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Tetris Under Fire
Andrew Bednarz writes
"How many people are aware of what The Tetris Company is
doing? They're claiming they own copyright on "the look
and feel and trade dress" of Tetris. They are attempting
to remove all unauthorised tetris games!" Considering
that there are dozens of tetris clones (many distributed
under the GPL) I suspect their quest is futile. I'm not sure
how I feal about this one. Their claim is probably legit,
and the above story compares this to the industry allowing
only one game in a genre, but tetris is tetris- its not a block
game genre, its a specific game with rules we are all familiar
with. Different side scrollers have different rules. Hmm.
Wierd case. What do you think?
I hate to defend their argument, but it would be akin to a person writing a very successful novel involving very specific characters, then someone else coming along and using those characters and the environment in their own novel without even asking permission of the original author. I don't like copyrights at all but they do have a good point if you support current copyright law.
What does this mean? Linux is not a copyright infringement. What is the connection?
This tetris company is claiming that games that have the "look and feel" of tetris are in violation of their rights. This other poster is saying that if you agree with this argument, and since Linux has the "look and feel" of Unix, then Linux shouldn't legally exist.
It's too late to stop people from cloning Tetris. There's probably more versions out there now than Space Invaders clones. If they want to sue every coder that made a clone they're going to be up against a lot of people from many different countries (some of which probably have very different copyright laws).
Arrgh, you keep doing that speling misteak.
It's spelled "weird". Remember, it's:
"i" before "e" except before "c"
or in weird words.
This story reminds me of the day when Unisys
decided to impose a tax on programs that generate
images in the GIF format.
OK, it's ridiculous. Check out their statements on their homepage:6 19.html
:-)
http://www.tetris.com
and this story from Wired:
http://www.wired.com/news/news/culture/story/16
Pajitnov seems to be in on it too, perhaps he really aquired a taste for capitalism since the fall of the Soviet empire...
Yes, that's right. I have copyrighted the look and
feel of First Person Shooter games. Now id software
and all the rest will owe me TONS of CA$H!
Muwahaha!!
Oh, yes, it's true. Hell , I'm sick
of tetris anyway. F**k tetris!
"i" before "e" except before "c"
Remember, it's wise to get it right or keep it to yourself. It's "I before E except after C...".
I'm not a lawyer, but...
I do not believe that you can legally do this...
The Tetris name can be trademarked. A specific tetris game implementation can be copyrighted. But unless they have a patent, they can't legally prevent me from making a clone of their software. Oh, if I have access to their source, or reverse engineer their implementation, then they would have a case against me for copying their implementation (copyright violation).
But a clean-room generated clone should be free and clear of that! (Consider AMD & Cyrix. They produce clean-room generated clones of Intel's Pentium chip. Or Wordperfect and MS Word. Or the competing spreadsheets. Lets face it, if you could copyright a program like this, the makers of visicalc would have already sued microsoft!)
As for Monopoly, I have personally seen monopoly-ripoff games based on different cities that were not produced by Parker-Brothers. Parker-Brothers moved quickly to come up with competing games. Which, since they were "official" Monopoly games, with the Monopoly trademark, had a definite edge in marketing...
However, I should also point out that most folks, when threatened with a lawsuit, choose to back down. Thus assuring the tetris folks, who are acting like bullies, of a large number of wins. Which in turn only encourages them further.
And, if they have trademarked "tetris", and you call your game "tetris", then you could very well be guilty of violating their trademark.
Where feel is correct. But ok this is of course just a typo and not as bad as the definates and wierds.
As long as your not obviously copying drawings, texts with just word-by-word substitution, and are not using trademarks, you should be safe. Just like for book, you could tell exactly the same story, with the same events, same people, provided that you're not copying phrases (you should use different names to be safe, but names like King Arthur, Lancelot, ... are probably in public domain).
Of course there is a limit ; the concept "unfair competition" still exists to provide some room for saneness in the most outrageous cases. I guess that, for instance, if some TV channels were involved in a sort of competition, and one would systematically create and show at the same time of another channel, a sitcom based exactly on the same scenario, events, kind of humor, that would be a ripoff of the other, it could be condemned, not necessarily on the basis of copyright infrigment, but on the basis of "unfair competition"
I seem to remember the official Nintendo version of Tetris also being licenced from Elorg, and I know that Super Tetris credits Sphere Inc. for the development. Perhaps if I can find both games, I'll post screenshots of the copyright screens. I suppose what's under concern is the wide variety of "Tetris clones" that stretch from xtetris (which my roommate plays with fanatic devotion and holds the 11th overall campus ranking) to those silly little LCD handheld games. I also seem to remember Electronic Gaming Magazine ranking Tetris as the top game of all time, but I may be mistaken about that (have to go do some research).
Over at bitlaw.com, there is a lot of information on this sort of thing. One example given was that you can copyright the instructions for making a machine, but that copyright does not seem to apply to using the instructions to make the machine. But everyone knows the instructions for tetris.
On the other hand, you can patent a process. So is the game of tetris a process?
The rules to Monopoly were actually patented a long time ago, not copyrighted, since copyright would only cover a specific implementation of the rules and not cover the same rules written a different way, which most human languages allow you to do (even so, you could just sell the game without written rules, maybe procedural diagrams). The patent on Monopoly was, I believe extended or some such. In any case, it lasted for a long time. It has since expired. Feel free to make all the clones you like, just so long as you don't use the trademarked name Monopoly(TM).
link
You don't get sued for creating a java browser
because your not copying protectable elements.
Provided you don't run into problems with patents,
there's nothing keeping you from making a clone
of Internet Explorer for Linux. Well nothing
other than self respect.
Watch this page about pentominoes
http://pubweb.acns.nwu.edu/~gbuehler/speech.htm
I used to be in the game industry (RPGs and board games, but games nonetheless) and my wife used to handle the copyrights for the company we worked for. IANAL but as I understand it you can't copyright the basic foundation of a game. You can copyright the rules and trademark certain physical aspects of a game, but not the underlying mechanics. To use Monopoly as an example, Parker Brothers holds the copyright to the the specific wording of the rules and the trademarks for the elements of the game's "interface," to use the computer term -- the title deeds, tokens, Monopoly man, etc. However, if I wanted to publish a game called Slashdotopoly based on the Monopoly model, I could still use the same game mechanics provided I wrote my own rules from scratch. I would also have to change the properties to web sites and . . . well, the analogy stretches pretty thin, but you get the idea. (To give you a better example, look at your local game store if you have one. Here in Seattle we have an authorized Parker Brothers Seattle version of Monopoly -- which, for some odd reason in a Monopoly game, doesn't include Microsoft -- and various unauthorized games along the same line based on Washington and Washington State Universities.)
Any number of games out there make use of the rules and basic look of Tetris. I've written a couple myself. So long as they don't call themselves Tetris, I don't think there's a problem.
-- Just Another Anonymous Coward
It's not all that ancient, since Solomon Goloumb (sp?) published his book on Tetronimoes in 1950. But then, it's reasonable to assume that there are people who haven't discovered America yet (some of whom live there), so I guess that's OK.
I before E
Except after C
Or when "E" souds like "A"
As in "neighbor" and "weigh"
Of course the phrase "ancient science" blows that theory out of the water. Basically, I just try to remember that "weird" looks weird to me and leave it at that.
What I want to see is the Tetris LLC try to go up against
the International Obfuscated C Code Contest. Two of the entries
that won (and are now public domain) are tetris versions.
Clearly the intent is to besmirch the Tetris name...
These entries are, like, ten years old, too.
They better hurry.
Anyone who has copied the (non-block) graphics or sound from the original (or licenced derivatives) game is probably violating copyright.
HOWEVER, the actual game concept (the falling blocks, etc.) is not copyrightable (it's an idea) but is potentially patentable. If the game had been patented, then original implementations (not copies) of the same game idea would be infringing.
However, AFAIK it wasn't and they aren't.
IOW, the rules of a game are (potentially) patentable (if they meet the other requirements of originality, non-obviousness, etc.) but not copyrightable.
The only thing copyrightable is the physical expression of the game, the actual text describing the rules, etc.
Take MONOPOLY(tm) for example. There are other games like it as far as 'game play' goes - if you know Monopoly, you pretty much know how to play the other games, but do NOT copy the look of the board. That board look is copyrighted. (Copyright applies to obvious derivates like just changing the street names, etc.)
Tetris's basic game play (algorithm) is based on tetrominos, which are uncopyrightable. but the "look" of Tetris(tm) is based on particular graphics details, which are copyrightable.
- Al (not a lawyer, but have taken some law courses and have been around the invention and publishing business enough to know the difference)
I am one of the victims of that campain. My site was feturing a Java Tetris Game. Everything was going fine, until one day I got a "Cease and desist" letter. Then I had to take down the site.
You can read the letter at:
http://www.rotaru.com/exgames/
Cata
Who cares, I have like 30 tetris variants that work fine as is...with source...I think I can breathe enough life into that code to keep enough illegal tetris gaming going. In fact tetris will be more fun because it will be contraban.
The patent has run out, in any case. They probably sued over trademark violation. Of course, the sad fact of the matter is that it doesn't matter if what you're doing is perfectly legal or not, large portions of the legal system belong to whoever enters the courtroom with the largest amount of money. Oh, sure, the court may not actually side against you, but how long can you hold out while the court costs and lawyers fees eat away at you? Gah, I should just stop getting out of bed in the morning.
It's interesting how they've only started doing this now that the guy who invented Tetris is dead.
as www.tetris.com points out, Tetris is more or less a computer copy of the Pentominoes game with the order of the pieces reduced to four from five. Alexy didn't come up with this idea out of thin air by himself, he just adapted other people's work.
Is the Tetris creator really getting money from this anyway? Presumeably he has some sort of royalty deal with this company, but it sounds to me like they pretty much own the copyright now rather than him, and they probably get the bulk of the profits. Their web site is one big propaganda fest. The kind of business lingo it's written in makes it seem to me that they're trying to position themselves to be bought by a larger company. Small time, seedy, software chop shop. Had a scheme to buy a hot property and make huge profits, and now they're getting bitter that it won't make them billionaires.
... whip up a GPL Tetris clone for Linux! Grrr ...
Works at Microsoft, I believe...
Alexey Pajitnov "invented" Tetris while being funded by the USSR. (True - really). He did not OWN anything. The Soviet Union did.
The trademarks and licenses, as best I can tell, were sold to the bastard... excuse me, person who now runs http://www.tetris.com/ (the Tetris Co. LLC), and claims to have "invented" Tetris for a few NON-PC platforms... What a weasel.
Last I heard, Pajitnov is sill very much alive, working in Redmond... Although some people on this board might consider that dead...
There is no way to copyright a game under US law. You can copyright the artistic content of the game as an artistic work, the specific written form of the rulebook/docs as a written work, etc., but you cannot hold copyright to game rules/mechanics.
Rob, you're way off on this one...
- RF (dfelker@cnu.edu)
I suggest readers look at the copyright law on the Library of Congress web site (www.loc.gov) before posting uninformed suppositions. Particularly have a look at Circular 1 titled "Copyright Registration for Computer Programs" at http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/circs/circ61.pdf and Form Letter 108 titled "Games" at http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/fls/fl108.htm .
The former says "Copyright protection extends to all of the copyrightable expression embodied in the computer program. Copyright protection is not available for ideas, program logic, algorithms, systems, methods, concepts, or layouts."
The latter says "The idea for a game is not protected by copyright. The same is true of the name or title given to the game and of the method or methods for playing it."
Now trademark law might apply to the name of the game, in which case a variation of the name such as XXX-tris is probably not in violation. Also the gameplay and look-and-feel is not copyrightable. If you did screenshots to get the graphics for the game, then you might be in trouble, but making a clone of a game (or any other computer program) is not an violation of copyright law. Only Trademark and Patent law apply to clones (and their names).
Copyrights only cover the specific implementation of the game (ie the code, the actual graphics, the actual sound, the manuals etc). The idea of a 'look and feel' copyright has been tried before and defeated in court. Provide you write your Tetris(R) clone in a clean-room manner and don't use any copyrighted material (eg the graphics), trademarks (ie don't call it Tetris(R) or anything similar), or infringe on any patents then you can legally produce and distribute it.
I have been reading this thread because I am
in a simmilar situation. I have been working
on a networked version of the popular game
Scrabble. I would like to realease it as
Open Source so that everyone can play it for
free, but I fear that Hasbro (the evil toy
maker) would sue me with one of these silly
"Look and Feel" claims. What is the best way
to get the code out to people without exposing
yourself to silly lawsuits like this?
This is what they are trying to do: scare people into surrendering. Notice that there have been no reports of any suits being filed after these C&D letters? They don't want a lawsuit either, especially as they probably wouldn't win it. But they know that if they send out these sort of letters most people will give in because they can afford to even fight a suit.
I wonder if there's anyway to file a class action suit against them for harassment.
I am gonna sue the entire human race for looking :-) Also I am going to patent .
and feeling similar to me, and for having 99+% of
their genes in common with me. Real Copyright
lawyers material
my entire genome and then everyone on earth will
have to pay me for his existence
I am quite sure this will go in my favour after
the recent patents awarded to MS etc and this story.
Well the inventor of tetris--alex. patinov not only owns the tetris company, but he also works for microsoft, so he is definitely not gonna screw them over, so the GLPed versions are the only ones left he can screw over....so just lube up and bend over, or you can fight back, and send him to hell, as he does not have a legal leg to stand on....he only has copyright, which protects only the implementation, and if you didn't see his code, and developed your clean room style, then he can't touch you if your lawyer is worth anything, but he can sue you, and it can drag on for years before you win so many people will give up, even if they are in the right simply because they are not willing to fight him on something that they did for free...however once GLPed product is out it can never really be pulled from the market, because anyone anywhere can distribute it, perhaps from a country that does not recognize such ridiculus claims, or any copyright whatsoever. He must be really regretting he didn't patent it, because then he could really push, and get everybody else of the market, because with a patent he would have a legal basis, but as it is he doesn't stand a chance legal wise.....but he might prevail if no one is willing to challenge the teris co.
Ummm... If I start a company and call it Tic-Tac-Toe, Inc. does that mean that anyone who wants to make a program to play TTT has to pay me??
How many breakout-type games have you seen? There are hundreds! I haven't heard anyone from Commadore or the like whining about rip-offs of those early games.
In my opinion you may be able to copyright the original artwork and code, but any rules of gameplay or general concepts should be open to whoever wants to build on them. Without this, the creators of Wolfenstein could easily have said "We hereby copyright the concept of a 3 dimentional video game" and there would be no Duke, Quake, or Half-Life. Unless Tetris, Inc wants to port "their " game to everything from Linux to my TI-85 calculator, they should leave well enough alone.
Ever stop to think, then forget to start again?
I was always under the impression that the russian
Alexander guy invented the concept, and didn't
"license" it or anything. I thought the Tetris Co.'s copyright was merely in name. I guess they do have a point however, tetris is a very specific game. Wouldn't be hard to by-pass this though, there are many tetris-like games like Columns, Puyo Puyo etc.
Is Tetris "copyrighted"? by CmdrTaco on Saturday November 21st 98@09:56
The one big problem I see with this is.. Is the Tetris Company ever going to make an 'Official' tetris for Linux? How about my TI-85? I can understand their view if the games are competing with theirs, but what about the ones that run on platforms that wouldnt generate any decent profit?
My Windows copy says (not that I am using Windows)
"Tetris is a trademark of Elorg
Tetris copyright and trademark licensed to Sphere, Inc, and sublicensed to Microsoft Corporation."
(I left out the part about M$ being the great universal Satan. but the rest is a direct copy.)
Guess it is copyrighted. Can anyone add to this?
Such as Borland vs Lotus, state that
essential Look and Feel cant be copyrighted.
i.e. For a spreadsheet, you can copyright the
Lotus 123 sheet layout.
Similarly, for a dropping blocks of four
squares game, you cant copyright the look and
feel itself, only implementations of it.
a useful archive of stuff.
http://lpt.ai.mit.eduThe Tetris corporation (or whatever) should get a new law firm. This one evidently doesn't understand the ramifications of the "look and feel" part.
In some respects, it really is a shame that MS won the "look and feel" case Apple brought against them. It would have forced MS to do something truly innovative to win market share from Apple. But that was then and this is now and this Tetris company is tilting at windmills.
--mtngrown
Hmmmmm.
I'm under the impression that the tetris shapes are based on an ancient (i.e. before America was discovered) game called 'Pentominoes'. This involved fitting shapes, such as L - | etc, into different sized rectangles.
The whole look and feel copyright is stupid as most design ideas are based partly on earlier ones. However I'm still convinced that microsoft will patent breathing one day.
-SP
If there is a copyright, than that should be the end of the argument. Any blatant copies of the game are illegal and should not be distributed under any licences, especially the GPL. This type of thing will give Linux and the GPL a huge black eye. If it's ok to break this copyright because it is a popular game, why not break all copyrights; including music, books, magazines, hardware and software copyrights, etc. This is not Linux's area this is M$ specialty.
Trademark dilution only applies to stuff that has similar names. They're going after every Tetris clone, whatever the name.
Copyright is futile, at least in its present form.
Instead of providing an infrastructure upon which
the free market can evolve, it is more and more
abused to destroy the very market it should
help to flourish. Copyright and patents are used
as means for destroying opponents, not as means
to protect ones own products from misfits. Today,
the copyright-holders, not anymore the "infringers" have become the biggest misfits.
The Tetris company is a very nice example for this
kind of miserable copyright-exploitation. Do nothing, buy copyrights, sue to world and make
big money.
This is a very serious issue for the whole society. If there isn't found a good solution
we'll end up in a world looking like the worst
nightmares of William Gibson.
"The more prohibitions there are, The poorer the people will be" -- Lao Tse
PS Though *nix versions are fine (of course), a Windoze version would also be acceptable, as I do end up there occasionally ;).
Alex Bischoff
HTML/CSS coder for hire
Like the mansion on the rainy night where the butler did it?
This sort of thing goes on all the time, but only in the software field do we find so much flak over the subject.
The biggest problem with the software industry today is that people see lots of money in it (thanks to M$). That sort of high payoff potental is just the sort of thing that attracts lawyors like bees to honey.
I read the internet for the articles.
There are only a few basic themes or genres in gaming. Of course good games take an interesting approach to an old subject. What's to stop people from ripping off Quake II? Nothing, in fact, look at all the people that succesfully have
There will always be tetris-like games until someone get a patent (god forbid) on that specific type of puzzle or something. Note I did not say copyright -- the most their enforcement means is that people will have to stop using the word "tetris" in their game's name ... hardly a big deal. Look at all the hundreds of local and store variations for Coca-Cola and Dr. Pepper ...
I guess that means we're going to have to come up with a new name for that type of puzzle game.
Any suggestions?
And besides, there is the trouble of trademark dilution, so they have to object to all unlicenced use.
In the case of Tetris, I think that horse escapted from the barn a long time ago...
"Remember, there never were pineapple-almond cookies here."
www.rotaru.com is down. This site had excelent java versions of Tetris and Pentix. Aparantly the maintainer of the site got a "cease and desist" letter.
If you go to the site there is a vague explanation.
"Remember, there never were pineapple-almond cookies here."
Thanks for your reply. I have to say that yours is absolutely the best java implimentation of Tetris that I have come across. Anyway, as far as I know, the only legitimate beef they have with you is your use of the "Tetris" trademark. It is interesting that they feel they own the right to the look and feel in such a broad sence that your "Colors" game infringes. It is pretty clear that they are overstepping the bounds of common sense. Of course, I am not a lawyer.
If you look on the www.tetris.com site, click on "the company" then "piracy", Then click on "Tetris is a copyrighted game -- what does this mean to me" they have the following quote:
The protected expression of the TETRIS games is the concept of a "brick" or "block" game in which differently-shaped Tetranimoes, each including four cells (or even some other number), fall from the top of the screen and are arranged by the player to complete horizontal lines. Later versions of TETRIS, whether created by Elorg or others, are derivative works. These may not be made, used or distributed without the consent of the Tetris Company.
This, in effect, says that anyone who distributes anything remotely like tetris is a pirate. Could this be grounds for a libel suit against them? I guess you would have to prove that they are knowingly damaging the reputations of freeware authors by calling them "pirates". Or something. Anyway, I Am Not A Lawyer.
"Remember, there never were pineapple-almond cookies here."
The first Tetris I ever played was the one bundled with the original (b&w) Gameboy. It's a "legit" Tetris, and it's the best one ever. No Tetris clone that I've seen mimics it 100%.
Does bending the rules and twisting the name evade this particular sort of liscensing?
--Threed
Usually, the defendant files a countersuit against the plaintiff to recover legal fees, so that if the case is found to be meritless, the plaintiffs do have to pay.
-- Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah. -- Blah Blah
The problem with that is that it means companies will be much less inclined to take an idea and improve it. It means that we'll be stuck with some copyrighted piece of software and have no way to recreate it in order to add features or take it in new directions without risking a copyright suit. In short, it would be bad for Linux and bad for the software industry as a whole.
Face it. If companies had been this patent and copyright happy 20-30 years ago, we wouldn't have a Linux. We wouldn't have much of the software that we do have because someone else would have copyrighted some similar idea and nobody would have been able to write the software they wanted to write because they would have feared being sued.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Quoth a blurb on www.tetris.com: Soon you will be able to play Tetris head to head on-line against a neighbor or someone half way around the world!
How many years has xtris been doing this now?
You seem to have forgotten that the whole point of copyright & patent in the first place were to encourage new development. They were considered a necessary evil to get people to produce new, wondrous things. Since the system has been subverted so badly to accomodate greed, it's having the opposite effect. If it's no longer serving its original purpose, that truly is an issue.
Of course, since it's been going on so long, it's just considered status quo, which people tend to equate with being ok.
Serves the colonies right for leaving in the first place...
dylan_-
--
Igor Presnyakov stole my hat
go after the Brown Department of Computer Science. The primary intro course here requires the students to build a Tetris clone. It'd be..interesting..to see whether this self-styled 'Tetris Company' is confident enough to take on a university rather than some student who can't afford to defend himself..
(I remember seeing this before..the most amusing thing is where they refer to the creation of anything remotely similar to Tetris as 'piracy' and claim that these games are made from 'inferior materials'..)
Daniel
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
For those of you interested, here is a link about the whole tetris history and why Tetris.com might have a valid claim. Still, I do not agree with the fact that they are after the little guys who are not making any money from their code.
http://atarihq.com/tsr/special/tetrishist.html
The real silver bullet to good programs is caffeine; lots and lots of caffeine! *twitch, twitch*
I suspect they have a valid case: after all, this is a specific game. They don't seem to be going after tetris-like games (like hextris), but just clones.
.GIF format battle a few years back -- they may have a valid case, but they have waited far too long to bring it. Somehow I doubt they'll be able to pull the clones now.
Unfortunately (for them...) this rings of the whole
just my USD$0.02
We may not imagine how our lives could be more frustrating and complex—but Congress can. – Cullen Hightower
They don't own the Tetris copyright and they can't own it either. Tetris was created in the 60s/70s by a Russian scientist who refused to collect royalties. He essentially made the Tetris name concept and original source code public domain.
If these yahoos choose to sue then take it to a british court because there is no way they can win.
PS : In England, Jamaica and some other commonwealth countries the looser pays all the expenses and when you bring a merit-less case ( like this one ) the courts are extremely hard on you and have bean known to award punitive damages and to fine you for creating public mischief.
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
There is a Tetris included with every copy of QT and Troll Tech makes no claims about ownership that I am aware of other than "We wrote this toy so you can poke through the source and see how cool the QT tool kit is".
Troll is small by corporate standards but it would be nice for these gays to pick on them since Troll would win easily and recoup the cost of going to court.
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
Look and Feel copyrights are bogus, and if this goes through it could ruin the software industry. Getting a look-and-feel copyright on tetris creates a slippery slope.
Imagine if id wanted to get a look and feel copyright with wolfenstein and claim that all first person perspective 3D games with a gun were their invention. It would be a reasonable extrapolation if the look and feel of tetris could be copyrighted.
this isn't capitalism, it's extorsion and racketeering.
__
Scott Draves
How can this be news? This story is as old as the hills.
Kris
Kriston J. Rehberg
http://kriston.net/
Kriston
I hate to defend their argument, but it would be akin to a person writing a very successful novel involving very specific characters, then someone else coming along and using those characters and the environment in their own novel without even asking permission of the original author.
... except that this author didn't create his own characters, and so he can't claim much more ownership than anyone else.
-rozzin.
There should be a lawing forbidding the articles found on Geocities to be posted on Slashdot. Seriously folks, we are just generating hits, giving Geocities all the more power to continue what thet are doing.
Ah, I feel better. Back to coding...
--Ivan, weenie NT4 user, Jon Katz hater: bite me!
--weenie NT4 user: bite me!
"Computers are nothing but a perfect illusion of order" -- Iggy Pop
HMM...
I know for a fact that a russian guy made tetris.. and those guys just stole it and lisenced it..
They just suck.
I wrote my own Tetris a while ago, so this issue is of particular concern to me. I have it on my website, but don't charge for it (how the hell are ya going to get anyone to buy a regular tetris game anyway?). I have not made a penny from making it, and never will - only wrote it for something fun to program and play. And until I recieve a court order to remove it, it's going to stay right where it is.
I assume this is a small company, there's no way they have the resources to take every person who's ever written a tetris-like game to court. So I believe this is mostly a bluff.
I don't understand why they have such a beef with us "tetris cloners" anyway. Why don't they spend their time making a newer version and sell it rather than removing all tetris clones and not making any money.
The problem is, as stated, the target is merely a student, and most likely doesnot have access to the required monies to defend himself in what passes for the court of law.
This is one of my favorite pet peeves. People don't understand how *wide* their definition of Tetris is. All games from tetris to wordtris to tetrisphere all had to be licensed from them, but all of those games are wildly different in actual play. If it has quadraminoes (?) and gravity, then they own it.
:P (i have a working version, help?)
Anyhow, what can they do besides send out "cease and desist" emails? Can't the project simply stop distributing their efforts? Or is that against the gpl? What if the project is using a "totally free" license?
I'm working on a game in the same genre.. the game play is similar to tetris 2 (tetris flash) but there are instead 4 different colors and you have to get them 4-in-a-row to score. It is score-based (original tetris) as opposed to level-based (dr. mario) but I suck at coding
I think there time has passed.
If the creator of Tetris had wanted to protect his copyright he should have done so long ago. Even if he couldn't afford to sue anyone, he should have protested anyway. By not doing so he gave people no reason to suspect that he was interested in the copyright of the game.
Although IANAL, I would have thought that the copyright on the Tetris concept would have been diluted too much - Tetris appeared about 15 years ago, and to start trying to enforce copyright now is just too late. I know that the courts in the UK would throw this out without hesitation!
Perhaps these developers should club together and get a restraining order placed against the Tetris company for threatening behaviour...
*--BigMan--- Time flies like an arrow.. but personally I prefer a nice glass of wine!
The "look and feel", as others have pointed out, seems to be a baseless claim, as no one has succeeded in winning a l&f case in court. But what about the "rules" to the game (which I think the company is really alluding to in its email)? Can you copyright those to some extent?
If you took the game Monopoly, and replaced the squares and pawns with an "Open Source" theme (20 lines of source required to stay overnight on Debian Avenue, with the pawns being Eric Raymond, Richard Stallman, etc.), and just simply named it "The Bazaar", would you be in violation of Parker Brothers' copyright? The name doesn't sound like "Monopoly," but the rules and flow of the game are exactly like Monopoly's. I think you'd be asked to remove it pretty quickly from their legal team.
A lot of shareware games have seemed to dodge this issue by modifying the game just slightly so that it feels a lot like the original game, but is tweaked just enough that it's not a blatant copy. I think of PacMan and Galaga in the early days (there was "MunchMan" on the TI-99/4A, for example, and Ambrosia Software made its business making copies of popular arcade titles). The precedent set in the industry, thus, seems to be that it's OK to copy an original, just as long as it's not an exact copy - i.e., add some "value" to it.
I think it's an interesting issue because I'd like to do a PalmPilot-version of the board game Quorridor. It's a great game with simple rules, and can even be played with a piece of paper and pennies. But since its rules are so simple (and perfect they way they are right now, in my mind), I wouldn't change the rules a bit (and then, without a doubt, I'd be ripping off someone else's great idea).
So, can you copyright the rules to a game?
SoulfryWhere it gets sort of fuzzy is the difference between a concept and a specific set of rules which govern the game. The concept of a flight simulator or a first person shoot-em up game is quite different than the exact rules of how a Tetris game proceeds. You can sit down and write out a clearly defined set of rules which govern the Tetris game; you can't do that with a flight sim or a Quake-like game. That is, you can say, "You have pieces of 4 blocks each, in each of these different shapes. They drop down and when a solid line is formed, it is removed, etc."
You might argue that you can say, "Well, in Quake, you shoot at something, and when it gets so many bullets, it dies. And you have health, which can be replenished with a med pack, etc." These "rules" are much more vague than the Tetris rules, and allow for a lot of room for interpetation. Hence, no one is suing over Quake-like games.
What is needed is someone familiar with this type of law to take a look at the case.
Soulfry
Email:
esp@blueplanetsoftware.com
dlucas@blueplanetsoftware.com
Tell them that they are going to be associated with a company that tries to enforce a copyright by attacking the little guys first to support an unfounded copyright claim (see Apple vs. Microsoft).
æeee!
If you release a tetris clone, you are in no way allowed to use the name "Tetris" in the game, because of it's stranglehold on that trademark. You can not even name your website a derivitive of the Tetris name
Sure, they can trademark the term "Tetris", but
if they try to claim a copyright on the look and
feel of the Tetris game concept, it should be
fought in court. If a look and feel copyright were
allowed to stand, it would set a dangerous precedent. Imagine if Apple had been able to copyright some of their GUI interface ideas, and thus control them for 95 years. Imagine if visicalc had copyrighted the spreadsheet interface.
Tetris is everywhere. Hell, i had it on my
TI-85 for awhile. And its not exactly a hard
one to code either. And even if they do have
it copyrighted, does anyone care? I mean, who
the hell are they going to sue. Its even out
there as Java applets. I think this is just
another lamer company trieing to twistlasws to
make em rich.
I'm afraid. I'm afraid, Dave. Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going.
It really is sad that most of the posters cannot see past the end of their very own nose. Yeah, it may be unfortunate that the Tetris Company isn't going to make a Tetris for Linux, but the own the damn rights to it. As long as it's something you want, then you will piss and whine about it, but if Microsoft is doing such a thing or if YOU own the rights to a property, I am sure you would be less than thrilled with other people making money off your property. Check your heads.
www.jackasscritics.com
I don't mean to sound overly suspicious, but has this been confirmed? Specifically, has the story appeared anywhere other than a Geocities site?
I merely ask because if you check out www.tetris.com, you'll see quite a few messages posted on the boards about people looking for specific clones. Hosting these messages doesn't sound like the work of a rabid, lawyer-influenced capitalist.
I am usually against patents crap but in this case, I am with the creator. Tetris is a unique game concept so if he wants it public domain, so be it. If he wants to protect it, so be it. These sort of things are hard to come by. If I was in his position I would feel robbed if somebody comes up with a Tetris rip-off.
Nope, I don't really care about Doom or Street Fighter ripoffs. I don't see them as being unique as Tetris.
I guess that means we're going to have to come up with a new name for that type of puzzle game.
.15 squares per second, to a maximum etc. etc.) it might be patentable, but it would be easy to modify their specific numbers and get around it.
Any suggestions?
"Tetrominoes"
That's what any decent recreational mathematician would call the pieces, anyway.
IAKAL^H^H^HNAL, but I think it would be hard to get a patent on it because of the existence of prior art - read Martin Gardner's books, or his old columns in Scientific American (sorry for the lack of specific issues or books, but its been 5 years since I was on a recreational math kick). Puzzles of the sort of "Fit the tetrominoes into a given space" have been around for a while. I just don't know if the vague concept of "pieces dropping from the sky" is patentable. I suppose if they were specific enough (there are 20 rows, each one is 17 squares wide, pieces drop at the rate of 1.32 squares per second, increasing each level by
i before e except after c.
So how do you explain this sentence:
"Einstein reigns over ancient scientists."
Well how about chess, hearts, spades, checkers, poker, slot machines? All these things were made up by /someone/ but that doesn't mean that I can't carve checkers out of wood and play in back yard or sell my homemade checker set if I wish. Frivilous law suits should be punished by the plaintif paying for all court costs as well as a fine like some countries do. It just backs up the legal system so that murderers and and rapists are not brought to justice as quickly as the should be.
What do they care if someone else puts time and energy into making there own version of tetris?
I wrote a version of tetris once, does this mean i have to take it off of my website?
Being a capitalizt, I have to be opposed to
any claim of owning "intelectual property" and
all that. Of course, this means I have to be
for Microsloth in the anti-trust case, but
I can deal. This is obviously a case where a
large company is trying to bully the little guy.
Let them take you to court! You'll win and
change some _very_ bad precidents that have been
set.
6th Street Radio @ddombrowsky
Nintendo itself has set a precedent. They successfully got all copies of the great C64 game "The Great Giana Sisters" off the shelf. Giana Sisters was an excellent remake of Super Mario Brothers, except with female heroines (unheard of in those pre-Lara Croft days) and lots of different characters. The game used no Nintendo copyrighted names, characters or artwork. But apparently Nintendo felt it owned the rights to any game where you run, jump, bop blocks and stomp on enemies. I don't know whether or not Nintendo legitimately won its case in front of a judge. But I DO know that they sued, and as a result, Giana Sisters ceased to exist except on a few C64 diehards' machines, whether real or emulated.
The precedent set is, basically, that all game clones are illegal. Guess this means I should stop working on GNUdius....