Roblox Copyright and trademark infringement

For the user named Copyright, see Community:Copyright.

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

Pokémon Brick Bronze, a game taken down by Nintendo.

On October 16, 2016, taymaster 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 Dogon. The developers of the game later stated that owner Dogon was warned by Roblox for the copyright infringement^{⁠[citation needed]}. 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 KnightGaladeld announced on the DevForum in 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.

Lamborghini Copyright

On September 30, 2022, an unknown user with a game named "Lamborghini Miami" got removed because the copyright owner Automobili Lamborghini S.p.A. sent a notification to Roblox that contained copyright materials owned by someone else and the user got a DMCA strike.

That didn't just affected the user, but all game developers were forced to remove all models related to Lamborghini in their games (such as Greenville, Driving Empire, etc.)

Viacom Content

Terror in Bikini Bottom, a parody of SpongeBob taken down by Viacom/Paramount

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Spongy Construction Project, a popular SpongeBob fan-game taken down by Viacom/Paramount.

Viacom, later known as ViacomCBS and now Paramount Global is the parent company of Nickelodeon. They are infamous for their abuse of copyright law, including a failed attempt to sue YouTube for hosting copyrighted content in 2007 in which they went on to lose the case in court. They are known to abuse DMCA take down notices, including filing one against the official trailer for the game The Last of Us, which they do not own the copyright to.

On Roblox, Viacom/Paramount have taken action to strike down numerous games that reference Nickelodeon content, by far the most popular of which being SpongeBob-themed games.

This extends not only to general fan games that use SpongeBob characters without Viacom's permission, but even games that parody SpongeBob, such as Terror in Bikini Bottom, Survival The SpongeBob the killer, and Sponge. This is in spite of the fact that parody is explicitly protected under US Copyright Law, and has been ruled by the Supreme Court to be protected as Free Speech under US Constitutional Law.

Another notable SpongeBob SquarePants fan-game that was taken down by Viacom is SpongeBob SquarePants: The Spongy Construction Project by spongeis5 which got millions of visits and got taken down on June 24, 2022, during the first release, June 29, 2023, during the second release, and October 20, 2023, during the third release.

Gamefam Studios also partnered with Paramount/Viacom in February 2023 to develop SpongeBob Simulator and TMNT: Battle Tycoon.

Viacom also has its own experience, Nickverse which is made by Paramount Game Studios, a division of Paramount. However, Nickverse was shut down on October 4, 2023.

Minecraft

Creeper CHAOS, a game taken down by Mojang

Mojang, the creators of Minecraft, have had to strike down several Roblox games that directly copy Minecraft. For instance, the game literally minecraft pog 2, as the name might imply, was simply Minecraft ported into Roblox. Another notable game taken down by Mojang was Creeper CHAOS, which featured Creeper enemies from Minecraft; The game's creator had to release a new version called "Creature CHAOS" in which the creepers had to be replaced with "creatures."

Multiple Roblox games have also directly copied ideas from Minecraft servers and minigame creators, such as BedWars and Bed Wars! (also known as Spawn Wars or Bed Wars 2) which are directly copied from the game BedWars from the Minecraft server Hypixel. Instead of simply being inspired by or similar to the minigames they are based on, these games recreate a huge number of features with identical functionality, and refuse to give any credit to the original creators whose ideas they've taken, while engaging in hyper-monetization. The smaller creators of these gamemodes rarely have the time or funds to pursue copyright claims against copies (or in some cases, don't mind if people copy their ideas), and as such, they are able to stay up.

The game Skyblock, taken from another Minecraft minigame, was shutdown. A more original version with less similarity to avoid another copyright claim, called "Islands," was later released.

Official Roblox Items

Several official Roblox items have faced legal issues over copyright and/or trademark law, or have been removed or changed out of fear of these issues Among them are:

• Got Milk Visor
• Devo - Changed to "Impossible to Obtain Red Wedding Cake Hat"
• Roblox Death Sound
• LOLWUT - Changed to "LOLHOO"
• Catalog:Flintstones Car - Changed to the Catalog:Trophy of Participation 2016, even though this was part of an event that was sponsored by the copyright holders of the Flintstones