Seeing as the OP framed the question in terms of moral responsibility: Anyone who has not agreed to keep the leaked information secret has absolutely no moral duty to not discuss the leaked information. Anyone who has agreed to keep the leaked information secret has a moral duty to see through their agreement (unless a greater moral duty comes along of course).

I think you mean legal responsibility here, and the agreement would be an NDA of some sort.

The morality, whether good or bad, of spreading the information those people have leaked is a topic that is debatable and open to interpretation.

No, I definitely meant moral responsibility.

If Alice and Bob agree to keep a certain piece of news secret from the world, and Eve discovers said news, Eve has no moral responsibility to also keep it secret. In fact, it could be argued that if anyone is acting immoral, it is Alice if she then tries to smear Eve's reputation merely for discussing news that Alice would rather not be public.

So, if my wife had cancer and we were trying to keep it under wraps and a buddy of mine, Fred, found out somehow and blabbed to everyone under the sun, I would be wrong to be angry at Fred? I would be in the wrong for trying to keep the cancer a secret? Insanity. Fred is wrong in this situation.

For what it's worth, when I heard that FFG "might" have something good for us on September 4th, I was pumped. I'm sure that had I shown up midnight on the 4th, I would have bought the spoiled product. Now that I've seen virtually all the content inside. I'm not excited about it anymore. I probably won't buy it.

That's at least 1 box not sold because of the leaks. So to say the leaks had no affect is simply not true.

[Darth Chuck, you rock! I'm on your side here. Things are not as morally gray in this life as many people would lead you to believe they are.]

Ahhhh. The old "there is no right or wrong because everything is gray" argument. Sorry. I don't buy it. As societies have evolved throughout the world, most of them have agreed on simple core concepts like murder is wrong, taking the property of another is wrong, lying is wrong, and betraying the confidence of another is wrong. It just is.

This is not what he said. At all.

He did not say there was no right or wrong - what he said is that what is right, and what is wrong, are open to interpretation. Even within the "simple core concepts" you claim - is killing in war murder? Is eminent domain immoral? Lying to save another? Betraying the confidence of a friend when they need help, or to stop them from hurting someone? Opinions on all these vary, and you come across as someone who read half of Kant one summer and went "There's the answer!"

And even within those absolutes you list, do any apply here? Those who have the info have taken no confidence from FFG, they have made no agreement with them. There was an error made - is an error immoral? Others were the beneficiaries of that error, and those people have no agreement with FFG, or Disney, or Target to limit their use of the product they fairly bought. Even copyright is questionable, as this could land rather solidly in fair use, and this sort of unboxing presentation is something FFG almost universally allows, even on their own site (see the Wave 7 leaks from GenCon).

So we have an agreement between two parties, one of whom made an error. Someone legally purchased something because of that error, and proceeded to do with it the same thing people have done with every other X-wing release they've gotten their hands on, which FFG has done nothing to stop. I'm having a hard time finding any legal issue which could apply to anyone other than maybe Target, and certainly nothing that even approaches a moral issue.

So, if my wife had cancer and we were trying to keep it under wraps and a buddy of mine, Fred, found out somehow and blabbed to everyone under the sun, I would be wrong to be angry at Fred? I would be in the wrong for trying to keep the cancer a secret? Insanity. Fred is wrong in this situation.

There is a difference between "right" and "moral". Fred should probably have kept it to himself as a courtesy to you, but he was under no moral obligation.

You might argue that under a utilitarian model of morality what he did might have been immoral, but that would depend on the benefit he got from spilling the beans compared to the harm you suffered from him doing so. From a utilitarian standpoint it's possible that Fred would even be morally right in this case - your refusal to acknowledge it publicly could have kept you from getting support that would have helped your wife. And your prideful refusal to admit her condition harmed her, making you morally wrong.

Morality's a complicated subject - which is why it's usually best to avoid slapping the term on something as stupidly trivial as a marketing street date.

Sure. But what if someone who's personally under an NDA is an administrator of a Facebook group, as the topic post seems to imply? If I'm under an NDA that says "don't talk about X", do I have an obligation to stop other people from talking about X in a semi-public space?

Depending on the purpose of the FB group, that individual may have a conflict of interest. You can certainly ask your community members to not post leaked information out of courtesy to the party with which you have the NDA but if you push moderation too hard you may alienate your community. I don't believe that you have any obligation to stop other from discussing it unless they are spreading information that you inadvertently leaked.

Of course you could have agreed to an NDA that does give you that contractual obligation.

Seeing as the OP framed the question in terms of moral responsibility: Anyone who has not agreed to keep the leaked information secret has absolutely no moral duty to not discuss the leaked information. Anyone who has agreed to keep the leaked information secret has a moral duty to see through their agreement (unless a greater moral duty comes along of course).

I think you mean legal responsibility here, and the agreement would be an NDA of some sort.

The morality, whether good or bad, of spreading the information those people have leaked is a topic that is debatable and open to interpretation.

No, I definitely meant moral responsibility.

If Alice and Bob agree to keep a certain piece of news secret from the world, and Eve discovers said news, Eve has no moral responsibility to also keep it secret. In fact, it could be argued that if anyone is acting immoral, it is Alice if she then tries to smear Eve's reputation merely for discussing news that Alice would rather not be public.

So, if my wife had cancer and we were trying to keep it under wraps and a buddy of mine, Fred, found out somehow and blabbed to everyone under the sun, I would be wrong to be angry at Fred? I would be in the wrong for trying to keep the cancer a secret? Insanity. Fred is wrong in this situation.

Well, think the most obvious insanity in your example is claiming that toy soldiers is a cancer. Still, if we ignore that for the moment, Fred isn't in the wrong for having spoken about something that he's not even agreed to keep secret in the first place. If he's been immoral about anything, it's for having done something to knowingly upset a close friend without good cause (assuming of course that he knew that he would be upsetting you and that he didn't have a good cause - you were a little sketchy on those details). Even then, that's relying on my own moral code that friends at very least try not to upset each other without good reason - I don't presume to think that everyone else on the planet should subscribe to my own moral code or else be branded immoral.

TLDR;

I think you're getting your moral infringements a little mixed up there.

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

Oy... I've been NDA'd on something that got leaked before it's time. Want to know what happened? A lot of pissed off customers and a very irritated upper commanding group. Want to know what's happening right now? Somebody is miffed upstairs, but really can't do much about it. Customers (players) are miffed because they don't have all the facts and can't get them until contractually this information can be released. Ease up.

There are reasons for such contracts to be put in place. Sometimes it's not the final product that gets released and then very bad things happen. In this case, it sounds as though they were nearly to the finish line before something out of FFG/Disney control ruined their surprise. I'd be annoyed too.

For those of us not NDA'd, yes we can discuss in our own groups... to do so on FFG's board comes with the knowledge that it is not our private playground, it's theirs. Don't take it personally if a thread with too much info vanishes. If somebody is temporarily banned, then you know contractually FFG needs to protect their position. Disney is a powerful player, and don't forget Lucasfilm itself is still an entity, if owned by Disney. Lucasfilm is well known for wanting secrecy on their projects - even so far as giving actors false lines to read in the films. See Darth Vader's surprise in ESB for an example.

FFG won't likely lose a license if things go sour, but it may not be renewed when it expires. Companies do part profitable partnerships over hurt feelings - they are run be real people after all. Now DON'T read too much into this, I never suggest this will or has soured the relationship. The only relationship I have to either party is that I spend gobs of money on their products.

Everybody is tired, frustrated and really these threads need to stop... that said, it's the internet... it won't stop and I know it... It will just get worse, because that's what we do.

There - my one post on this thread and my only one. You may continue.

Seeing as the OP framed the question in terms of moral responsibility: Anyone who has not agreed to keep the leaked information secret has absolutely no moral duty to not discuss the leaked information. Anyone who has agreed to keep the leaked information secret has a moral duty to see through their agreement (unless a greater moral duty comes along of course).

I think you mean legal responsibility here, and the agreement would be an NDA of some sort.

The morality, whether good or bad, of spreading the information those people have leaked is a topic that is debatable and open to interpretation.

No, I definitely meant moral responsibility.

If Alice and Bob agree to keep a certain piece of news secret from the world, and Eve discovers said news, Eve has no moral responsibility to also keep it secret. In fact, it could be argued that if anyone is acting immoral, it is Alice if she then tries to smear Eve's reputation merely for discussing news that Alice would rather not be public.

So, if my wife had cancer and we were trying to keep it under wraps and a buddy of mine, Fred, found out somehow and blabbed to everyone under the sun, I would be wrong to be angry at Fred? I would be in the wrong for trying to keep the cancer a secret? Insanity. Fred is wrong in this situation.

You're not wrong for being angry at Fred, that's a natural reaction to your plans being messed with.

Did Fred know you were keeping it a secret? If so, then he was wrong for spreading it against your wishes. If Fred didn't know it was a secret, then he is in no way wrong for telling someone else about it - it was simply information that he heard about.

Now, once the proverbial cat is out of the bag, you can choose to not talk to anyone about it - you can refuse to give new information and you can punish the first person who let the secret out. What you can't do is try and force other people to stop talking about the news - that would be futile and makes you look like an ass.

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

Great example being slavery it was legal to own other humans but clearly immoral, so people helped them escape which was breaking the law but a moral act.

The law can be immoral and still be the law.

My local play group is currently rife with debate over whether we should be talking and posting about leaked items and the potential consequences to bothy so players and the region as a whole.

It was disclosed to a majority of the players that there is a playtesting group for our area, and that they were tasked with stopping as much of the leak as possible. Individuals outside that group then obtained unreleased materials and posted a photo album to reddit of said materials.

This has led to a lot of infighting, mostly falling along the lines of "this is bad, stop doing it" and "a giant mega corporation can't hurt me"

I can see it both ways. On one hand, FFG can't do much about a big box store breaking a street date. On the other hand, FFG can take our regional away from us, or deny our store championship applications for being a problem area.

So where do you fall? Do you stand with the moral right, and try to stop the leaks? Or do you side with the opportunists, taking advantage of a system that can't be brought back on you?

All this hubub creates conversation about the game and drives up interest.

I'm not saying FFG engineered this, but I'm sure they're not surprised and maybe willing to capitalize on some warehouse guy grabbing a box off the palette and snapping some pics.

In a few months, the game will be out, and it will all be old news.

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

Great example being slavery it was legal to own other humans but clearly immoral, so people helped them escape which was breaking the law but a moral act.

The law can be immoral and still be the law.

Hang on...I can almost hear Godwin's Law about to happen....

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

Great example being slavery it was legal to own other humans but clearly immoral, so people helped them escape which was breaking the law but a moral act.

The law can be immoral and still be the law.

So, if my wife had cancer and we were trying to keep it under wraps and a buddy of mine, Fred, found out somehow and blabbed to everyone under the sun, I would be wrong to be angry at Fred? I would be in the wrong for trying to keep the cancer a secret? Insanity. Fred is wrong in this situation.

I think you're missing the point. What does your wife's dial look like, and will she have a title upgrade that fixes the X-Wing?

The playtest NDA only dictates the terms of your behavior in the presence of the information. That is you cannot discuss the terms of the playtest even when the product is made public. The information you have access to is covered by the NDA, not an early product release. It does not atipulate that you are required to try to stop early leaks as doing so may compromise your NDA agreement.

That is, those playtesters cannot discuss this leaked product because FFG has not made it public. They certainly cannot discuss the playtest, so doing either would likely violate the NDA.

As a playtester, there's an easy rule to follow: only discuss the playtest with people who have active NDAs with FFG. Anything else risks legal action.

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

Great example being slavery it was legal to own other humans but clearly immoral, so people helped them escape which was breaking the law but a moral act.

The law can be immoral and still be the law.

Hang on...I can almost hear Godwin's Law about to happen....

so let's say I find out about the Auschwitz but the Nazis tell me to keep quiet about it, is it immoral if I go tell the U.S. Army?...

If they signed some sort of deal that they should not tell then they should uphold it.

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

You believe those laws are amoral because you don't consider the cost to others. Stealing intellectual property is no different then Stealing money from someone. That's in no way amoral.

The only reason you consider it amoral is because you condone the behavior and don't want to see yourself as someone immoral for stealing.

If you know someone is breaking NDAs or benefiting from illegal behavior that is in itself is immoral as people here have all stated the person who breaks the NDA or whatever rules they agreed to not to share this information. And you promote his illegal and immoral actions do you honestly think you have no moral obligation to prevent such actions by not condoning and supporting it? If you view movies or music someone worked to create from someone hosting it online. You don't think not paying someone for thier work is immoral? How is that any different then stealing which is in itself an immoral act? You have an obligation not to support illegal and immoral behavior unless that lack of support itself is even more immoral.

The legality of something does not equate morality, as Vorpal alluded to. Leaking an item on the internet has zero moral weight, unless the individual involved gave his/her word not to. That is a violation of integrity and honor (ie: a moral issue).

While I technically agree morality does cross paths with legality.

For instance it's likely Immoral for you to seek out the content you know is illegal, because that means you are supporting illegal behavior.

Stealing and Sharing illegal movies is illegal and immoral. If you go and search and watch that movie it's both illegal and immoral even if you don't share it with anyone.

I'm calling bull on this right here. The breaking laws is not immoral behavior, especially when those laws themselves are amoral.

Bull is your response.

You believe those laws are amoral because you don't consider the cost to others. Stealing intellectual property is no different then Stealing money from someone. That's in no way amoral.

The only reason you consider it amoral is because you condone the behavior and don't want to see yourself as someone immoral for stealing.

Seeing as the OP framed the question in terms of moral responsibility: Anyone who has not agreed to keep the leaked information secret has absolutely no moral duty to not discuss the leaked information. Anyone who has agreed to keep the leaked information secret has a moral duty to see through their agreement (unless a greater moral duty comes along of course).

I think you mean legal responsibility here, and the agreement would be an NDA of some sort.

The morality, whether good or bad, of spreading the information those people have leaked is a topic that is debatable and open to interpretation.

No, it is not open to interpretation. It is pretty clear-cut.

Different people have different morals. Why are yours right and other's wrong?

The legality of it is clear-cut. Those who signed an NDA are at fault. Those who didn't aren't. The morality of it, however, is open to interpretation

Ahhhh. The old "there is no right or wrong because everything is gray" argument. Sorry. I don't buy it. As societies have evolved throughout the world, most of them have agreed on simple core concepts like murder is wrong, taking the property of another is wrong, lying is wrong, and betraying the confidence of another is wrong. It just is.

I'm not suggesting that I am perfect. I do wrong things all the time. I lie. I envy. I speed. I gamble. I swear. I cheat. It does not make me a monster, it makes me human. I do not try to justify myself by saying it is within my "moral code" or other such nonsense. I just try to do better.

You just proved my point. They create laws. Laws are created based on common morals of those who write them. However, not everyone's morals are exactly the same. Just because a moral of yours is not to spread information about X-Wing products doesn't mean others have to have that same moral. The only people that have an obligation are those who signed an NDA

You believe those laws are amoral because you don't consider the cost to others. Stealing intellectual property is no different then Stealing money from someone. That's in no way amoral.

The only reason you consider it amoral is because you condone the behavior and don't want to see yourself as someone immoral for stealing.

You're actually wrong there, I'm not trying to condone my own behavior. The last time I downloaded any ill-gotten content was with Napster before Lars from Metallica got all bent out of shape about filesharing. At the time it seemed to be the natural progression of getting a mix-tape from a friend or lending out a VHS tape with movie that had been recorded off of HBO.

IP law is absolutely amoral. It is merely a set of rules to help protect products and maintain a competitive advantage. Companies commit many acts that are thugish and heavy handed to secure and defend IP including attacking people that can't afford to defend their own claims against a corporation with a big legal budget.

Laws are (for the most part) morally neutral and can be used for good or ill.

Did the CEO or some other higher up at Target leak this information? Or was it just a lower level warehouse staffer making minimum wage? My bet is on the latter.

My room mate just swore off watching movie trailers because he doesn't want anything spoiled for him. I totally get that because if you know you're going to see a film anyway (like TFA or the new Spectre James Bond film) then you might as well save yourself for it but as for me I usually like to see a trailer before I see a film so I know what I'm getting into. Its all a matter of opinion and everyone's is valid. If you don't want to see these things theres a simple solution. Its the same way to not have a child if you don't want one; Abstinence. No-one is telling people to go on the internet and look at these things. But if you wish to subscribe to the internet as a whole (which one generally does on these fora) then deal with it. Otherwise its 2-3 months wait.

There's a new james bond film?! awesome!

There's a new james bond film?! awesome!

Got a link?

Cheers

Baaa

I don't understand how some internet leak has anything to do with you or your play group in any way?