Why was Beastie removed?

[Julius]

STK is in several Linux distribution repositories which do not allow content under such license conditions, for example Debian.

I believe these models are still available as extensions can can be downloaded manually after installing STK.

[eltomito]

I'm sorry for your loss, man. I feel with you. I was crushed when Wilber got made into a light car, i.e. undriveable.
But shut the f+ck up, dude! Do you want Hexley to go the way of the Dodo and Beastie or what?

[Alayan]

I would personally happily have Beastie back.

Although it is annoying when distros alter the game because it doesn't fit their purist restrictions.

[drummyfish]

Hello,

I am responsible for cancelling some mascots in STK, I don't rememer which they were anymore, but the issue was this:

Yes, the author gave permission to use the character in the game but this alone isn't enough to have the mascot included in something that's to be distributed under a free license. A free license has to allow doing anything with the game AND everything in it, it has to allow you to take anything out of the game, modify it, sell it on its own etc., which the author's permission doesn't include (I even asked him personally through email, it was confirmed the permission was only for STK) -- the author only gave permission to use it in this one game specifically. It's similar to how you can legally download and maybe even share a freeware game, there is nothing illegal about it, but that's not enough to call it free as in freedom and put it to Debian repos etc. Fair use, exclusive permissions and things like this don't work in the free world -- though some like to break it (e.g. Wikipedia) and though many libre games are killed like this (e.g. Neverball by including GitHub's proprietary Octocat), it is still so. If you don't want it this way, cancel copyright.

I presented this issue to Debian package maintainers and they agreed with me, they said they would keep the game in the repositories because the mascots would be removed. If the mascots weren't removed, they would have to remove the game from repositories that only allow 100% libre games, such as those of Debian or libregamewiki.

Thank the authors of the mascots for making trouble, or alternatively cancel copyright as a definitive solution to this issues.

If there are more mascots like this, they have to be nuked too.

[Julius]

The compromise was to have them easily available as an add-on. Thus you can't really call this a removal. Just install them as you like.

Debian's view is not "puritanical" but a necessary requirement of how copyright works. They have no choice but to remove STK from their core repository if it includes non-libre assets.

[Julius]

STK currently includes non-libre assets.

Such as?

[Alayan]

Another example is the Blender logo on Suzanne's kart. Nobody has been trying to remove it yet, but the same line of argumentation can be made.

In the end, it is about whether it's better for the game to have assets that all completely abide by free licenses, and be included (unchanged) in places enforcing such limitations, or if it's nicer to have Beastie.

The Beastie license means that If someone made some kind of objectionable STK derivative with content that could be construed as of bad taste, or wanted to reuse the kart model in that sort of way, then it wouldn't be possible while abiding by the licensing terms. But removing Beastie from STK just means that STK can't have it either, it doesn't really help this hypothetical derivative. So the reasoning has to go into hypotheticals such as "what if all the STK assets were licensed under similar terms" and how it makes modifying and sharing difficult or impossible.

Any derivative of STK could easily remove Beastie if needed without affecting core functionality, and the license isn't tied to STK as a project or an organization, any derivative could keep using Beastie as long as it abides by the same (limited) restrictions. That's not something I find concerning.

Licensing of arts and assets and of code have vastly different implications.