Re: [piecepack] Re: New game added to the wiki: Piecepack Isle

[Ron Hale-Evans <rwhe@...>]

On Thu, Nov 11, 2010 at 8:24 AM, sshum2003 <sshum2003@...> wrote:
> Jorge Arroyo <trozo@...> wrote:
>>
>> Copyright only covers the actual text used to write the rules of a
>> game and the actual art on the components, but not the mechanics
>> themselves. See: http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl108.html
>>
> sshum2003: This is not this is the exact page of the Copyright Office website I was talking about.  It leads some how to people confusing game mechanics with a whole game.  Game mechanics are moving pieces, rolling dice, etc. which have been around for centuries.  No one can claim any type of IP ownership over these mechanics.  Game mechanics are the equivialent of "words" to the whole game are to "articles".  No one can claim copyright over words; any one can claim copyright over an article they wrote.  Otherwise games are not copyrightable at all.

You're conflating rules and mechanics.

Copyright covers /expression/, or rules. Patents cover /ideas/, or
mechanics. Expression includes such things as the way a rule set is
written up in words. Contrary to what you believe, there *are* new
mechanics other than "moving pieces, rolling dice, etc. which have
been around for centuries", and they *can* be patented. For example,
Wizards of the Coast patented "tapping" a rotated card in a card game.

Consider, on the other hand, the Wizards of the Coast game Guillotine.
To the best of my knowledge, it contains no patented mechanics. That
means these folks were free to port it:

http://www.opus-dei.co.uk/

The authors of Opus-Dei: Existence After Religion /completely/ rewrote
the /rules/ to the WotC game Guillotine, so that they're no longer
about 18th-century French aristocracy, but instead about atheist
philosophers after the Rapture. The /mechanics/, however, are pretty
much identical. Instead of aristocrat cards lining up in this life to
be sent into the next, philosopher cards in the "pre-life" line up to
be sent into this one.

The Opus-Dei people got sued, all right, but not by Wizards of the
Coast, who understand the difference between /patents on mechanics/
and /copyrights on rules/. No, they got sued by Opus Dei, whom they
naively assumed to be a shadowy arm of the Roman Catholic Church in
Dan Brown novels, but turned out to be a shadowy arm of the Roman
Catholic Church in real life as well.

Opus Dei (the real one) lost their case in court against the game
authors, because trademarks like their name can't apply across all of
time and space. They apply only to specific domains that you specify
ahead of time and defend later. For example, the Opus Dei trademark
may apply to the domain "shadowy religious cabals" :) but doesn't
apply to the domain "board games" automatically.

Moral: know your legal rights. The Opus-Dei: Existence After Religion
authors did, and they sell their games worldwide, in multiple
languages. They've never been sued by Wizards of the Coast, and
they've been sued by the Roman Catholic Church and *won*.

Of course, I am not a lawyer, but then, I'd give odds of 100 to 1 that
"sshum2003" is not either. Don't succumb to FUD.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty_and_doubt

Ron

--
Ron Hale-Evans ... rwhe@... ... http://ron.ludism.org ... (206) 201-1768
Mind Performance Hacks book: http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596101534/