Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!gatech!bloom-beacon!husc6!cmcl2!beta!hc!ames!xanth!kent
From: kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Monopoly piracy
Message-ID: <1546@xanth.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 10-Jul-87 15:53:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: xanth.1546
Posted: Fri Jul 10 15:53:47 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 12-Jul-87 12:32:22 EDT
References: <3@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM>
Reply-To: kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan)
Organization: Old Dominion University, Norfolk Va.
Lines: 43
Keywords: patent =/= copyright =/= trademark
Summary: but wait, Steve ...

In article <3@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM> denbeste@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM (Steven Den Beste) writes:

	About 5 years ago the copyright on Monopoly ran out. Monopoly is now in
	the public domain, and anyone who wants to can sell it.
	
	(Actually, maybe it was a patent. Regardless, it is now in the public
	domain.)
	
	Parker Brothers would love to have you think that it isn't so, but they
	don't have a legal leg to stand on.
	-- 
	
	Steven C. Den Beste
	Bolt Beranek & Newman, Cambridge MA
	denbeste@bbn.com  (ARPA or CSNET)


I remember it differently.  I think Parker Brothers unsuccessfully sued the
maker of "Anti-Monopoly" for _trademark_ infringement of the trademark
"Monopoly", and the court made the (widely booed) decision that Parker Brothers
had lost its "Monopoly" trademark due to not protecting it (I say "maybe".) and
that the names "Monopoly" and "Parker Brothers" were no longer linked in the
public mind (it was this part that drew the negative press, and I agree with
the critics).

This follows along the lines of saying "xeroxing" instead of "photo-copying";
as long as Xerox doesn't protest, they are allowing their trademark "Xerox" to
enter the public domain.  In their case, it's probably worth it, to have their
corporate name so closely linked in teh public mind with photocopiers.

This in no way invalidates Parker Brothers _copyright_ on the design of the
board game Monopoly, and it is this right that they have apparently
successfully enforced in this case.  Note that, unlike trademarks, copyrights
are very difficult to lose by neglect (roughly every 50 years you must renew
a copyright, or at least reassert your claim to it, but the fact that a text is
widely pirated in no way invalidates the original copyright, unlike the
trademark case), so the copyright is a lot easier to enforce.

Now that I've put in my $0.02, would someone with a legal education and
experience in the trademark/copyright area like to step in and make the
definitive statement?   ;-)

Kent, the man from xanth.