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Sep 29, 2011 -- 9:46AM, CrowScape wrote:

Sep 29, 2011 -- 9:35AM, Dane_McArdy wrote:

Trust me, you'd get sued, and you would loose.  

Of course I would loose, as lawsuits are scary things. I'd hope there was a bathroom nearby.

Fortunately, I wouldn't lose, as I am merely taking the idea. This is different than Koons, who COPIED THE PHOTO. All he did was render it in 3D, otherwise, it was the EXACT SAME THING. Red-Jack's theoretical plagarist's work is more original, which is why the plagarist gets off scott free, while Koons loses in court (And he probably loosed, as well).

I guess you decided to not read about the case beause:

"the puppies were to be made blue, their noses exaggerated, and flowers to be added to the hair of the man and woman." 

It was not exactly the same thing.

"The Court found both "substantial similarity" and that Koons had access to the picture. The similarity was so close that the average lay person would recognize the copying, a measure for evaluation. Thus the sculpture was found to be a copy of the work by Rogers.

On the issue of fair use, the court rejected the parody argument, as Koons could have constructed his parody of that general type of art without copying Rogers' specific work. That is, Koons was not commenting on Rogers' work specifically, and so his copying of that work did not fall under the fair use exception."

Another example, one that I know well enough, because it involves me:

Kool Aid Gets Fired

 I know for a fact that people at Kraft, the owners and makers of Kool Aid have seen the comic book, I've meet the people, who bought it directly from me at comic book shows. One guy worked in pudding research, and later wrote to me how everyone in the office loved it. 

 See, my story is parody and satire, and is protected by the law as fair use. I don't base my story on any story that Kraft came out with. Nor do I base any of the characters in it on people working at Kraft. I don't use their Image of Kool Aid, nor any other of their art. Same for all the other food mascots that appear in the book. 

Now, that's NOT to say they couldn't try and sue me. Like I said, anyone can file a lawsuit. But I've had this book out for about 5 years now, and it's been reviewed a lot, even in national papers, like USA today.

If anything was to happen, it most likely would have happened by now.

Certainly Petter Bagge and Alan Moore didn't get sued for their Kool Aid story.

Sep 29, 2011 -- 10:10AM, CrowScape wrote:

Sep 29, 2011 -- 9:57AM, Dane_McArdy wrote:

I guess you decided to not read about the case beause:

"the puppies were to be made blue, their noses exaggerated, and flowers to be added to the hair of the man and woman." 

It was not exactly the same thing.

Ah, you went from Wikipedia. Nice of you to truncate your quote to remove the guilty passage:

He asked that as much detail be copied as possible

Copyright protects WORKS. Koons copied the WORK. Koons was guilty.

In my example, I am copying the IDEA. Copyright does not protect IDEAS. Legally, I'm good. Rowlings can threaten to sue, force me to incure legal fees, process being the punishment and all, but I'm still on the right side of the law.

Now, is there a bright line distinction where you can tell when someone has stopped copying the idea, and started copying the work? No. This is why it is in your interest to make your work as distinct as possible from whatever inspired you. But, you cannot conclude from this that copyright is protecting the idea, because the only thing that can get you into trouble is similarity TO THE WORK.

Really, I'm serious, there was a guy with a similar name and even avatar to yours. Ask him, he can probably explain it to you better than I can (though maybe he's infringed on your copyright, so he's in hiding).

Nice example in your case, though, which illustrates absolutely nothing.

It's nice you actually finally read it, rather then trying to argue without reading. 

But Koons argued that he was inspired, by the postcard, and instructed that changes be made to the final piece. And that it was also parody protected by fair use. The courts ruled that it wasn't the case. It didn't help Koons case that he removed the copyright from the image. But it's not why the courts decided against him. Like they said "The similarity was so close that the average lay person would recognize the copying, a measure for evaluation."

Like I said, you can claim you were inspired by JK Rowling all you want. You can even believe it to the core of your soul that you didn't steal from her. In the court of law, that really doesn't matter. They are going to look at her story, and your story, and decide if there are enough similarities between your story. If they see it, you lose. If they don't, you win. 

The End. 

Sep 29, 2011 -- 10:19AM, Dane_McArdy wrote:

It's nice you actually finally read it, rather then trying to argue without reading.

Stupid me, I read the actual court ruling instead of Wikipedia. See, I was led to believe the following from that:

23.

Here, the trial court found original elements of  creative expression in the copyrighted work were copied and that the  copying was so blatantly apparent as not to require a trial.   We agree  that no reasonable juror could find that copying did not occur in this  case.   First, this case presents the rare scenario where there is  direct evidence of copying.   Koons admittedly gave a copy of the  photograph to the Italian artisans with the explicit instruction that  the work be copied.   Moreover, the importance of copying the very  details of the photograph that embodied plaintiff's original  contribution--the poses, the shading, the expressions--was stressed by  Koons throughout the creation of the sculpture.   His instructions  invariably implored that the creation must be designed "as per photo."    This undisputed direct evidence of copying is sufficient to support the  district court's granting of summary judgment.

Little did I know that a reading of the Wikipedia entry would have shown me that this wasn't important.

Edit: And lastly, to put the nail in your argument's coffin, from the decision of your favored copyright court case:

26 We recognize that ideas, concepts, and the like found  in the common domain are the inheritance of everyone.   What is  protected is the original or unique way that an author expresses those  ideas, concepts, principles or processes.   Hence, in looking at these  two works of art to determine whether they are substantially similar,  focus must be on the similarity of the expression of an idea or fact,  not on the similarity of the facts, ideas or concepts themselves.

Oct 1, 2011 -- 2:48AM, BlinkBlink wrote:

Thanks! That's what I'd expected. But hearing someone upthread assert that WotC *shares* the copyright struck me as pretty odd.

The real thing to keep in mind, that clause in the ToS is mainly (like 99%) to protect WoTC from someone posting and then claiming WoTC stole their idea a few months later, when they come out with something similiar.

I might have issues with WoTC, but I honestly can't see them coming to the forums looking for idea's, and if they find one they think is great, not contacting the person and working something out.