The law is a very strict thing and it differs depending on a country that wrote it. Even international law. Let's say the US - they had a law (it's under a big question mark after 9/11) that their secret agencies must not spy on american citisents (but were alowed to spy on foreigners). I'm sure that let's say in Germany there was a law protecting you from being spyed upon (even by american agents).
So the law is many times very uncertain and aplicable only to the countries that have that law. But the basic idea is similar everywhere.
Laws themselves are made to prevent people to hurt each other and enabeling them to live in peaceful co-existence.
And now to make a few arguments:
1
-Piracy is causing companies to lose money so it's prohibited because of the thet of their intelectual property!
-A company is only making money its intelectual property if it's selling it.
-Once a company stops selling a product they are not making any profit of it.
-Abandonware games are not sold by their owners any more - so we're not hurting anyone - hence it's not piracy.
2
-Taxes are collected based on the income.
-Piracy is also prohibited because a pirate is gaining money by selling illeagal goods.
-Abandonware is for free - we are not a profitable organisation - so we're not doing any piracy!
3
-Intelectual property is a very importaint thing. It means that the person who created something has the right to it.
-Breaking the intelectual property would be making new games based on the charactored that are a trademark (if someone would let's say make a sequel to Sam'n'Max).
-Also it would go against respecting the intelectual property if we'd not give the necesary credit to the people who made the game (let's say we'd erase the credits and no-one would see who made the game) - or would claim we made it ourselves.
-Abandonia isn't doing any of this - so we're not doing anything illegal.
Abandonware is not illegal - at least not by the general laws - unless someone abuses the points I made above. Offcourse we will respect the wishes of companies if they say we should take some games off line - and we'll be on the lookout for any law changes. If a new law comes - maybe we'll have to shut down - or maybe we'll be given an award for doing an excelent service (but the time still hasn't come).
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