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Under U.S. copyright law, yes. A sequel is a derivative work, i.e. a work based on or derived from an underlying work. Only the copyright holder of the original
by matthewmcg 3y ago
Under U.S. copyright law, yes. A sequel is a derivative work, i.e. a work based on or derived from an underlying work. Only the copyright holder of the original work may authorize derivative works.
Example: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/tolkien-estate-sues-over-unauthorized-lord-of-the-rings-sequel https://news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/tolkien-estate-sues-ove...
- archontes 3y agoThe exact answer to his question is "no". He didn't ask about sequels, only styles, and copyright explicitly never protects style.
- matthewmcg 3y agoRight, but what are the chances that the "new material" doesn't include any elements of protected expression from the underlying work, e.g. characters? I understood the request to be about writing a sequel.
- mabster 3y agoI thought derivative works were okay if they were "transformative"? That lawsuit sounded like he had copied text verbatim. I'm not in the US, so I could easily be off base. I really enjoyed The Time Ships by Stephen Baxter, which is a sequel to The Time Machine by H. G. Wells. He's a UK author, so maybe it's different. As a society I think we are better off with this kind of remixing so I'd hope that's the direction we head in.
- bazoom42 3y agoCopying text verbatim is copyrigt violation. Plagiarism (copying ideas) is a different issue and much more of a gray zone. In general ideas are not protected, but it can be prosecuted in blatant cases. The described case seem to be a bit of both.