Re: Chess moves

On 8/26/97, Christopher Pesce <pesce[_at_]seanet.com> wrote:
>
> Lee Tien suggested that "A chess game is a work of joint authorship by
> the two players." I don't see it. If two people just play the game,
> there's nothing fixed to claim authorship to. If someone writes down
> the moves that were made, any element of "expression" that may exist
> (and that's a debatable point at best) would be unprotectable because it
> would be merged into and indistinguishable from the factual record of
> what happened. Unlike a news story, the listing of moves of a chess
> game can only be communicated in one way (or a very limited number of
> ways). Copyright is the wrong way to try to assert ownership of this
> purely factual information (at least in the US).

     What if the players played chess on a computer that automatically recorded their moves and computed their scores in fixed form as they played? Wouldn't they then be more likely to be seen as creating a fixed work of joint authorship? This would be different than a basketball game, it seems to me, in that (1) the chess game is an intellectual creation and (2) the chess players would themselves be creating a fixed work. I'm not sure that the fact that they happen to be playing chess at the same time -- or even the fact that playing chess is their principal reason for making the moves -- would change this result.

     As for merger, I'm not sure that this case is fundamentally different from saying that a photograph is the only way to communicate the fact of my pointing the camera in a certain direction and clicking the shutter. Is it?

Neil Netanel, University of Texas School of Law <nnetanel[_at_]mail.law.utexas.edu> Received on Wed Aug 27 1997 - 16:46:35 GMT