First and foremost, as a builder and creator, you must do what you are called to do, and you must do it in the way that you feel is right and ethical. If something you feel is right and ethical, happens to be illegal, re-examine your ethics. If you ~still~ think it's right and ethical, consider protest and/or civil disobedience. I took Vijay's advice and looked up Scrabulous. I disagree with him about whether Hasbro was being "petty". It seems to me that Scrabulous wasn't a "derivative work", or a "work inspired by", but an exact clone of Scrabble. It seems not to have had offered variance from, or improvement on, the original work. The developers of Scrabulous implemented a better network version Scrabble for Facebook than Hasbro did, but then they weren't able to reach an agreeable sale price. It's important to remember that "rich" and "petty" are relative terms. So, perhaps, is "original". Scrabulous has been taken down, and Lexulous, which does match my definition of a derived or insipired work, has been put up. In my opinion, the makers of Scrabulous got hit, not because they honored Scrabble with a derived work, but because they cloned it, verbatim, without license to do so, and then tried to extort an unfair price from the owners of the game. Another person might say that putting a board-game on the 'Net is a significant improvement, enough to justify calling it an inspired or derivative work. Still another might say that making a clone of something that's already on the 'Net, but making it prettier, more stable, faster, is enough. Personally, I think a good litmus test might be this: Is my inspiration (the original work) being helped or harmed by my derivative or inspired work? You be the judge: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99338221 David L. Willson Trainer, Engineer, Enthusiast RHCE MCT MCSE Network+ A+ Linux+ LPIC-1 NovellCLA UbuntuCP tel://720.333.LANS Freedom is better when you earn it. Learn Linux. ----- "vijay chopra" <vjchopra@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On the legality point - you can't copyright the rules of games, only > their layout; so you don't technically have to give any credit at all > if you re-write the rules in a different format for a different games > system. > > Ethically, it's totally your choice; "inspired by x" is a nice > gesture, but can bring about problems with trademarks, a megacorp > like > Hasbro might decide to sue you if you put an "inspired by x" on your > rules as "x" is their trademark. Jut google for the scrabulous > lawsuit > to see how petty they can be. > > regards, > Vijay > > > On 27 March 2011 17:16, Jeff Zeitlin <icehouse@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > wrote: > > I have a tendency to start with some core element or elements of > > existing (possibly non-pyramid) games, and build from there. > Sometimes, > > the result works; sometimes it doesn't. > > > > Recently, I saw a commercial game that is completely unrelated to > any of > > my existing pyramid games, but which on brief reflection easily > modifies > > into a variant of one of them. > > > > Or, it can stand as a pyramid game in its own right, with rules > similar > > to the existing pyramid game. > > > > Which leads to the questions: > > > > (1) To what extent am I legally or ethically required to credit the > > existing game in making my game available (e.g., on the > > Icehousegames.org wiki)? > > > > (2) At what point does a game cease to be a "variant" of another, > and > > become a game that rightfully stands on its own? > > > > (3) Alternatively to (2), when there are several variants, how do I > > decide which one should be the "base" game, of which the others > are > > considered to be variants? > > > > (4) What is the best way to get the Looney Pyramids community to > > playtest my games and provide feedback? (This question applies > to > > some games that have been "out there" for quite a while, not just > to > > games I may come up with in the future.) > > > > (I should note that I posted this to the ning forums several days > ago, > > and have received ZERO responses or suggestions. I find that to be > > slightly upsetting, suggestive that either my questions aren't > worth > > responding to, or that it's personal about ME.) > > _______________________________________________ > > Icehouse mailing list > > Icehouse@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > > http://lists.looneylabs.com/mailman/listinfo/icehouse > > > _______________________________________________ > Icehouse mailing list > Icehouse@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > http://lists.looneylabs.com/mailman/listinfo/icehouse