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From: CAH0@bunny.gte.com (Chuck Hoffman)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.games
Subject: Re: Some Copyrighted Games...
Message-ID: <10932@bunny.GTE.COM>
Date: 8 Apr 91 14:14:45 GMT
References: <1341@caslon.cs.arizona.edu>
Sender: news@gte.com
Organization: GTE Laboratories, Inc.
Lines: 38

In article <1341@caslon.cs.arizona.edu> jtgorman@cs.arizona.edu (J. 
Taggart Gorman) writes:
>   I know I don't want to hear a long rambling discusion of copyrights 
and I'm
> sure most readers don't want to either, so don't answer the following
> question with...

I had to chuckle when I read this.  Someone proposing expression so free 
that it might infringe on a copyright, and in the same breath suggesting 
censorship of replies to his own posting.  :)

Seriously, though...
Seems to me that wanting to imitate a game which someone else has 
developed and marketed is a pretty clear acknowledgement that you think 
their game is more successful, or their marketing is more successful, (or 
both), than what you might come up with alone.  They might want to share 
their success with you, and they might not.  But you have to make a 
proposal to them.  After all, they've done all the work and taken all the 
risks so far.  It's their game.

Another responder suggested changing the artwork and the details of a game 
so much that it no longer resembled the original, except in fundamental 
concept.  This included changing the name.  I think this is legitimate if 
you also change a few significant ways the game actually works.  Mah-jong, 
Canasta, and Rummy all resemble each other, and follow fundamentally 
similar rule sets, but we think of them as three different games.  That 
person also noted that you wouldn't be able to derive benefits from the 
other game's distribution and advertising, but that's the whole idea.  You 
wouldn't be just selling a version of the other game, you would be selling 
your own game, and would benefit only from your own distribution and 
advertising.


- Chuck Hoffman, GTE Laboratories, Inc.  |  I'm not sure why we're here,
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