Klingon is Copyrighted

I don't know the answer to this one. But The Importance of raises the question if/whether Klingon, which is owned by Paramount, should be copyrightable:

However, can you really copyright a language? You can copyright a dictionary, certainly, but can you copyright grammar? I'm not sure you can copyright grammar at all, since it is a set of rules regarding word usage. Grammar is an idea, that can probably only be expressed in a fairly limited number of ways, even if fanciful.

Additionally, each Klingon word would seem to be too short to qualify as copyrightable individually. I don't think that a list of words in a dictionary format would be copyrightable under Feist. So, I'm not sure at all how one could copyright a language. The individual descriptions of the words might be copyrightable, but as long as they aren't exact copies, the idea/expression dichotomy should provide only limited copyright protection to Paramount.

Perhaps a Tolkien expert might be able to enlighten us on the copyrighting of literary constructed languages.

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.
platypus matt's picture

A harbringer?

This discussion may seem comical, but I see here a possible foreshadowing of where language is headed in general. With more and more "ideas" becoming "property," with no more respect than pig iron (to quote ya!), I'm sure it won't be long before the English language itself will be copyrighted.

Just imagine if Esperanto had been copyrighted, then really taken off? We'd have to pay for every word we say.