Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

As far as I've read, from a legal standpoint, there is no patent or trademark on the Scrabble game itself, just the name ('Scrabble'). IE the style of game play and rules are completely unprotected since it went into the public domain in the 1950's, was never patented, and so on.

The only patent issued to Scrabble related to how the grid could reflect the score value of 'multiplier' tiles when those tiles were covered by game chips (see US Patent#2,752,158, which EXPIRED in the 1970s). It was a very specific invention by which little triangular bits extended past the edges of the tile, the number of which related to the tiles value (2 bits = 2x multiplier, 3 bits = 3x, etc.). Since it was/is expired using this concept in a tile game or Scrabble-alike would not be in violation of anybody's rights.

The game won't go anywhere, and the game was not 'stolen' from the current trademark owners any more than they 'stole' it in the first place - they bought the rights to the NAME 'Scrabble' not to the game design itself. Making a 'Scrabble' style game, even 100% based on the original rules violates no patent.

The only thing Scrabulous may have to do is change the name, and that is even silly considering "Scrabulous" isn't "Scrabble", so the current trademark owners would have to argue that their trademark extends to names derived from the syllables of the word "Scrabble". Considering the application is already popular a name change would do little to harm its permutation.

The big win here for said 'trademark owner' might be to consider approaching the vendor who makes the widget (not facebook - they don't have any real responsibility for the content of a widget built by a third party on an open publishing system any more than an ISP or search engine does)... and asking them to work out something mutually acceptable. I'm sure a link to buy various hardcopy versions of the 'real' game off Amazon would generate them actual revenue vs. a bunch of money lost fighting a frivolous lawsuit, and it would be little nuisance to people playing the facebook game.