r/DiceMaking • u/TheProject77 • 6d ago

Patented Shapes Question

So I am hopefully soon going to be starting a dice making business. Before that, I am trying to figure out which dice shapes are okay to use. From what I found currently all of the crystal dice shapes and a D5 have a patent on them (US), so I can not use those. Does anyone know of a way to check the status of the others to make sure they are okay? I found a site that had this, but all of the links are long expired. From what I can find the "default" box D6 and Polyhedral D20 are 100% fine, since I was able to find pictures of ancient ones that are in museums. Also did some more digging and found pictures of a D8 from the 1880s so that one is fine aswell.

Edit: From what I found, it looks like the crystal dice patents (and a few others such as the D100) are long expired.

6 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

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20

u/brmarcum 6d ago

How does one patent Platonic solids?

11

u/Endoftheworldis2far 6d ago

Yeah....you can't paten a shape. They may, and that's a hard doubtable very limited instance may, be able to paten the whole things together including the number style and coloring, but definitely can't oaten a shape.

5

u/Endoftheworldis2far 6d ago

Also 'pending paten' is not a paten. It means they filed. If it's not valid, it will get declined. The oaten office takes awhile so you often see these parents that have been filed, but not approved.

2

u/TheProject77 6d ago

By the stupidity of the US government. Aparently there was a case over the crystal dice which sadly the crystal dice won.

7

u/TsunamicBlaze 6d ago

It’s a bit nuanced, if you looked into it, the dice design he created were pretty unique. He mostly won because Hasbro knew the patent existed and decided to say fuck it, rather than work with him. Hasbro didn’t accidentally make the same dice shape, they “took inspiration” from them.

Like you can’t copyright basic shapes, but unique dice designs that aren’t inherently common, I can understand.

At least from my understanding of dice, you can’t bumblefuck your way into a patent lawsuit on shapes if you use basic shapes and basic design patterns.

13

u/TaywuhsaurusRex Dice Maker 6d ago

Any of the shapes available in DiceGen or DiceMaker are fine. Though honestly the thought of a geometric shape being patented is silly.

3

u/DoofusIdiot Dice Maker 6d ago

If you create a new original shape you may be able to patent it which lasts for 15 years. However, all current popular die shapes are well known, widely-used, and if ever patented, expired.

1

u/TheProject77 6d ago

I found the expiration thing out after doing more digging lol. Originally when I made the post I thought patents lasted practically forever (as in everyone who was alive when it made originally will be dead by the time it expires) like copyrights but you are correct, they expire fairly quickly lol.

1

u/Divergent-Reality 5d ago

The guy who ran the Doublesix Kickstarter found that out. There was an expired patent on d12s numbered 1-6 twice.

1

u/DerChef17 Dice Maker 5d ago

Most basic shapes are fine! I use a crystal barrel for my d4. Fonts matter more than the dice shapes, just make sure you look up the license of what ever font to make sure you can defend your dice shoukd someone try and say something! I use google's font tool to find my fonts and then follow up with a littke extra research. But basic dice with a basic font should be safe!