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Originally Posted by Ed the Coastie
Mithril may be a copyrighted word, but the concept isn't and yttrium silver fills the same niche that mithril does. Now I just have to find an appropriate "fair use" word to represent it. |
Please note that single words and names cannot be "copyrighted". You can trademark them if you want, but this is rarely done.
So if you write a book where you mention "mithril", the book itself will be automatically copyrighted, but the names of characters, places, things are not.
Words need to be specifically trademarked if you want to prevent others from using them.
In the case of Mithril, it's quite obvious it wasn't trademarked, as it is used in
dozens of rpg and video games...
According to Wikipedia:
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The name mithril or similarly spelled variations (mithral, mythril, and others) is present in other fictional contexts like role-playing games, since the Tolkien Estate did not trademark the term. One early example is Dungeons & Dragons most notably the Forgotten Realms setting. It appears in many computer and video games such as: The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall and Time of Castles, IV: Oblivion, EverQuest, RuneScape, Dark Age of Camelot, Lineage II, Dungeons and Dragons Online, Tales of Symphonia, World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy, Maplestory, Patapon, Star Ocean, Cabal Online, Harvest Moon and Kingdom Hearts. The name is usually used for a special type of metal (often used as armor, and is then almost always the best type), or as a denomination of currency, or as a name for a project or device.
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