On Thu, 16 Nov 2000, Doug Meerschaert wrote:
> Individual rules can't be copyrighted, but (and IANAL) I believe that
> an argument can be made that a complete game has a "character" that can
> be copyrighted.
>
> I'd appreciate it if anyone has a better source for the "no you can't"
> half of the question, so I can put it in the "party line" FAQ.
I have a web page on the subject. On this subject, I
would point to the U.S. Copyright's office form FL108 on games,
which says:
"Copyright protects only the particular manner of an author's
expression in literary, artistic, or musical form. Copyright
protection does not extend to any idea, system, method, device, or
trademark material involved in the development, merchandising, or
playing of a game. Once a game has been made public, nothing in the
copyright law prevents others from developing another game based on
similar principles."
Further, "Allen v. Academic Games" (9th Cir., 1996) found that even
though other people were running tournaments using Allen's games
which included copies of some rules, the rules were not protected.
Among the reasons cited were that if a rule concept can only be
expressed one way (or is logically expressed that way), then it is
not infringement to express the same idea.
Anyhow, you can read more about it on my website at
http://www.ps.uci.edu/~jhkim/rpg/copyright/index.html
- John
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For more information, please link to www.opengamingfoundation.org
