>My 5 cents on the Sudoku copyright discussion here:
>
>First of all the right to the usage of the method/mechanism/facility that
>produces the Sudoku sets should be protected, but perhaps not exactly
>in the form of "copyright".
>
>And the Sudoku sets that result from the usage of such Sudoku
>producing method/mechanism/facility, when made accessible, with or without
>commercial payment, should NOT be copyrighted. And there are two
>reasons for this:
so you are proposing a new legacy system about copyright and you're
not discussing the existing one
>1. The method/mechanism/facility is only there to "uncover" one of
>the many Sudoku sets that exist mathematically. It falls into the
>category of intellectual assets that can be repetitively produced by
>different parties with various methods. There is not that much of
>"creation" here, rather it's more of "uncover". The problem here
>is, a Sudoku set is only unique until uncovered again. It does not
>carry the "uniqueness" as by the "Monalisa's Smile". (This point
>has been mentioned many times in various threads)
what usually is referred to as copyright for an assembly or
collection of facts. This is unclear though, since any work
which is undoubtedly copyright can also be encrypted as a number.
>2. Now if someone still insists on the copyright on Sudoku set just
>because he/she is the first one to bring out (uncover) the particular
>set, the reality is that the Sudoku set must be published in some form
>for gamers' consumption. At the end of the day the solution must be
>also made available.
this is a strange requirement.
>How does the original publisher protect
>the "copyrighted" Sudoku set being published with different masking
>of the numbers (based on the same solution) and published as
>a new Sudoku set? How can the publisher get to "copyright" these
>off-springs?
there are usually 1e12 equivalent transformations of a sudoku !
All have exactly the same solving behaviour but they look
completely different.
>*** Need some enlightening here, if I have a Sudoku set solution,
>is it possible to produce more than one sets based on the same
>solution with different masking, yet still "OBEY" the unique and
>symmetrical "RULE" as "REQUIRED" by the Sudoku core people?
what you mean ? The symmetrical arrangement of the clues ? We have
the 8 symmetries of the square, so there are 4 variations of this,
usually, to keep it symmetrical. But of course we can always also
permute the digits in 362880 ways.
>If there can be more than one Sudoku sets from the same solution,
one solution=sudokugrid has 10^30 or more sudokus.
>do we start to go into the mess of copyright of the game and/or the
>solution? ...
I don't hope these sudoku makers will come to the idea
to even claim copyright for the solution grid ! That would
be ridiculous, IMO.
>In reality people do copy a good Sudoku set and pass it on to friends
>for sharing of the challenge. The game publisher needs to find
>a way to charge for the access to the given Sudoku game as
>published. Once the game is made available to an audience, there
>is no more realistic copyright protection whatsoever anymore.
just as with music CDs etc. This is not new. Just that it is even
easier to copy sudokus.
>I.e. such copyright claim does not ends in much, if commercial
>revenue is what the publisher is aiming for.
even if they don't enforce the copyright, they accuse others
directly or indirectly of infringement. Even when it's unclear
whether they have copyright or not.
>Perhaps we need the clarification from the judge himself for the
>judgement?
we need clarification from the law-makers. They enjoy keeping
things unclear...
>And here are the same old two questions again:
>
>1. What is the definition/coverage of the copyright on Sudoku game?
No law exists which deals with copyright on sudokus.
>2. How can such copyright be enforced?
3. which country's copyright does apply, when the "creator" is in
country A, the "infringor" in country B and the server where
the copyrighted(?) sudokus were uploaded is in country C ?
4. how large must a copyrighted work be ? Can I copyright also
6*9 sudokus or 4*4 sudokus ?
5. what about sudokus with special properties, when there are only
a few existing with this property ?
6. do you want to eliminate the requirement for "creativity" and
"originality" entirely ? No difference between hand-made and
computer-made sudokus ?
>Anybody?
just me again.
26 quote-marks added by hand, hope I missed none
-Guenter.
