a nice thing, i should add that to my model.

he goes to warp up his model with the encryption. and releases it to the public.

then i see this fine new model on armaholic and i download it. to see that wtf, that thing is mine. i scripted that function,

i contact PlayerX and he refuses to addmit he stole my work nor will he share the code so i can proof its mine... i hope you see the dilemma

Edited November 1, 2010 by nuxil

[ffur2007slx2_5 11]

What need would that be? We've been over the same argument over and over and over again in this thread. People are just reposting what they said 10 pages ago.

IF YOU POST IT ONLINE, THERE IS A CHANCE IT WILL BE STOLEN. IF YOU DON'T WANT TO TAKE THAT CHANCE, DO NOT RELEASE IT!

If it's THAT important to you, use it with your community and don't publicly post it.

Okay, if you only want low quality addons not the high quality addons made by RHS you can say like that!

---------- Post added at 06:30 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:20 AM ----------

@Sekra

Locking the the pbo will not solve the problems with models getting stolen. i guess less models will be stolen until a decrypter arrives.

You're right that whatever what kinda of protections we've made will still be defensiveless if someone who still wanna to steal it. But that 1% of bad eggs are just enough and it'll be too late until more and more people thinks coppying others' IPRs is such a simple thing!

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Just back for a quickie... :p

the first proper reason for not locking pbo's by nuxil at post #243...

#13 was the first place I saw it. And was mentioned again and again (#17), including my myself (#55).

This is part of post #5:

I know there are people on these boards who refuse to allow "their" work into the outside world, but they're a small and insignificant element.

DMarkwick, nuxil, 5133p39 and myself (sorry if I left anyone out) has been the nay sayers throughout this thread. Others have come and gone, but they have been quite numerous. On the yay sayer side, I get the feeling it's only the same people over and over again. Both sides using the same arguments over and over again.

The ONLY benefit seems to be to reduce theft, which in most cases (excluding models) actually wouldn't even be theft (after originality and scope is considered - you can't own knowledge). Disputes may occur from time to time, but I'd rather have an external party make those decisions (read: Moderators and crew of Armaholic and similar sites, that deals with public spread of such material) rather than a pbo switch that prevents that sharing of knowledge.

However, there are countless and utterly serious problems, that has been mentioned again and again, claimed by the nay sayers, that for the most part is simply ignored. And as often stated - it works both ways. You can prevent theft. And you can hide the fact that it's not your own work. But it's only the first that seems to matter. Weird, huh? ;)

[noubernou 77]

Just release all your models under the BSD license... :p

Seriously though, model makers have to put in a lot more tedious work on their content, work that is not easily defined as their own (because its just model, it doesnt do anything really) compared to code which obviously has functional elements and syntax and quirks that reveal who made it if someone tries to rip it off.

If there was a way to lock down model content, encrypted p3d files, then it'd be fine with me. Locking down script is probably a bad idea because everyone I know in the game, including myself have depbo'd something to figure out how it works and to see what someone did to do x and y so that I can try and make z.

[5133p39 12]

If there was a way to lock down model content, encrypted p3d files, then it'd be fine with me. Locking down script is probably a bad idea because everyone I know in the game, including myself have depbo'd something to figure out how it works and to see what someone did to do x and y so that I can try and make z.

Exactly.

People here seems to forgot that this discussion is not about locking models, but it is about locking PBO files (models, sounds, but also scripts, missions, configs, EVERYTHING).

This is NOT about p3d models.

(but personaly, i am still saying NO to any locking at all)

[PuFu 4591]

Back in 2003 I created an AI suggestion thread where I said suppression should effect the AI. I've yet to receive credit for that idea as it works now in ArmA2. I demand attention for my brilliant idea

Oh lovely that one. I want credits myself for inventing the internet transactions, since i had a talk about those back in the day, over a pint, with my brother..

You should have created the fix yourself, then you would be credited, like every addon maker who's content is now in A2/OA.

@ Soul_Assassin why should you?

surly you have only good intentions. but how can we be sure you havent included and voilated someone elses code that was cc by-nc-nd

it lets you hide your theft behind a encryption.

surely you can't be talking serious.

Besides, are you actually unpacking all released addons and policing everyone around those boards?

Seems that almost everyone (minus a few like gnat, echo DW) who is against the OPTION to lock a pbo has never released something back for this community, and never intends to.

CG, although is saying that locking pbos is selfish, has only been a consumer, using parts of configs and scripts for his own mission, inside his own community. I feel dazzled about it. Same goes for nuxil.

For the sake of the argument, can you find a good reason NOT to have the OPTION?

If, as you are saying, only the ego-centric, and the so called elite of this community would be using, then where's the problem? By the looks of it, everyone else won't, so you won't be able to poke around the content of only a few members or groups around here(RHS, RKSL, CWR), where most are creating models anyway.