FreeGameDev

This legal opinion says no:
http://www.oocities.org/athens/partheno ... galop.html

Also, an interesting text on the subject:
http://jolt.law.harvard.edu/articles/pd ... ech543.pdf

Andrettin {l Wrote}:This legal opinion says no:
http://www.oocities.org/athens/partheno ... galop.html

Also, an interesting text on the subject:
http://jolt.law.harvard.edu/articles/pd ... ech543.pdf

I'm pretty sure it depends on the judge, your lawyer and on the side suing you. In case of Tolkien Estate, you'll be facing very strong and enthusiastic opponent, capable of bribing judges.

Even reusing someone's programming languages is dangerous:
http://www.wired.com/2012/04/google-oracle/

Moreover, languages can be patented and trademarked. That includes separate language constructs/idioms and/or symbols.

It also will depend on the country where the lawsuit is held. I'm somewhat certain that in my home country the creation of a language has enough "intellectual height" to be automatically protected. I have no idea what the proper translation of "intellectual height" to English is, it just is a blurred term to distinguish trivial (not protected) from non-trivial works, which are protected.

Actually to break the protection, you'll have to convince the judges that the creation was trivial. Which might or might not succeed. The default for written works of any sort is "protected".

But IANAL, this is just what I gathered from studying actual copyright cases.

Language copyright is a modern phenomenon. I think this question relates to the country, its laws and social norms.