
Copyright Does Not Protect the Klingon Language, Court Hears - ohjeez
https://torrentfreak.com/copyright-does-not-protect-the-klingon-language-court-hears-160330/?platform=hootsuite
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morninj
TF's copyright reporting is often good, but this headline is silly clickbait,
if technically accurate. The _defendants argued_ that copyright does not
protect these things, but the court hasn't _ruled_ on the issue. Most readers
won't parse the technical distinction between "court hears" and "court holds."

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Brendinooo
Agreed; I got about halfway through the article before I realized that the
court hadn't actually ruled on anything. Guess it's partially my fault for
being a skimmer, too...

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Brendinooo
I think it's unfortunate that Paramount is going after the defendants, but I
think this is a pretty tough case for the Axanar folks to make in most cases.
I can't imagine Lucas or Disney taking too kindly to claims that they don't
own the rights to the Jedi and the word 'lightsaber'. That stuff is brand
names and trade dress, certainly within the realms of copyright.

The question of the Klingon language is a more nuanced and interesting one to
me, though. I doubt that there's a precedent for a corporation owning a spoken
language.

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ktRolster
_The question of the Klingon language is a more nuanced and interesting one to
me, though._

I don't think a language (being a concept) is copyrightable. That is why the
Oracle vs Google case focused on the libraries being copyrighted, rather than
the Java language itself being copyrighted.

