This isn't even true. OSRS was on life support with very few players for years until they started giving it updates.

Turns out the 2007 version of the game was ROUGH for a lot of reasons - they picked the time because, IIRC, it was the most complete backup they had.

OSRS has now had nearly a decade of consistent updates, a large team, and typically 10x the online player count of the "modern" game. The catch is that OSRS is not the 2007 version of the game, it's an alternative update timeline which broke off at the 2007 version of the game.

> Moreover it's unclear whether that excuse even works. If you make a low cost version of star wars, copying the screenplay exactly, that still seems like copyright infringement, even if "it's not a replacement for the original in any way shape or form".

Are you being intentionally obtuse here? Intention matters here.

> Virtually nobody got sued for torrenting with a VPN on.

Let's not use obviously illegal actions which are done covertly to act as an example that is in any way similar to singing a song in the "open."

Yes you could be sued for anything though. If it never happens to anyone (hyperbole) then does it matter?

Clearly the team, if it is a team, that is entitled to the copyright is entitled to the copyright of the song, that's a silly statement to make. Copyright belongs to some entity, obviously.

You were specifically calling out individuals singing a song, not publishing lyrics online. These are not the same thing. Again your distribution/consumption model matters here.

On artists being "cool" with it - if the copyright holder doesn't pursue you then does it matter? The only valid argument I would see here is if the copyright holder doesn't know about the infringement and therefore cannot seek remedies, but we can fish for illegal scenarios all day if we would like: that's not useful though.

It's not that you can remember a song and therefore copyright infringement when you sing.

For 99.999% of people that are singing a song, it's not a replacement for the original in any way shape or form, hard stop. Let's not pretend it could even get anywhere close.

For the last 0.001%, we would call it a cover and typically the individually doing a cover takes some liberties of their own, still making it not a replacement in any way. Artists are typically cool with covers.