March 3, 2008
Scrabble and the lame argument for piracy
Of what does the above picture remind you?
No prizes for this one: it looks like a Scrabble board. It is, however, actually a screen print of Scrabulous, the online game popularised on Facebook and created by two brothers in Calcutta. Clearly this is no coincidence but Hasbro and Mattel, the owners of the game, make nothing from Scrabulous because it is not licensed from Scrabble.
As ever in cases of online piracy, which this plainly is, those who favour it claim that they are really doing the brand good because they are providing viral marketing to a younger audience that would not pay for the original.
This argument is one of those cited by Chris Anderson in his forthcoming book (previewed in Wired magazine) which proselytises in favour of companies giving away products - or at least relying on advertising rather than subscriptions.
Personally, I find the argument specious. It may well be that companies should find ways to spread their brands online, and there is a role for free online versions, but the idea that others are justified in co-opting their brands if they do not act rapidly is self-serving and lame.
On the other hand, the idea that companies should sic their lawyers on people who are strengthening their brands is self-defeating and lamer.
Posted by: Felix | March 3rd, 2008 at 4:55 pm | Report this commentBut the question is, what intellectual property rights are there in a game ? There are no patent rights in a game, which means hasbro/mattel would have to rely on copyright protection, which would extend only to the instructions, and in any case, when did the author die ? Trademark could be forever, but that only applies to the name “Scrabble”. So what’s left ?
Posted by: haveahacks | March 6th, 2008 at 6:44 am | Report this comment