On Wed, 23 Jul 2003 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > If that's the case, and your scope argument is interesting, then the vast > majority of PI is trivial to circumvent unless it is already protected by other > laws (like trademark or copyright). > > Because honestly, if you can source exactly the same thing (like a name) from > the public domain (and since the name can't be copyrighted by itself, only > trademarked) then people could have their buddy (who hasn't read the OGL'd > product) write a one paragraph story using the name, license it from him or grab it > from the public domain, and utterly circumvent all protections for PI'd > character names except those which are established because the name is a trademark.
"Trivial" apparently meaning "through the use of a time machine." In order for you to make a claim to sourcing a term to the public domain, it has to be the *pre-existing* public domain; your buddy has to write his one-paragraph story *before* the book with that same name PI'd comes out. Otherwise the hypothetical judge in the hypothetical case is likely to laugh in your face as he rules against you. Spike Y Jones _______________________________________________ Ogf-l mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.opengamingfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/ogf-l
