Illwinter's next project - Page 14

Fantomen · #**131** October 3rd, 2011, 12:45 PM

A single monster trademarked (not copyrighted, mind you) on dubious grounds in the US is not going to cause any trouble for a 2 man indie developer in sweden, just because they use a similar monster type among hundreds of others.

First, I withhold that it's far too irrelevant for WoTC to care, and second sweden doesn't have a money driven legal system where you can just sue anyone just because you're a big company. You need to actually be more or less right to win a case here.

brxbrx · #**132** October 3rd, 2011, 01:41 PM

Actually, Shrapnel is an American company (right?). So if WotC decides to sue, they can effectively stop distribution of the game everywhere

Anaconda · #**133** October 3rd, 2011, 01:42 PM

Right, bringing the product to the States aint a problem, BUT distributing the product in the States may change the situation.

brxbrx · #**134** October 3rd, 2011, 05:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anaconda

Right, bringing the product to the States aint a problem, BUT distributing the product in the States may change the situation.

If Shrapnel is indeed located in the US, distributing it anywhere would be a problem should litigation ensue.

Soyweiser · #**135** October 4th, 2011, 07:54 AM

Well, if they trademarked the name it could be a problem. IIRC, you have to aggressively keep up your trademark or else you can lose it.

But this is just the thing Shrapnel should have lawyers for. So I think they will deal with this. (Sadly we will not really hear from it, but that is their decision).

S.R. Krol · #**136** October 4th, 2011, 12:08 PM

The thing is though I have never seen Beholder written as Beholder(tm) in any D&D book. While the wiki claims it is part of the "identity" of D&D and therefore is not in the SRD I did a quick search for "Yaun-Ti" which they also consider the same. Lo and behold there is an entire module dedicated to the Yaun-Ti from a third party, Goodman Games. I'm also guessing you can find beholders in third party adventures.

And as pointed out beholders, while often not called beholders, have appeared in computer games since the 8-bit days.

Soyweiser · #**137** October 4th, 2011, 01:38 PM

I don't think it is mandatory to tag each mention of a trademarked word with (TM). But hey, I'm not a lawyer

.

Gandalf Parker · #**138** October 4th, 2011, 02:28 PM

When I worked for a law firm I was told that tags, signs, declarations, etc are fairly worthless. Instead of being informative or legally useful, they are often used as intimidation. Signs like "not responsible for" or "do not trespass" or "violators will be shot" or "beware of dog" have little real legal value. If you are responsible, then no sign changes that. And things like (tm) tags, ToS, AUP, (or warning letters from lawfirms) are more along the line of "I want you to believe me so you wont take me to court about it".

S.R. Krol · #**139** October 4th, 2011, 10:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

And things like (tm) tags, ToS, AUP, (or warning letters from lawfirms) are more along the line of "I want you to believe me so you wont take me to court about it".

Once registered though it provides more strength than just a warning.

lch · #**140** October 7th, 2011, 12:29 PM

[quote=Johan K;781995The game is Conquest of Elysium 3. For those that haven't tried it, it's another fantasy strategy game, but simpler and much quicker than Dominions.[/QUOTE]

for a game simpler than Dom3, and

for a game quicker than Dom3, too.

I think the copyright/trademark thing on the Beholder was settled when brxbrx posted this...

Quote:

Originally Posted by brxbrx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beholder#Licensing

But here's a link about copyright law that some people might find interesting, too: 10 Big Myths about copyright explained