The World Handled A 'Wordle' Ripoff Just Fine Without Any IP Action
from the move-along dept
In the video game space, it has become commonplace to see creators freak out over “rip-offs” and “clones” of their games when the targets of their ire are actually not rip-offs or clones at all. This typically comes down to the all to common confusion over whether you can own or protect ideas versus specific expression. Typically in these stories, it turns out someone is complaining that they’re seeing a similar idea in other games, whether it’s first person shooters that share common features, the explosion of battle royale games, or even just artwork.
Which brings us to Wordle, a browser-based game that I gleefully enjoy telling my fellow Techdirt readers I have not played. However you feel about the game, it’s notable in that its creator has been adamant about not monetizing the game, nor has he bothered registering any copyright or trademark for it. Between that and the game’s popularity, there is a ton of goodwill there, which may explain why the world smacked down another person’s attempt to actually clone (basically) the game into a mobile app that then required paid subscriptions for all of the features.
“I love Wordle so much I decided to make my own Wordle app but with a twist!” tech entrepreneur Zack Shakked wrote on Twitter yesterday. “There’s not just 5-letter words, but also 4, 6, and 7 letter words too! You can also play unlimited times if you’re on the Pro version.”
The new version of Wordle on the App Store didn’t just have bigger puzzles, it also required you to pay a subscription to unlock all of its features. It was a greedy innovation that, in the words of Any Baio, compounded the plagiarism into a “naked cash grab.” The downloads, reviews, and active paid trials instantly started rolling in.
Yes, they rolled in. And Shakked took to Twitter to brag about the adoption rate in the most irritating way possible.
“We’re going to the fucking moon.” That prediction turned out to be true, by which I mean the creator ended up in a place where all the oxygen had been sucked into a vacuum. See, that goodwill I mentioned before for the original Wordle creator led to the internet losing its damned fool mind over this cloning of the Wordle game into a money-grabbing app. In addition to Andy Baio dunking on Shakked, so did many, many others.
Cabel Sasser of indie studio Panic, the publisher behind Untitled Goose Game currently working on the Playdate handheld, responded to Shakked that he couldn’t wait to show Wordle’s true creator how to navigate the App Store takedown process. Others were more explicit. “Absolutely fuck you,” wrote Vlambeer cofounder Rami Ismail.
And eventually, Apple took the Shakked’s app down. The reasons why are trivially easy to understand: the app called itself “Wordle”, had nearly the exact same gameplay and look as the original game, and was clearly attempting to profit off of the work of others.
But notably absent in all of this was anything related to actual intellectual property registrations and the like. The world managed to take the right and corrective action on a bad actor without talking about copyright, trademarks, lawyers, cease and desist notices, DMCA takedowns, or any of that. You can chalk some of this up to our general ownership culture I suppose, but the truth is this all feels like the public doing its thing via a backlash on someone doing something shitty and Apple responding to that.
Which leads to the obvious question: why can’t this be the norm?
Filed Under: content moderation, copycats, games, trademark, wordle, zack shakked
Companies: apple
Comments on “The World Handled A 'Wordle' Ripoff Just Fine Without Any IP Action”
'Treat our customers like people? What a crazy idea.'
Which leads to the obvious question: why can’t this be the norm?
Because getting the public on your side like that requires that you treat them decently and not try to squeeze every last cent out of them by the most exploitative methods you can think of, and that’s just way too much work and not nearly as profitable for most companies.
What’s a five-letter word for “asshole”?
Re: Five-letter synonym
"prick" (when "asshole" is glossed as "contemptible person")
Re: Re:
Uh…
isn’t is just "Ahole"
Not universally applicable
One thing not acknowledged in this article though is the way the Apple app store is set up allows for this kind of action. Apple has sole authority, with likely very minor restrictions to avoid lawsuits, to remove any app they want. The only way this would work globally is if all markets had a similar "benevolent dictator" controlling them that could easily remove bad actors without getting lawyers involved.
Also not addressed is this was perpetrated by basically an individual and not some massive company. If Facebook, Google, or even Apple for example wanted to create something similar and push it to their audiences and monetize it, the public backlash likely wouldn’t be enough to stop them. Of course they’d be smarter about it and call it something different even if the game is effectively identical.
Finally, it was done against something massively popular at the height of its fad. If instead the target was something with a slightly smaller community, there may be backlash from that community but the rest of the world would do a collective shoulder shrug and it probably wouldn’t be enough to move the needle for a company like Apple to care.
Re: Not universally applicable
This!
If the original has enough popularity/media coverage, things like this are resolved almost instantly. But it is the result of an exceptional and manual intervention by Apple because of the visibility of the specific case. For all those less-visible but original and wonderful apps that are drowned out by unscrupulous clones, there is absolutely no recourse…
It’s like the numerous dragging and seemingly unsolvable customer complaints that all of a sudden are resolved almost instantly once media coverage becomes high enough for The Brand to be scared of Bad Publicity…
seriously?
The like the "mob with pitchforks" approach?
Unfortunately the only reason the backlash worked was because it was an individual doing it. If it were King or Zynga it’d still be up as their empires are built on copycat games
Re: Re:
No, the main problem here is that they used the actual brand name of the original. The original author chose not to trademark it, but it seems clear that there will be definite customer confusion here (as people trying to search for Wordle will only get this app and not the original they intended to search for), and that has certain possible implications legally and financially down the road for the store if they knowingly allow it to happen.
King or Zynga would have copied everything but named it "Word Crush Saga" or "Wordville" and been in the clear because they weren’t using the original name.
Re: Re: Re:
Eh, King are fairly scummy when it comes to trademarks, they’d try and claim Wordle Saga and when that gets challenged, go and buy the rights to an obscure game from the mid 2000s with a similar name and steal it out from under them for their clone.
https://www.themarysue.com/king-candyswipe/
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-02-12-king-accused-of-more-trademark-trolling
It wouldn’t be the first time.
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Cloning games is evil...
Basically copyright protects original expression. There is very low bar for content item to be considered original expression, i.e. basically single words or 2-3 word combinations are not yet expressive enough, but when there’s a whole sequence of words, like a paragraph of text, it clearly gets copyright protection. This applies to your game’s feature list too. If someone blatantly copies your featurelist, one, two or 3 features are not a big problem, but when there’s a whole paragraph of features being cloned, you can start asking difficult copyright questions from the authors.
While copyright protection protects expression, it would be best to actually write down text document explaining the thought process. But in case of the game, if the text document of your features does not exist, you can use your game screenshots or source code as a replacement. It just needs to be original expression…
This has nothing to do with whatever they call "ideas" when considering ideas/expression division line. Your game screenshots or game source code are clearly in expression side of that equation, and copyright protects it. Thus when you encounter clones of your exact game mechanics, you can start listing features and if the cloned features crosses certain 3-5 feature threshold, copyright protection will become an issue.
Re: Cloning games is evil...
Not really. Software has always had somewhat ‘thinner’ protection than most copyrightable works due to its more functional nature. For example:
Mechanics are procedures, processes, systems, or methods of operation. They’re not copyrightable under 17 USC 102(b). This is true of individual mechanics — better known as ‘rules’ and collective ones.
For example, here are the official Rules of Golf (slightly outdated but you get the point). The rules aren’t copyrightable because they’re the procedures, etc., for playing the game. A given written expression of them may be, but anyone can rewrite the rules so long as they don’t claim to be from (though they can claim compatibility with) the US Golf Association.
If you couldn’t then copyright would effectively be a patent on the game itself, as opposed to protection for a particular implementation.
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Re: Re: Cloning games is evil...
This is avoided because only the original expression is protected. So if you create a football game, the football rules are not "original", since you just reimplemented already established football rules. This original requirement filters out attempts to copyright already established game rules.
Only the stuff that are original are protected. So if you made football game that has robots playing against humans, then only the robot selection gets copyright protection, not the whole football game. And thus when you "clone" other people’s football games, only the decision that robots are playing would be dangerous in your cloned game. This all comes from the "original" keyword in copyright laws.
Cloning established football rules is dangerous for another reason. Usually the sports organisations are very protexctive of their logos and look and feel of their trademarks. Cloning those trademarked sports organsation’s assets would be natural next step after football rules have been implemented, to make it look like "real football game". But that tendency to copy real world football games is leading to dangerous area in intellectual property.
Re: Re: Re: Cloning games is evil...
Rules, blah blah blah, trademarks no one mentioned.
You really know how to move the goalposts.
Re: Re: Re: Cloning games is evil...
No, only original works of authorship are even potentially copyrightable. But merely being an original work of authorship does not guarantee copyrightability.
There are several reasons why the rules of football are not copyrightable, but yes, a lack of originality is one of them. However, even completely original game rules (and note also the difference between novelty and originality; novelty means ‘did not previously exist’ while originality merely means ‘were not copied, even if they did previously exist’) are not copyrightable.
I’m guessing that you mean a video game rather than humans and robots playing against each other on a football field/pitch. This adds unnecessary though immaterial complications. In discussing the general issue of rule copyrightability let’s stick to humans and robots on a football field/pitch. (The humans are playing American* football, the robots are playing soccer — this is only one of the interesting rules of human/robot football)
No. The rules for what sorts of robots the robot coach can select are also not copyrightable, even though they’re original. For example, the original rule that midfield robots must be able to transform into street-legal cars but back robots must be of types used for automobile welding and assembly, and goalies must be a robot vacuum. This is truly a fascinating new sport.
You need to read more laws. Whether a game can involve robots is not a work of authorship. A book of rules stating that Football/Soccer must involve robots is a work but the particular rule is just part of the system/process/method of playing the game. It may need to be expressed differently (possibly not under the merger doctrine given the law-like nature of rules where precise language is vital) but it is clearly not copyrightable.
Not relevant for this discussion. Besides, lots of games and teams have no difficulty picking new names except when they don’t, like the Giants, Cardinals, Rangers, Panthers, Jets, Kings, and probably others.
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Re: Re: Re:2 Cloning games is evil...
This isn’t true. Robots are clearly one element in the feature list of such game. And my whole position is that feature lists are protected by copyright, even if the actual list is not "fixed" in a "medium". The feature list gets "fixed in medium" status when the game source code is implemented, even if the features themselves are described in the source code as very verbose manner, where its not immediately clear which line of source code implements which feature. The feature lists are special because any implementation will have those features fixed in a medium.
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
Features and game mechanics aren’t covered by copyright. But you’d know this if you were an actual developer, instead of a sad Chris Dodd/Paul Hansmeier wannabe.
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Re: Re: Re:4 Re:
There is no reason to keep features outside of copyright protection. It requires similar kind of intellectual effort to invent new features for software than whatever your million monkeys are typing in a typewriter. Feature development is fundamentally trial and error type activity, i.e. you need to write the same feature multiple times until you find a configuration that actually becomes successful. It would be strange to give copyright protection for activity that implements a feature once, but then fail to give copyright protection for activity where the features are implemented 15 times. This kind of thinking that 15 times more difficult work is not worthy of the same protection than doing it just once, is completely crazy kind of thinking.
Final feature set for any project is the most important sellable asset for any software project… Software project might have 150 failed features, and 32 features in the end product, but 182 features needed to be developed to get the product out from the shop door. We’re really wondering which part of the features you think should deserve most protection from copyright law?
Re: Re: Re:5 Re:
Oh but there is. Copyrights are for original creative works of authorship. Trademarks (and the like) are for source identifiers. It’s patents that are for things that function: useful novel inventions.
A software feature — like (and I’m showing my age here) justifying text in a word processor — is a useful function, not a creative one. A particular implementation of it might be creative, but that’s merely an example of how a given thing can embody multiple different types of ‘intellectual property’ not that the policy of having strict separation between copyrights, patents, and trademarks can or should be gone around. (Trademarks also have a utility doctrine — useful features cannot be source identifiers once the patent expires, or else the expiration of the patent wouldn’t really let them into the public domain).
Copyrights, trademarks, and patents are not replacements for each other. This policy comes from the Supreme Court (and lesser state and federal courts) in numerous cases and is also seen in statutes.
You yourself give away that you’re just trying to get around the patent system:
But tough titty; if you want to protect things you invent, i.e. inventions, get a patent.
No it’s not. Perhaps if you realized that, you’d be more successful at it such that you didn’t need to try to come up with stupid ways to rig and game the system for your own benefit. (Short-sightedly too; it would be used against you far more than you’d get to use it against others)
Re: Re: Re:5 Re:
cpt kangarooski’s already explained the issues you have when (probably intentionally) mixing up what copyrights and trademarks do, but here’s something you constantly need to be reminded of: copyright does not guarantee you money if you spend time doing failed development attempts or making poor business decisions. There is nothing in copyright law that entitles you to payment for wasted effort.
I get that there’s many a filmmaker who puts out trash like Uwe Boll’s flicks or Elf-Man and thus has to rely on scaring people into paying extortion money, but being a fucking annoyance and clogging up the courts with these cases is not the Hail Mary moneymaker you think it is.
Also it’s funny as hell that you’ve resorted to the good old MyNameHere/John Smith method of shitposting while logged out, desperately hoping no one would be able to track you on the bullshit you spew. Like you did when you started shitposting in 2015. Only took you five years to realize that signing up for a trollposting account was fucking dumb.
Re: Re: Re:6 Re:
At least it guarantees that the reason for failed marketing push is with my own actions, the offered product or product placement, and not because the customer already purchased the same product from another copycat vendor…
Re: Re: Re:7 Re:
Once again, on very rare occasions you demonstrate some amount of self-awareness that you only have yourself to blame for Meshpage’s complete and utter failure as a 3D engine.
If you think Blender and Pixar copied so much of your tech, you’re more than welcome to bring them to court and accuse them of copyright infringement. Odds are that will not end well for you. But I doubt anyone else will mind.
Re: Re: Re:8 Re:
I thnk you missed the keywords "the same product"… blender and pixar do not have the same product than meshpage.
Nice thing about copyright is that I don’t need to sue them myself. Its enough that someone in the world sues pirate services and forces their customers to find more legal service. All legal services that are actually offering a product to customers will benefit.
Re: Re: Re:9 Re:
Then why is so much of your strategy focused on them being destroyed from the market based on copyright infringement of your software?
This theory doesn’t pass the laugh test. Suing pirates in one service doesn’t magically funnel them towards a service in another industry. Even if there was an uptick in streaming subscriptions that isn’t a benefit to Meshpage. But you should know that already, because you still have zero users.
Re: Re: Re:10 Re:
Well, the working theory has the following elements:
1) meshpage was built by professional programmers
2) the developers worked hard enough that any more burdensome operation would be illegal because of labor laws
3) meshpage still has significant user-visible problems that competitors are able to sweep clean plate with
4) given that those competitors are more successful than meshpage, they must have done one of the following:
a) use illegal practices like copyright infringement
b) break labor laws by making employees work harder than is legally allowed
c) invent some mathematics which wasn’t available for meshpage authors
d) build larger teams for writing the software and pay salaries to all employees to get copyright assignments from the employees.
e) drop open source software
Basically these are the only alternatives for those more successful entities. And doing copyright infringement seems to be the choice that many of the entities are choosing. Thus we can destroy their operation, once we figure out which part of their operation needs help from the pirate community.
Re: Re: Re:11 Re:
Meshpage was built by one paranoid Finnish fucknugget who hates other humans and doesn’t believe in teams. This is irrefutable fact. This is something you regularly brag about.
Crunch work is common in the software development industry. Frankly, it’s a pretty reprehensible thing to put people through, but you’re not ruling an entire industry illegal because of it.
Um, yes? It’s called "your personal failure to compete". Customers are always open to use other legally available, improved competing services. Competing services aren’t going to suddenly become illegal because the alternative scenario sucks for you.
Once again, that’s up to you to prove in a court of law. Or someone else who sues those services on your behalf. And your track record on getting others to do your dirty work hasn’t been so great, has it chumley?
You invented mathematics which wasn’t available for non-meshpage authors. So?
Having a larger team is not going to suddenly make the operation illegal.
Yeah, we get it, you hate open source software like Paul Hansmeier hates due process.
Broski you’ve been "figuring out" this shit for years and still haven’t found anything. It’s fair to say that your threats are baseless, toothless, and worthless.
Re: Re: Re:11 Re:
"1) meshpage was built by professional programmers"
Unless you missed some significant detail out of the stories you’ve been spinning here for many years, it was built by exactly one incompetent Finnish programmer, who did it as a side projects after he got bored with embedded telecoms systems, threw a hissy fit and blocked anyone else from collaborating when he got some common sense being directed into his project, and has not received any compensation for it to offset all the money he threw at buses.
That’s stretching the "professional" aspect, especially if you enter the real world and understand that "open source" does not necessarily mean "unpaid" and that you’ve have to be some kind of extreme moron to be saying that Pixar don’t have professional staff working on their software.
Re: Re: Re:12 Re:
It’s still significantly better than what you can do. All we’ve heard from you is trolling and bashing systems that are ready for customers. When exactly you got your systems ready to be used by real customers?
Re: Re: Re:13 Re:
"It’s still significantly better than what you can do"
Maybe, but I don’t go around claiming to have world changing software that would work if only all of my competition were made illegal…
"systems that are ready for customers"
You might want to advertise one of those systems, because they’re not on meshpage.org…
"When exactly you got your systems ready to be used by real customers?"
Never. I provide infrastructure for a near 1 billion Euro company to run their software on, and for entertainment purposes I watch movies and play videogames created by people using your competitors. I’ve never claimed to be in the industry you have failed to participate in, I just trust the people who do.
Re: Re: Re:14 Re:
This isn’t required. The products are slightly illegal already at the time when they get popular among end users. My position is that all products on the planet are illegal in some ways. This is required feature before the product is able to get popularity.
Re: Re: Re:15 Re:
"My position is that all products on the planet are illegal in some ways."
You do realise you just included Meshpage in that comment, you little pirate you.
Re: Re: Re:16 Re:
Yes, I can’t know all inside trading rules that exists in the stock market.
Re: Re: Re:17 Re:
Not my damn problem. You said that all illegal products must be taken off the market to respect copyright law. You said that all products are illegal, including your own. Why is your stuff still available online? Because you’re a filthy fucking hypocrite, that’s why, and hypocrisy such as yours is why stricter copyright laws will never be accepted.
Re: Re: Re:18 Re:
(or risk having RIAA/MPAA knock your door)
Just need to keep the illegal part as small as possible. If customers and competitors cannot find it, it’s a-ok.
All development activity has some risk attached. Either you don’t get customer buy-in happening, or your product is too illegal and you need to take it off the shop shelf, but either way, it’s very risky to do any product development.
Then think of product safety requirements. If some small children buy your product and they accidentally hurt themselves with the product, you’ll be liable. There’s risks like this in all product development.
Re: Re: Re:19 Re:
Then put your money where your mouth and copyright law are, and take off your product if you want others to do the same.
Re: Re: Re:11 Re:
[Hallucinates facts not in reality]
Re: Re: Re:10 Re:
The statistics are slightly different than just zero users:
$6.00 Gross Revenue, 2 Payments, 2,302 Views, 437 Downloads, 17
Followers.
It’s slightly more than 0 users.
Re: Re: Re:11 Re:
Only you could use "I have 2 paying customers over the decade I’ve been whining here" as some kind of flex about how you don’t have literal zero customers…
Re: Re: Re:12 Re:
You missed the real news item. There’s actually 437 suckers who downloaded the product. Either your claims that meshpage is useless does not hold, or we have over 400 people who got sucked into trying the offering…
This kind of numbers are simply not fitting the message that you want to spread around. Someone might conclude that meshpage is useful to real customers, if you focus on the real important numbers.
Re: Re: Re:13 Re:
"There’s actually 437 suckers who downloaded the product"
Downloaded, but you don’t know if they ever used it and you didn’t convert them into paying customers.
"we have over 400 people who got sucked into trying the offering"
Apart from the fact that referring to them constantly as "suckers" doesn’t bode well, that’s fairly meaningless. I’ve tried many products over the years that have been instantly deleted because they were not good. A download does not mean they actually used it once, let alone liked it, found it useful or loaded it again.
Meanwhile how many downloads do the competitors you keep comparing yourself against have? I know they have regular users, because I’ve used the products those users created with them. I don’t recall seeing any product advertised proudly with "made with Meshpage" on their ad copy.
Also, 400 people over how much time? If that’s the whole time you’ve been complaining here, it’s nothing to boast about.
Re: Re: Re:14 Re:
Yes, because getting technology to work properly is more difficult task than you think. It’s like trying to turn inanimate rock into a living entity. You design what each part of the technology needs to do, write accurate code that implements the commands, and then your frankenstein monster will be alive. Once vampires have accepted the monster to be alive, there will be techdirt folks who still think it’s a dead rock that cannot move. Even after significant amount of proof that the rock moves independently and makes decisions without being kicked, techdirt refuses to declare it a living thing. The proof is all around you, but you refuse to accept the truth. It’s alive.
Re: Re: Re:15 Re:
"Yes, because getting technology to work properly is more difficult task than you think"
No, because I didn’t like the product, not because I couldn’t get it to work. Not every piece of software is for everyone and "not for me" is a perfectly valid reaction to even the best designed, bug free application.
"You design what each part of the technology needs to do"
…then forget to create a UI that actually informs the user that it does those things. I don’t believe you’ve ever fixed that issue after people laughed at you for having to provide usage instructions here because the keymapping required were not communicated by the UI or the surrounding documentation.
Re: Re: Re:16 Re:
It’s clearly a bug in the product, if users do not like it. Product developers are creating significant amount of features to their products to avoid the fate that users will reject it for no good reason.
Re: Re: Re:17 Re:
Thanks for admitting that Meshpage is full of bugs. Which you admitted to putting in yourself just so you could get your "RIAA copyright" to work.
Why the hell do we owe you money for your shitty work that we don’t even use?
Re: Re: Re:18 Re:
It’s not even a bug. He’s just described a failure in design and marketing, which are two things that no code can account for no matter how well it’s written.
Re: Re: Re:18 Re:
To avoid running after irrelevant stuff, I filter out stuff from the bug reports where the users failed to try the product properly. Basically, if you cannot even get a cube to the screen with builder, you’re not qualified to send bug reports to meshpage. This seems to happen quite often, especially in techdirt. Any other failure in the basic steps needed to get builder to work is similarly fatal to their bug reports.
It’s not a problem in the product, if users are simply too busy that they don’t have time to check out the solution that I’m offering. Solution to those problems is that users need to reserve a weekend for checking out the solution.
Re: Re: Re:19 Re:
As I often do, I have to wonder why someone so actively hostile to end users has decided to try making his name with a product that would fundamentally require working with them, if it were developed by someone competent.
Re: Re: Re:20 Re:
There is nothing that would require active particpation by end users. While end users might speed up decision processes, nothing in the development process requires that input. Development need to continue even in situations where end users are simply not available for money-testing the solution.
Re: Re: Re:21 Re:
Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about. If you think that you can dictate to end users what they want rather than listening to what they want, you’re in trouble.
I’ve worked for startups that have pivoted their entire business model due to user feedback. I somehow doubt that anyone’s going to continue using your product after being told they don’t matter and their experience is designed to cause them problems.
Re: Re: Re:22 Re:
The process does not work like that. I’m only implementing what is technically possible. After my work is done, it still requires some choosing which features to offer to each customer. The base work implements "full areas", i.e. all significant features are implemented once.
basically it does not dictate anything. I can quickly reconfigure my software to any customer wishes, once I receive information what is customer requirements.
Re: Re: Re:23 Re:
This is all extremely meaningless when you don’t have any customer wishes to base reconfigurations on.
Re: Re: Re:7 Re:
"At least it guarantees that the reason for failed marketing push is with my own actions,"
Your own actions guarantee that, there’s no reason to change the rules for people who are competent at what they do.
"not because the customer already purchased the same product from another copycat vendor"
Some of the projects you whine about being "copycats" existed long before your did.
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Re: Re: Re:8 Re:
I think you missed the whole point. Again problems with the "same product" requirement. It’s not copyright infringement if they just try to compete wth their own product. It is copyright infringement if they copy the product made by someone else.
Re: Re: Re:9 Re:
You’re going to be waiting for a long, long time before Blender or Pixar gets sued for copyright infringement.
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Re: Re: Re:10 Re:
if copyright argument doesn’t work, can always base your lawsuit to GDPR. There’s like 10 million bucks damage awards waiting if they forgot to implement popups to their web site…
Re: Re: Re:11 Re:
Who’s going to bring that lawsuit, you? Don’t make me laugh.
Re: Re: Re:12 Re:
Nice thing about gdpr is that I don’t even need to sue the bastards myself. It’s enough that someone in the world sues them.
But if these folks have troubles implementing copyright’s rules, their gdpr implementation isn’t going to fly too far either. GDPR is significantly more difficult to implement properly than copyright laws. It’s just that copyright has been around long time, and if your developers couldn’t get these "copyright maximalist principles" implemented in that time, they have no fucking way of implementing the harsh demands of the GDPR legislation. The government tried to encourage market participants to implement the rules, by placing 10 million bucks fines for anyone who does not conform the strict legal rules. The experience with vendors ignoring copyright maximalist practices kinda hinted to the direction that proper fines are necessary.
Re: Re: Re:13 Re:
And how’s that gamble paid off so far? Last I checked nobody’s sued them based on those magical requirements you think are going to wipe out someone else’s website.
Your "copyright maximalist principles" are just barely being codified in Article 13/17. This idea that you can prevent copyright infringement before it even happens, with or without mandatory filters (something which your professional troll buddies still haven’t been able to decide, which is getting the EU dangerously close to ruling your copyright laws as unenforceable), is even newer than GDPR. So if you’re claiming that "my rules are older than yours therefore you have to follow them", you’ve also failed that laugh test.
People don’t ignore copyright maximalist practices because it’s profitable, people ignore copyright maximalist practices because it’s impractical and unreasonable. Your copyright troll buddies do that all the time. If they genuinely believed in copyright maximalist practices, they’d properly register their copyrights. But they don’t. Your supposed team of copyright maximalists can’t even be bothered to follow the rules they demand. Why should anyone else?
Re: Re: Re:14 Re:
We get decisions like this:
https://torrentfreak.com/adblocking-does-not-constitute-copyright-infringement-court-rules-220118/
Re: Re: Re:15 Re:
Is that supposed to be a win for stricter copyright law? Because it’s not. What you linked was the fact that a court ruled that blocking ads does not equal to copyright infringement, something that your boys at the RIAA have argued otherwise.
What you linked was a loss for stricter copyright law. You linked to an article that proved the opposite of what you advocate. But this sort of dumbfuckery is par for the course for you, I suppose.
Re: Re: Re:16 Re:
It’s not RIAA that argues this point. It’s newspaper publishers who keep arguing that blocking ads is infringement.
But if you can’t even recognize who is the target of your fury, you cannot even fill the paperwork for the lawsuit correctly, as it requires correct target name that you wish to sue.
Re: Re: Re:17 Re:
The linked article did not involve the RIAA, sure. That doesn’t change the fact that the RIAA and MPAA have argued that blocking ads, or avoiding ads, is infringement. As early as 2002 the MPAA argued that standing up to use the bathroom or changing the channel during advertisements can be considered stealing, or at a minimum, copyright infringement.
And frankly, your RIAA friends have spent years suing the wrong people. Your kind can’t be bothered to even use the correct target name.
Re: Re: Re:
You’ll notice Tero Pulkinnen bring up the idea that feature lists have to be copyrightable quite often – that’s because one of his dream scenarios is taking his competition like Blender and Pixar to task for "infringing" on his "feature list".
Removing his competitors from the market on dubious IP-based claims is literally Tero’s only plan for making it big with Meshpage.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
The plan is more cunning than you think. Basically as time passes, all the pirate services will be destroyed, and all their millions of customers will need to move to legal services instead. And once that keeps happening, all the legal services like meshpage.org will benefit from the flood of old customers of piracy services.
This kind of large movements of customers do not happen in any other way than via copyright enforcement. Thus copyright and intellectual property issues are the best chance for smaller web sites to get enough users to sustain the development of the services.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"…as time passes, all the pirate services will be destroyed…"
<looks at The Pirate Bay>
Seems to me the only thing destroying pirate "services", ever, is the emergence of newer and more effective pirate "services". But you do you, tp, and keep imagining that somehow your wishful thinking will make human nature change.
"…and all their millions of customers will need to move to legal services instead."
The irony of that statement is that we already have evidence that it’s the reverse of that causal relationship which applies. Once legal services such as streaming came online piracy started dropping. Then when Streaming began splitting access and became inconvenient again, piracy surged.
Once again your wishful thinking will not alter established reality.
"…And once that keeps happening, all the legal services like meshpage.org will benefit from the flood of old customers of piracy services."
Not happening. Primarily because your meshpage services aren’t outcompeted by piracy but by fully legitimate open source alternatives, freeware, and various models supplied by legal businesses.
What makes your argument truly pathetic, tp – as in more incoherent than that of the average five year old who doesn’t understand why he can’t have a pony – isn’t just your fanatical devotion to copyright maximalism of an order not even Nick Valenti was deranged enough to push.
It’s that your business model hasn’t failed because of piracy in the first place. It’s failed because your offer can’t survive the legal competition. And, I’d wager, because rather than work at fixing that you waste your time barking up the wrong tree.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
You’ve mentioned this plan before, and it wasn’t cunning to start with. Your explanation even less so.
You realize that initiatives like The Pirate Bay and Sci-Hub are still very much active, right?
Nobody calls "pirates" customers. At least not in the context used by antipiracy enforcers. There is an extreme taboo against treating pirates as customers because anything less than hatred doesn’t fit your "RIAA worship" narrative.
This plan of yours still doesn’t solve the "problem" of Blender and Pixar and 3dsmax still being legal options. "Destroying" pirate services will not flood meshpage.org with the pageviews and users you’re desperately hoping for.
You mean like X-Art/Malibu Media, your buddies in professional trolling? The couple who are now looking at 6-digit fines because they got caught abusing copyright law? I hope you enjoy getting fined up the ass buddy…
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Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
All the services do not need to be destroyed at the same time. The hand of the law works slowly, but once it finds your service is full of pirated material, your product will be destroyed. The order of destruction just depends on the strength of the copyright that the service authors are able to use. (though I think that pirate bay should have been destroyed long ago)
All copyrighted works have problems implementing copyright laws. Blender and Pixar are not exceptions. Their products will be destroyed too. It just depends on the strength of their copyright when that will happen. Legal eagles are constantly inventing new legal instruments which force product developers to implement new practices and keep the wheels of the progress running. EU’s legal eagles invented GDPR and now they’re refining copyright laws. Once your product fails to implement newest copyright rules, its time for the product to disappear from the market. (even the EU parlament couldn’t implement GDPR rules on their own web page yet)
Destroying pirates is still the easiest way to get "movement" happening in the marketplace.
Re: Re: Re:4 Re:
This is a very meaningless boast when you have a kill count of zero.
Emphasis mine, purely to show why your endgame scenario will never happen. When your explicit aim is to outlaw even legal services and products in the name of copyright, you won’t find any support. Even the RIAA is loath to admit that their goal is to see everything destroyed the same way you do.
This is, of course, also ignoring the fact that Meshpage would have to be destroyed too since it’s also a copyrighted work, but given your predilection for Adolf Hitler logic I’m sure you’ve got some bullshit reason why Meshpage doesn’t qualify, on top of the program already being used to commit copyright infringement from copying Scott Cawthon’s work.
The destruction of legal works is not "progress" by any stretch of the imagination.
And you think a parliament among multiple governments that can’t even enforce the rules you want is going to start giving you money? Despite your own accusations that the government isn’t using your software?
This is your plan? To demand money from a government – nay, multiple governments – who you consider so fucking incompetent they can’t even do as you want them to?
Destroying pirates only destroys them. Realistically, it means they don’t spend money on your stuff. They spend it on other stuff. Which, once again, will not ever be against the law no matter how much you masturbate to Cary Sherman.
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Re: Re: Re:5 Re:
This is true. Meshpage will also be destroyed at some point. I just hope that my copyright implementation is good enough that it happens later rather than sooner. All more reason to follow copyright maximalist position.
Re: Re: Re:6 Re:
You literally committed copyright infringement which would be illegal under copyright maximalism. You’ve already failed that goal under your own definitions. That’s not even getting into your attempts to have everyone else arrested and destroyed for using existing legal services. I think you’d have a better chance begging Chris Dodd to ejaculate over your face.
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Re: Re: Re:7 Re:
RIAA or MPAA have not yet found it interesting enough to ask google to block the site or add it to notorious web properties list. While it would be a sign of pride to be included in their notorious lists or get blocked by google, I consider it a success of copyright maximalist practices that RIAA or MPAA do not need to block our service. When we have no content owned by RIAA/MPAA in the site, they have no teeth against us, and their tiger will be loud but toothless.
Re: Re: Re:8 Re:
So you consider it a sign of pride to be called a pirate? Well, then. I guess to satisfy you, we can regard Meshpage as software built on a foundation of piracy and copyright infringement. The RIAA will get to you eventually just like you wanted.
I swear, you copyright fucktards are worse than vore fetishists when it comes to masochism.
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Re: Re: Re:9 Re:
Always focusing on the negative aspects and ignoring the advantages that have been built to meshpage. While there are rough spots in it, like all other services, calling it infringing is kinda harsh and unfounded. Maybe you should build your own web site and watch how strong copyright you can preserve in your site.
Re: Re: Re:10 Re:
What advantages have been built into Meshpage that other options like Blender and Maya can’t provide, besides the ability to give some Scandinavian has-been his prostitute fund?
You called every service under stricter copyright rules by your precious RIAA infringing. Those were your words. Not mine. You hoisted yourself up on your own damn petard.
I’ve already seen how you "preserve copyright" on your site. You claim everyone else is breaking the law and overlook your own crimes. That’s the kind of "preserving" that gets you thrown in jail like your professional troll friends at Prenda Law.
Re: Re: Re:11 Re:
It’s still able to display 3d models on webpages, if you failed to notice that minor feature. This is still significantly better than what you are able to do in your own web page. We don’t even need to take Blender or Maya as examples, but focusing on what YOU can contribute to the well-being of the internet phenomenon.
Stricter rules are necessary or web development is completely impossible when the end result has more gaps than your average cheese.
Yeah, like displaying copyright notices and giving credit to the people who contributed to the horror.
Re: Re: Re:12 Re:
You’re not the only webpage with 3D models. You keep desperately wanting this to be a huge perk. It is technically a perk, just not enough for the Finnish government to make you rich for it.
Not every webpage requires 3D models. For that matter, why are you competing with me? If you won’t even compete with Blender or Pixar, who are in the same business of 3D models, why the hell do I need to be your yardstick?
Like your website? Guess we’d better destroy it based on stricter rules, then.
Where’s your Scott Cawthon copyright notice?
Re: Re: Re:13 Re:
When comparing things, you should avoid the following:
1) comparing someone’s work to the best work on the planet
2) comparing one person’s work to the combined effort of a continent
3) comparing one person’s work to a flexible assignment of authors
4) comparing output of different work amounts
5) comparing output based on popularity
6) comparing different time ranges, like 1700-1800 compared to 10 years of work by one person
7) etc–
You get the idea. Somehow the comparision is unfair if your comparision targets are not similar type.
You’re better target than blender or maya, since you don’t have 200 people working for you.
You should ask where’s the model? It simply disappeared from the front page.
Re: Re: Re:14 Re:
The question that should be asked: where was the punishment Tero Pulkinnen received, per the rules of stricter copyright law?
Re: Re: Re:15 Re:
Such punishment does not exist. When publisher removes material from distribution quickly after learning about copyright problems, it’s at worst innocent infringement. That has like less than 200 dollars damage awards, when actual copyright infringement is in 100k to 1B range.¨
stricter copyright laws have advantage that when you actually follow the onerous rules, the liability is reduced. It’s only the pirates who couldn’t care less that are in big trouble because of strict copyright rules.
Re: Re: Re:16 Re:
Nah, the punishment does not exist because like all other copyright fanatics, when you’re caught committing infringement you think that you shouldn’t be punished. Just like the time the CEO of Warner Music admitted his son pirated music, and the time the RIAA was caught on multiple occasions using photos they didn’t pay the original photographer for.
Re: Re: Re:12 Re:
3D models in webpages? That’s so early 2000s.
Re: Re: Re:13 Re:
But still the top100 most popular sites do not have 3d models available in their sites. Something must have failed in their 2000s implementation, so we have another chance of implementing it correctly.
Re: Re: Re:14 Re:
You’re not very good at that, are you?
Re: Re: Re:15 Re:
I already have bugfree code available for customers to consume. That proves that I’m very good at that.
Re: Re: Re:16 Re:
Having zero users using your code is not a sign of you being good at anything.
Re: Re: Re:4 Re:
This is false and has no basis in reality.
They fully confirm to all copyright laws.
Re: Re: Re:5 Re:
A sane sensible man would understand that if someone buys a hammer and they use it to break someone else’s windows, the responsibility lies with the person and not the company that made the hammer.
tp, not being sane or sensible, would demand that the hammer’s manufacturers not only be held liable but that they must design a hammer that can’t be used to break windows, and that the hammer losing all meaningful use for any other activity in the meantime is a small price to pay.
Re: Cloning games is evil...
Mechanics are literally one fo the few things you explicitly can’t get copyright protection for. its in the law. look it up. 17 USC § 102 There is the text for you. its not long. Look at provision (b).
The script is copyrightable, the characters are copyrightable, the visuals are copyrightable, the music is copyrightable, voice dialog is copyrightable (all subject to other restrictions on copyrightability). The mechanics are not.
Re: Re: Cloning games is evil...
I do get the point that you can copyright a compilation of I copyrightable materials so long as the compilation itself is copyrightable, but a compilation of rules meant for playing a specific game strikes me as uncopyrightable as a compilation under section 102(b) for the same reason as any specific rule.
OTOH if you wrote a book called ‘Rules of Sports I Like’ and included the rules of say, ten specific sports in a creative order, chosen in a creative fashion, then perhaps you’d have a creative compilation. Maybe even if you had a book that just collected specific rules without the entire rule set (eg the rule from baseball would be the infield fly rule or something). But I don’t see how you could protect — as rules, which might be re-expressed differently — a set of the complete rules for playing a specific game.
Re: Re: Re: Cloning games is evil...
I have no idea why you replied to me. Nothing I said disagrees with this or what you said earlier. All I did was cite the law in fuller context, provide a link to the relevent text of the law in a law school repository, and note that while portions of a game, like visuals, characters, a script, audio dialog, and music have copyright, that copyright does not extend to portions of the game, like ‘mechanics’, not otherwise covered by copyright.
Re: Re: Re:2 Cloning games is evil...
Yes, I’m agreeing with you, though the earlier poster’s erroneous belief is not entirely unfounded. It just doesn’t work in this context of reimplementing the same game.
Re: You wouldn't download a roll of Toilet Paper
You should have saved the world having the burden of trying to wade through your tripe, and just hit flush instead of send.
Re: Re: Re:
Tero Pulkinnen’s the kind of copyright advocate who’d bring a copyright infringement lawsuit against every woman for having a vagina because his mother has one, then sue his mother for committing copyright infringement on half his DNA information.
Re: Re: You wouldn't download a roll of Toilet Paper
The world can take a small bit of beating. They’ll survive. You can’t make an omelet without breaking some eggs. In the end, the omelet will actually help you survive when there’s interesting entertainment available for your consumption. Consider it as a mind-blowing experience that you’ll remember for the rest of your life.
Re: Re: Re: You wouldn't download a roll of Toilet Paper
Don’t hold your breath. Meshpage won’t have any interesting entertainment made using its engine until long after its copyright has expired.
"But notably absent in all of this was anything related to actual intellectual property registrations and the like."
It’s nice when that happens, but in this case I doubt it will last long. This app has demonstrated that there’s a market for clones, that people will pay for them, and that they have to be slightly more subtle about it. It won’t be long until imitators come along that don’t fall in the same traps, and by that point the original author has essentially refused to arm himself with the tools needed to protect customers who are being ripped off.
Maybe he doesn’t care, and I’m sure that people willing to pay for puzzles of different sizes and more than one puzzle a day won’t be too concerned either. But, if it’s determined that people are being ripped off those things will likely have to come into pay in some way.
A nice result all around here, but the tools you mention will almost certainly have to come into play when the narrow set of circumstances that made Apple feel the need to step in before the backlash truly started are no longer in play.
Re:
I imagine plenty of people would want—and even pay for!—a version of Wordle that doesn’t limit players to a single puzzle a day. And an enterprising developer could tweak the game even further (e.g., more/fewer letters in a word, more/fewer guesses, giving out scores, multiplayer/competitive play). All power to all of those people, and I mean that sincerely.
But plenty more people—myself included—like the fact that Wordle gives you one puzzle per day. That approach doesn’t force people into a commitment any longer than the few minutes they need to do the puzzle itself. No ads, no microtransactions, no trying to siphon your attention away for hours at a time—I (and many others) appreciate at least one app/game/website choosing to take that route. That appreciation probably explains why so many people reacted the way they did to the “ripoff” app.
Re: Re: Re:
Don’t neglect the social aspect of it, where everyone gets the same word each day, so those little results charts have actual meaning to friends and colleagues who see and share their own.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Yeah, that’s also true, I forget that was part of the way it got spread so quickly.
Re: Re: Re:
"I imagine plenty of people would want—and even pay for!—a version of Wordle that doesn’t limit players to a single puzzle a day"
Absolutely, and I imagine that the different letter size puzzles was a big attraction. The basic format does seem to be one that’s easily, and maybe successfully, built upon.
"But plenty more people—myself included—like the fact that Wordle gives you one puzzle per day."
I wouldn’t want to hazard a guess at actual figures, but there’s different audiences for sure. Some people want a nice daily challenge to sink their teeth into on a quick break or while waiting for their morning coffee. Some people want a nice timewaster that lasts a bit longer and will be disappointed when they’re told to wait 24 hours.
"That appreciation probably explains why so many people reacted the way they did to the “ripoff” app"
I’d say there’s several factors – the clear, gleeful profiteering, the fact that the original author has no interest in this kind of roadmap, the fact that it was set up in a way to fool people who didn’t realise there’s no official app. I’d guess that if there were some cosmetic changes and they didn’t use the Wordle name it wouldn’t have had the response it did, though obviously that’s just a guess on everyone’s part as to what the real reason was.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
By the way, there actually were cosmetic changes. The squares are rounder, the dark theme is different, the icons are different, and the icons are in different positions. The keyboard and squares are still there because they have to be there and there are few if any other practical ways to position them.
I mean, it can’t be the norm because not every original product is more popular and better-known than the ripoff. Remember when Microsoft made DoubleSpace, a file compression program, by ripping off Stacker? Without legal recourse, David has no chance against Goliath. It’s a happy accident that Wardle was the big cheese in this case, but it’s certainly not broadly representative of cases like these, which is why we need impartial arbitration.
"Which leads to the obvious question: why can’t this be the norm?"
Because lawyers have student loans.
A lot of you are missing the point…
It doesn’t matter if this was done by an individual or a corporation. The fact that we’re talking about the crappy actions of the person who cloned the game Wordle shows that public accountability is effective. Besides, this smells more like plagiarism than copyright infringement; the fact that the person attempted to profit off of the work of others only amplifies the existing allegations. As the saying goes, always give credit where credit is due!
Re: A lot of you are missing the point…
Not really. In this specific case it did, but for any other dev the results are not reproducible without an element of luck.
If you’re going to rely on luck, you’ll have better odds playing poker, not in hoping you get sufficient media coverage and community outrage to protect your intellectual property.
There’s a simple answer to the question of "Why can’t this be the norm?"
Simple. It’s not a copyright issue. Was this a trick question?
The article starts off with the fact no copyright protection was used on the game.
The end result is a legitimate product being taken out of the store, and for what? Because it looked and acted like the original.
If I’m not mistaken, didn’t Zak’s statement indicate the game is better than the original? Why, yet it does. It has more words!
Isn’t this what copyright was designed to do? Give creators the opportunity to monopolize their works in exchange in giving it to the public so they can expand on it?
This time, there is no copyright involved. The original author waived it.
The article’s ignorance proclaims this to be a copyright issue when it’s nothing more than mob mentality at work because a few idiots forgot this is how it’s supposed to work.
Re: Re:
The author didn’t waive copyright. Josh Wardle, who made the Wordle website, is still free to enforce his copyright on Wordle, although there may be a fair use argument in favor of Shakked. But more importantly, Shakked didn’t provide proper attribution and infringed on Wardle’s trademark.
Re: Re: Re:
He most certainly did waive it. The article itself said he didn’t register the copyright.
A registration of copyright is required before any legal recourse can be taken.
This means this issue cannot, and is not, a copyright (IP) issue.
Techdirt has been reporting this information for years, and I swear it seems none of you actually understand anything about copyright, including the author if this article.
Why is this?
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Close, but no cigar.
Copyright attaches at creation. You can not get damages, but multiple courts have pointed out a plaintiff can register a copyright at any time and proceed to enforce it against any infringement within the statute of limitations. That the copyright isn’t registered doesn’t mean it couldn’t still be. His copyright still exists. Not registering doesn’t waive the copyright, it waives the right to stautory damages. Also, Google isn’t that good with DMCA notices. If the developer submitted it, google probably would have accepted he had the copyright without investigation.
Indeed waiving copyright is hard. on numerous occasions, we have seen failure to register a copyright did not stop copyright from being enforced, merely that a grifter was able to come in and claim the copyright. A CC0 license doesn’t waive copyright – it merely provides a very permissive license. ignoring copyright doesn’t make it disappear.
But you’ve missed the point – the fact that copyright wasn’t involved is the newsworthy bit. Developers claim that aggressive IP enforcement over game mechanics is necessary to deal with also-ran grifters. This justifies an expansion of DMCA scope to cover game mechanics and a corresponding shift in Copyright eligibility. This is a story where, without the involvement of copyright, the also-ran app was addressed. The fact that copyright wasn’t involved suggests IP enforcement might not be the best approach to address this issue.
"But copyright wasn’t involved". That’s the point.
"But the developer wouldn’t have used copyright" Speculative, but also not really the point. The point is that the solution was found without copyright. At no time was copyright unavailable to the Original Developer, it just required more steps before it could be enforced.
"The Original"
FYI, there’s a good amount of physical prior art.
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/5662/word-mastermind
Re:
And not just in prior board games or videogames—the game show Lingo had a word-guessing system that likely served as one inspiration (if not the sole inspiration) for Wordle.
Re: "The Original"
I remember having the previous coloured peg version of that game and the sight of those people on the box art gives me flashbacks, though I always associate the name "Mastermind" with the gameshow that involved Magnus Magnusson and other things that non-UK people might not get.
Re: Re: "The Original"
yeah well you spell colour with a u so we’re used to not getting UK things.
Re: Re: Re: "The Original"
I’m sorry if your dialect’s oversimplification of certain things has left you confused looking at the OG 😉
Re: Re: Re:
The only U that matters is the U in U-S-A!
(this is a joke, I don’t actually think like this, the U.S. is a capitalist hellscape)
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
Hell has MUCH better roads.
I see two main reasons the situation here solved itself without "intellectual property".
First is the goodwill generated towards the original creator. He was popular for the quality of the game and his generous attitude. (In both not monetizing the creation and not aggressively enforcing his IP.)
Second is that the creator of the rip-off shot himself in the foot by publicly bragging about the obvious cash-grab over a rip-off of a well-liked game.
I’m not sure this situation would have developed in this way if he didn’t bring attention on it. Otherwise it would probably have stayed in the shadows for a while longer, possibly indefinitely. Also, if there was no attempt at IP enforcement, Apple had no reason to take it down from the AppStore. The app was, as they said, "awful but lawful": an immoral attempt to parasite the success of the original game, but without violating a trademark that didn’t exist. Apple acted this way because of the public attention brought by the author of the rip-off himself and the negative feedback from the public. It basically did what we often complain about with copyright overreach: taking down something legal, even if this case morals weigh more on the side of the original creator (actual clone + obvious commercial use).
I personally feel pretty conflicted in the way this situation turned out. For once, someone avoided the heavy-handed approach to "imaginary property", but "the world" (i.e. Apple) still reacted as if he did. If I published something and didn’t enforce my rights over it, I don’t think I would like someone else to do it on my behalf. But maybe that’s just me.
Re:
He didn’t help himself after the fact by acting like people had literally strung him up by his feet when he posted that passive-aggressive non-apology on Twitter.
Re: Re:
" Also, if there was no attempt at IP enforcement, Apple had no reason to take it down from the AppStore"
Well, I think that depends on where you live. Although the term wasn’t trademarked, using that in the name would appear to be a deliberate attempt at confusing customers, for the direct purpose of profiting from the confusion. Apple may well have been in the clear in the US, but other places with stronger consumer protection laws might have taken a dimmer view of them allowing apps of that name after they’ve been informed they did not originate from the original creator. Plus, Apple are under fire with all the "big tech" lawsuits and legislative attacks currently being pushed, and this was a big win in terms of marketing even if they had no direct legal or financial reason to block the app.
"For once, someone avoided the heavy-handed approach to "imaginary property", but "the world" (i.e. Apple) still reacted as if he did"
I think Apple reacted as if when the backlash inevitably goes the other way and people start asking why if the dev is boasting about making $X from the app then why Apple are fine taking Y% of what seems to be a clear attempt to fool customers into buying something they don’t need to buy. The original creator is not part of the equation here in Apple’s mind, I think, because he has no direct relationship to them one way or the other. But, the customers who could later claim to have been defrauded are.
Re: Re: Re:
Trademarks exist even though the original authors have not registered their name. Basically trademark registration is optional, if the name has been consistently used in the marketplace, then it gains trademark protection, even if you didn’t register it. Of course registration have some benefits, but it’s not necessary if usage of the name is otherwise consistent in the marketplace. Registration is more for checking that you don’t accidentally violate someone else’s trademarks.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
You’re thinking of copyright. The entire point of a trademark is that it’s meaningless unless it’s registered, because it can’t be enforced. But you command the understanding of IP law like a piece of damp, stale toast so your confusion isn’t surprising. Then again, trolls like you would love it if the need to register IP wasn’t required for you to sue people. Unfortunately, the courts disagreed with your buddies at Malibu Media.
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The current popular one isn’t even the original game. That would be Wordle for DOS in 1993.
https://www.classicdosgames.com/game/Wordle.html
This is okay, but the norm should be better than this.
Even this shouldn’t be the norm. The concept of ownership associated with rival, physical property shouldn’t apply in the context of nonrival, intangible works. Free culture should be the norm. People should be legally able to share modified versions of works and charge for money if they want to. Let potential users decide with their wallets until anti-consumer behavior becomes a problem. However, the manner of copying and charging may still be socially unreasonable, as was the case with Shakked. I don’t mind that the unofficial app was taken down, but I do hope people aren’t upset for the wrong reason.
To prevent confusion:
Registration is not needed for copyright and some trademark protections. Any work without an explicit copyright license is locked from unauthorized copying, modification, and redistribution under copyright except in cases of fair use. Even so, copyright isn’t the important issue here. A court likely wouldn’t see Shakked’s app as fair use because fair use is (too) hard to establish for derivative works made for profit, but the app looks slightly different from Wordle, is in a different format, and is transformative because of the new things it adds. Maybe the app could have changed the colors, but the array of boxes and the keyboard are still there because their presence is functional and therefore noncopyrightable.
The more serious issue is the automatic trademark protections that may apply to Wordle. The name of Shakked’s app literally has "Wordle" in it, and it’s clear that people unaware of the Wordle website (i.e. the original) would be confused about who made the Wordle app.
Plagiarism is not as big of an issue here as people are making out. Plagiarism outside of fraud and education contexts isn’t illegal, and usually the only thing needed to resolve the issue is to include clear attribution. Attribution is usually bundled with copyright anyway. If attribution is the only thing needed to resolve plagiarism, then people should be saying "lack of attribution" instead of throwing around the word "plagiarism".
What's the Big Deal
I find myself wondering whether Wardle himself cares about the creation of a similar game for mobile phones, and cares about the commercialization of that version.
Unless HE cares, why should Apple care?
IP enforcement itself wouldn’t be all that problematic if it were limited to actual ripoffs like this instead being used as malicious blackmail against competitors or worse, completely unrelated products that just happen to share a common word in the name.
Most of the time, so-called clones are just equivalent competitors, like how all first-person shooters were called Doom clones in the 90s.
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