Roblox Copyright and trademark infringement

"The Congress shall have Power…To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Tımes to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

- United States Constitution, Article 1, Section 8

Copyright is the protection of creative works and intellectual properties from duplication. Trademark allows intellectual property to be identified through a recognizable sign, design, or phrase, such as the Nike logo. Intellectual property can include things such as music, logos, movies, plays, buildings, and books. Using copyrighted items without permission can lead to punishments including fines, jail time, and the removal of said assets.

Copyright, Trademark and associated rules for Roblox are discussed thoroughly within its Terms of Service. By creating an account, users agree to follow said rules and will be held liable for any copyright infringement that occurs. The player also allows Roblox to use any user-generated-content to the platform's liking. Roblox's Intellectual Property policies follow good-faith from the player, which means that the assets in violation are removed and the player warned. Players are not terminated unless there are repeated or severe copyright infringements.

Notable Examples
Since Roblox is a build-to-create website where anyone can create anything, some people will create assets on Roblox that use the copyrighted material. Since such fan games usually fall under fair use, they are usually not dealt with. However, there have been cases of games being taken down by copyright infringement or being forced to rebrand the game to something non-copyrighted, usually if the game makes revenue.

Nintendo Copyrights
On October 16, 2016, tweeted that “ROBLOX Pokemon Go will soon be gone”. The tweet contains an attached image of him emailing Nintendo's copyright infringement email with links to Roblox games that were profiting off the Pokémon trademark. It is presumed this email led to multiple Pokémon games being removed from Roblox in subsequent years, including Pokémon Universe, Pokémon Arena X, Pokémon Reborn RPG, and  Pokémon Brick Bronze.

Similarly, Roblox removed multiple games containing content from Nintendo's Super Mario on August 14, 2018, including Paper Mario Roleplay by. The developers of the game later stated that owner was warned by Roblox for the copyright infringement. Mario Kart:Roblox Dash was deleted a year later. After these games were removed, Roblox censored both Pokémon and Mario from any game names or username, but these words are not filtered in the chat.

Audio
One of the biggest areas of copyright infringement were found within Roblox's audio feature. When the Audio feature was first introduced, users were able to upload up to 15 seconds of audio at a time; players were able to capture snippets of copyrighted music and play it on Roblox. When the length was increased to 6 minutes, players were able to upload full-length but copyrighted music.

Developer Relations staff announced on the Devforms May 31, 2018, significant changes to Roblox's audio system and copyright concerns. As well as Roblox reaching an agreement with APM Music to allow their licensed music into Roblox, an automated system to flag copyrighted music was announced to be released on June 18. Audio that's flagged would be automatically replaced by a licensed track approved by Roblox. This behavior was later changed to flagged audios being completely silent.