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Jeffrey Pavlov
16,191 PointsIs this an infringement on a copyright?
Hi,
I recently created a score board for a game called "Ingenious" after the one that originally came with the game failed me. It would be great to launch a free version to Google Play so everyone else could use it. My question is, do I infringe on any copyrights by releasing the app under the name "Ingenious Scoreboard" and if the software mimics the physical board. Thanks in advance!
2 Answers
Kevin Korte
28,148 PointsI'm no lawyer, but I'll give you my opinion
- You are probably okay on the scoreboard app itself functioning like the games scoreboard.
- You probably can not have the appearance (colors, fonts, etc) look too much like the games scoreboard would.
- I bet the games name is Trademarked, and so I bet you can't use the games name, or any likelyhood of the games name in the name of your app.
I hate answering these types of questions, so I'd encourage you to find out more and see if you can find any cases or real world examples where someone digitally replicated part of a companies physical asset, and what happened in court.
Jeffrey Pavlov
16,191 PointsThanks.
Geoff Parsons
11,679 PointsGeoff Parsons
11,679 PointsGreat points Kevin Korte, adding on to link to the US Copyright Office's section on copyrighting of games. Not all that useful but does cover the official stance on some of the points mentioned above.
I'd like to second the most important fact stated above though: I am not a lawyer. It may be worth contacting the game company and asking for permission though I wouldn't hold your breath or get your hopes up. :(