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Gothic chess

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http://www.gothicchess.com/

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"Karpov agrees to play Fischer, one year later..."

Like saying Gameknot agrees to merge with Red Hot Pawn, but only GK has signed the bottom line and RHP is totally oblivious to what's going on.

Half news is not really full news.

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Uh huh. Read his blog, the self-love just shines through. Does this sound credible to you?

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See this Thread 54078. Mr Trice himself chipped in for a while.

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Is anyone here familiar with patent law?

I was reading the Wikipedia entry on Ed Trice (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Trice) and was a bit confused to see that it said that he invented Gothic Chess in 2000. My research strongly suggests that it was invented around 1998.

I couldn't think of any reason why Mr Trice would claim that Gothic Chess was invented two years after it was until I started thinking about his patent (http://tinyurl.com/yrfgcf) which was filed on 16th May, 2001 and granted on 19th November, 2002.

I Googled a bit and found the following article on the Basics of US Patent Law: http://www.ipfrontline.com/depts/article.asp?id=15052&deptid=2

It contains the following:


Not eligible for Patentability

An invention is not considered new or novel if the same were on sale for more than a year before the filing date of patent application. Selling the invention for testing deprived it of the novelty. Even making an offer to sell or making a contract of sale for the future is fatal to novelty of the invention and it shall not patented.


So does this mean that if Gothic Chess was played publicly before 16th May, 2000 (a year before the date that the patent application was filed) then the patent shouldn't have been allowed?

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It's a stretch to assume anyone is playing it 🙂

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Originally posted by Fat Lady
Is anyone here familiar with patent law?

I was reading the Wikipedia entry on Ed Trice (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Trice) and was a bit confused to see that it said that he invented Gothic Chess in 2000. My research strongly suggests that it was invented around 1998.

I couldn't think of any reason why Mr Trice would claim that Gothic Chess was in ...[text shortened]... ttp://tinyurl.com/yrfgcf) which was filed on 16th May, 2001 and granted on 19th November, 2002.
I think it's fair to say (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capablanca_chess) that the priciple is several decades older than that. All Mr. Trice has done is move the Capablanca setup around a bit and invent a couple of new names. If that deserves a patent, I'm going to patent Revenge Chess, which is the same as normal chess except that black finally gets the chance to move first.

Richard

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From 1998-2000 they were playing Capablanca Chess though and just calling it by another name. You can see here http://web.archive.org/web/20030711200636/gothicchess.org/long_answer.html they talk about Capablanca Chess as their first marketing attempt.

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http://www.gothicchess.com/bk_archive.html

Thousands of games already played.

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Originally posted by PawnCloudHunter
From 1998-2000 they were playing Capablanca Chess though and just calling it by another name. You can see here http://web.archive.org/web/20030711200636/gothicchess.org/long_answer.html they talk about Capablanca Chess as their first marketing attempt.
Well I'll be darned. I never noticed that the setup of the pieces for Gothic Chess had changed.

Here is an archive of gothicchess.com showing the setup as of April 2001:
http://web.archive.org/web/20010408040610/www.gothicchess.com/how_to_play_setup.html

And here the setup as of November 2001:
http://web.archive.org/web/20011122122747/gothicchess.com/how_to_play_setup.html

And indeed the former seems to be the same as the setup for Capablanca Chess:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capablanca_chess

Gothic Chess sets were clearly for sale more than a year before the patent was filed:
http://web.archive.org/web/20000324231052/www.gothicchess.com/products.html
(this is from March 2000, the patent was filed in April 2001), but the fact that Gothic Chess was exactly the same as Capablanca Chess then is very confusing!

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Gothic Chess Association was the name of the company. They were formed to market "Gothic Chess" which was still being researched. Originally this was Capablanca Chess with a new name.

The patent does not have the name "Gothic Chess" on it. It a method of playing an 80-square variant that is the current Gothic Chess setup.

Gothic Chess as it is played today was born in the same year as the patent filing. There was no one year lapse as implied.

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Gothic Chess sets were not for sale before December of 2000 so your information is wrong.

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Originally posted by PawnCloudHunter
Gothic Chess sets were not for sale before December of 2000 so your information is wrong.
Are you saying that this is not a true archive of www.gothicchess.com from March 2000: http://web.archive.org/web/20000324231052/www.gothicchess.com/products.html

Or that gothic chess sets weren't actually for sale, despite the fact that the above page appears to offer them for sale?

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Originally posted by Dance Master MC
http://www.gothicchess.com/
Yet another chess variant. **yawn**

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It turns out that "Gothic Chess" is not even an original chess variant, but a blatant ripoff of "Capablanca Chess", invented by the eponymous World Champion.

Compare:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capablanca_chess

and

http://www.gothicchess.com/rules.html

Even the names of the "new" pieces in Gothic Chess are exactly the same as those in "Capablanca Chess".

There are a couple of minor differences in the games (such as the starting positions of the "new" pieces), and the more significant difference of "Gothic Chess" being "licenseable" (that is, the "inventor" of "Gothic Chess" wants you to pay him money), while "Capablanca Chess" is completely free.