We're almost at 17 years since launch, what happens when patent runs out?

[garicasha]

I'm guessing all the copyrights on the characters will stay, but will the original vanilla code for the client and the server backend infrastructure enter the public domain?

[AcidX]

Nothing will happen

[Eosia]

Nothing, because there is no "patent". A patent only applies to an actual invention being a product or process. Software code falls under copyright law. As things stand now, we'll be long dead before that happens.

[Coniferous]

Nothing will happen. Basically, lawyers have set it up so that nothing ever enters the public domain anymore. Beatles songs written in the 60s aren't in the public domain yet, and probably never will be.

It's crazy, because no one is writing songs today based on the idea that they'll still be profitable in 60 years (the idea behind these protections is that it encourages production of IP), but that's how the law works now - special interests (the companies who hold the rights) make sure that their little enclosed profit center stays that way while the public mostly doesn't pay attention.

[Lochton]

I'm guessing all the copyrights on the characters will stay, but will the original vanilla code for the client and the server backend infrastructure enter the public domain?

They'll keep their licensing up to date most likely.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Copyright stuff expires after the death of the author plus an additional 70 years. Good luck with companies actually dying here..

[Darsithis]

Not how it works. The game's source code won't be released and it won't fall under public domain, any more than games 20, 30, 40 years old today aren't always released as abandonware.

[Berndorf]

Having a hard time deciding if this is a troll thread or not.

[MrLachyG]

I'm guessing all the copyrights on the characters will stay, but will the original vanilla code for the client and the server backend infrastructure enter the public domain?

yeah everything will enter the public domain because a small indie company like Blizzard will almost certainly forget to renew copyright... /s

where do these "hot" takes come from, my god

- - - Updated - - -

Copyright stuff expires after the death of the author plus an additional 70 years. Good luck with companies actually dying here..

I dunno apparently Blizz has been "dying" since 2006

[Mysterymask]

Yeah....we'll be long dead LOONG before that ever happens. I mean it was only a few years ago that stuff started entering public domain again "Steamboat Willy" became public domain LAST year and through legal shenanigans Mickey Mouse and Peg Leg Pete are still owned by Disney. Winnie the Pooh has officially hit Public domain yesterday but like hell is Disney going to let go of that.

So when will Warcraft go Public Domain?

Well let's assume Mike Morhaime's death is the sole factor in that. He's currently 54 years old...average life expectancy in the US is 78 but lets assume he died today somehow.
Warcraft would go into public domain in the year 2092....but since its own by Activision-Blizzard now they can keep the copyright renewed for the life of the company.

[Amnaught]

I'm guessing all the copyrights on the characters will stay, but will the original vanilla code for the client and the server backend infrastructure enter the public domain?

They wont.

Look at Mickey.

[Drusin]

while the public mostly doesn't pay attention.

*care
the public mostly doesn't care lol.

[Dimmak]

It's already been renewed when vanilla servers came out. Also the copyrights for the RTS games were renewed when they remastered them. I suspect they will continue to renew them. 60 dollars to renew a copyright is nothing for a company their size.

[Mic_128]

Copyright stuff expires after the death of the author plus an additional 70 years.

And when that gets close, expect Disney to bust out the lawyers again.

[Gaidax]

What "patent", bruh it's not invention.

It's their IP, they can renew copyright indefinitely.

[Easo]

OP, WTF are you talking about? What patent? For what?!

[Tiwack]

As long as they keep renewing the copyright by releasing new story chapters of warcraft, there's nothing to worry about or discuss - other than the insane rules that are in place in the first place thanks to lobbying giant corporations - and the fact that releasing the same shit with barely anything changed from the original is enough to renew the license on the old stuff.

[VinceVega]

You can't have a patent on code or and IP in itself.

You can only patent something in gaming if you develop something truely unique that no one ever thought of before, which is basically immpossible.

ActiBlizz themselves have one a lawsuit from another dev who tried to patent some bullshit with using stuff in a virtual space where the though ABK used it in CoD and Wow.

Copyrights and trademarks don't really run out that fast.

[Big Law]

You can only patent something in gaming if you develop something truely unique that no one ever thought of before, which is basically immpossible.

Your comment had me curious about what patents exist in the gaming world.

The Ping system: The Ping system allows you to communicate with your teammates in Respawn's battle royale hero shooter by marking points of interest, calling out the location of an enemy, and much more. As well as reducing in-game toxicity by offering an effective alternative to speaking over voice chat, the Ping system also helps players with cognitive, speaking, and hearing disabilities.

The Nemesis system: The Nemesis system, introduced in Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and later refined in Shadow of War, put a refreshing and inventive spin on procedurally generated enemies. Instead of fighting nameless, carbon copy foes, Shadow of Mordor pits you against various different members of Orc society and each and every one is unique to your playthrough.

With their own names and ranks, every Orc you come across will remember your encounters to add more depth to the action.

Dual-reality gameplay: In The Medium, you take on the role of Marianne who you control in both the real world and the spirit world in what developer Bloober Team calls "dual-reality gameplay". The screen is split in half, so you gain two different perspectives in both worlds. Ahead of the game's release, many were quick to notice that Bloober described this dual-reality style as "never-seen-before and officially patented gameplay" in the Microsoft and Steam store listings. As it turns out, Bloober filed a patent for this dual-reality gameplay back in 2016.

The dialogue wheel: Mass Effect Legendary Edition is going to bring us back to the starry expanses of space all over again, and I, like many other fans, can hardly wait to board the Normandy again. But did you know that one very prominent part of the Mass Effect experience is actually patented by the developer? BioWare requested a patent for the dialogue wheel or "graphical interface for interactive dialog" used to select your responses back in 2006, which was officially approved a few years later.

Play while you wait: Mass Effect Legendary Edition is going to bring us back to the starry expanses of space all over again, and I, like many other fans, can hardly wait to board the Normandy again. But did you know that one very prominent part of the Mass Effect experience is actually patented by the developer? BioWare requested a patent for the dialogue wheel or "graphical interface for interactive dialog" used to select your responses back in 2006, which was officially approved a few years later.

Directional arrows: "Come on over and have some fun with Crazy Taxi!". If you played the racing arcade game from Sega that was later ported to the Dream Cast, you might be well acquainted with that line as you booted up the game. You may also remember that it featured a big, green arrow that points you in the direction of your destination.

The sanity system: Eternal Darkness from developer Silicon Knights and Nintendo released on the GameCube back in 2002. Described as a physiological horror, the adventure included a "Sanity system" which featured a meter bar. The meter depletes if your character stumbles upon an enemy or sees "a gruesome situation". When this happens in-game, various different effects occur on screen and around the environment to show the character is being affected by these encounters.

The Nintendo D-pad: Nintendo pioneered the design of the D-Pad back in the '80s, and it was such a good design that it continued to form a part of Nintendo's consoles and handhelds through the years, with the most recent Switch Lite even featuring a traditional D-Pad. Given its great design, it's not so surprising to learn that Nintendo patented its trademark "multi-directional switch".

Unlocking secrets... with a controller?: Midway Amusement Games took out a now-expired patent with a rather interesting title back in 2000. It was called "unlocking secrets in video games", and it was essentially a way to sell peripherals by locking game content that could only be accessed by using a particular controller. "A video game system and method is provided which the enabled content of a video game depends upon the type of video game controller coupled to the video game console," the abstract reads.

So, if you were to use a specific controller that's a "matching type" to the game you're playing, it would unlock "extra features or secrets" in-game that are not "otherwise available". Additional paid-for content is nothing new in the world of video games, but just imagine having to buy a controller just to get your hands on more features and secrets.

Source: https://www.gamesradar.com/video-gam...-surprise-you/

[Kumorii]

Your comment had me curious about what patents exist in the gaming world.

The Ping system: The Ping system allows you to communicate with your teammates in Respawn's battle royale hero shooter by marking points of interest, calling out the location of an enemy, and much more. As well as reducing in-game toxicity by offering an effective alternative to speaking over voice chat, the Ping system also helps players with cognitive, speaking, and hearing disabilities.

The Nemesis system: The Nemesis system, introduced in Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and later refined in Shadow of War, put a refreshing and inventive spin on procedurally generated enemies. Instead of fighting nameless, carbon copy foes, Shadow of Mordor pits you against various different members of Orc society and each and every one is unique to your playthrough.

With their own names and ranks, every Orc you come across will remember your encounters to add more depth to the action.

Dual-reality gameplay: In The Medium, you take on the role of Marianne who you control in both the real world and the spirit world in what developer Bloober Team calls "dual-reality gameplay". The screen is split in half, so you gain two different perspectives in both worlds. Ahead of the game's release, many were quick to notice that Bloober described this dual-reality style as "never-seen-before and officially patented gameplay" in the Microsoft and Steam store listings. As it turns out, Bloober filed a patent for this dual-reality gameplay back in 2016.

The dialogue wheel: Mass Effect Legendary Edition is going to bring us back to the starry expanses of space all over again, and I, like many other fans, can hardly wait to board the Normandy again. But did you know that one very prominent part of the Mass Effect experience is actually patented by the developer? BioWare requested a patent for the dialogue wheel or "graphical interface for interactive dialog" used to select your responses back in 2006, which was officially approved a few years later.

Play while you wait: Mass Effect Legendary Edition is going to bring us back to the starry expanses of space all over again, and I, like many other fans, can hardly wait to board the Normandy again. But did you know that one very prominent part of the Mass Effect experience is actually patented by the developer? BioWare requested a patent for the dialogue wheel or "graphical interface for interactive dialog" used to select your responses back in 2006, which was officially approved a few years later.

Directional arrows: "Come on over and have some fun with Crazy Taxi!". If you played the racing arcade game from Sega that was later ported to the Dream Cast, you might be well acquainted with that line as you booted up the game. You may also remember that it featured a big, green arrow that points you in the direction of your destination.

The sanity system: Eternal Darkness from developer Silicon Knights and Nintendo released on the GameCube back in 2002. Described as a physiological horror, the adventure included a "Sanity system" which featured a meter bar. The meter depletes if your character stumbles upon an enemy or sees "a gruesome situation". When this happens in-game, various different effects occur on screen and around the environment to show the character is being affected by these encounters.

The Nintendo D-pad: Nintendo pioneered the design of the D-Pad back in the '80s, and it was such a good design that it continued to form a part of Nintendo's consoles and handhelds through the years, with the most recent Switch Lite even featuring a traditional D-Pad. Given its great design, it's not so surprising to learn that Nintendo patented its trademark "multi-directional switch".

Unlocking secrets... with a controller?: Midway Amusement Games took out a now-expired patent with a rather interesting title back in 2000. It was called "unlocking secrets in video games", and it was essentially a way to sell peripherals by locking game content that could only be accessed by using a particular controller. "A video game system and method is provided which the enabled content of a video game depends upon the type of video game controller coupled to the video game console," the abstract reads.

So, if you were to use a specific controller that's a "matching type" to the game you're playing, it would unlock "extra features or secrets" in-game that are not "otherwise available". Additional paid-for content is nothing new in the world of video games, but just imagine having to buy a controller just to get your hands on more features and secrets.

Source: https://www.gamesradar.com/video-gam...-surprise-you/

The nemesis system is one of the best systems ever created imo. I got so surprised how the orcs evolved, remembered things, for new traits etc etc. The amount of dialogue created for most scenarios.

They better create more games using it after making that patent. But I doubt they are... Which makes the patent very sad to me