[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Fantasy nations in contrib/nations

[Christian Knoke <chrisk@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Oct 21, 2005 at 06:46:42AM +0000, Per Inge Mathisen wrote:
> On Wed, 19 Oct 2005, Jason Dorje Short wrote:
> > >> If not, they should not be included for copyright and trademark reasons.
> > >
> > > According to discussion in RT#10206, using of copyrighted names in
> > > Freeciv would fall under Fair Use. As is the case with all Tolkien 
> > > nations.
> >
> > Names can't be copyrighted. The trademarked names (like Frodo) we do
> > not use.
> 
> Imaginary characters, nations and their likeness can fall under copyright,
> AFAIK.  So "Frodo Baggins" as a character might be under copyright, as
> would a "Fremen" nation that it is clear comes straight out of the Dune
> books.
> 
> I think adding more of these dubious nations is a very, very bad idea.
> There is _no_ reason for us to take this risk.

I'm with Per here.

What we can do is, accept more nations that come out of history, limited in
size and in the time they had a place in history. They must be clearly
marked as such.

Christian

-- 
Christian Knoke            * * *            http://cknoke.de
* * * * * * * * *  Ceterum censeo Microsoft esse dividendum.