Hasbro Defeats Challengers in ‘Game of Life’ Copyright Dispute

Hasbro Inc. successfully warded off the efforts of successors to the designer of “The Game of Life” to take control of the board game’s copyright, with a ruling by the First Circuit.

Bill Markham designed the game’s prototype in 1959 as a work for hire under the 1909 Copyright Act, and his successors in interest therefore don’t have the termination rights needed to reassert control over the copyright, the opinion by Judge Kermit V. Lipez said.

The successors said that Markham was an author of the game under the 1976 Copyright Act, but the court refused to apply that act ...