Copyright & claims · plainly

What this house claims — and what it gives away.

TL;DRThe copyright and unregistered common-law trademark claims for Only Humans Score — what's owned, what's released CC BY 4.0, the coined marks, and how to ask about licensing.

A clear, honest statement of the copyright and the unregistered common-law marks behind Only Humans Score. Stated in plain English, hedged where it should be. This is not legal advice.

No copyright wall

You won’t find a © All Rights Reserved velvet rope at the door. The writing here is my own work — and copyright in original work is automatic, so dropping the notice waives nothing; I’m just not waving it in your face. Quotations and cited research belong to their authors and are credited where used (house rule: no lying).

If you think I crossed your copyright: don’t send a troll. Call me. Ask me. Or sue me — but talk to a human first. A person can settle in one honest conversation what a fiction will spend a year litigating. The line runs one way: you call us. — [email protected].

No offense to the real lawyers — the honest ones who take the hard case. But the suit vultures — the ones who chase the profitable claim and won’t pick up the cases that actually deserve respect — shouldn’t be the ones in charge. A lawyer arguing for a corporation is speaking for something that isn’t human; the machine that drafts isn’t human either. Neither the fiction nor the bot should outrank the person. Humans should be in charge. Only humans score. (Opinion, plainly mine — not legal advice.)

What’s deliberately given away

Not everything here is fenced. As stated across the site, play is free and game data is released CC BY 4.0 (public domain). The point of the project was never to hoard — it’s to keep a human name attached to the human work. The free game stays free, forever.

™ Coined marks (unregistered, common-law)

These phrases were coined for this project and are used by it in commerce. The ™ denotes an unregistered, common-law claim of use — not a registered ® trademark, which is a separate filing the author has not represented as complete:

Only Humans Score™ · the project & its thesis
The machine paints; only humans can score™ · the creed line
The attention economy, in reverse™ · coined here

Common slogans the project simply uses — like “more beds, less parking lots” or “less work, more exercise” — are not claimed as marks; they belong to the commons.

Licensing & permissions

Want to quote at length, reuse the writing, or license a mark? Just ask — [email protected]. Short, fair quotation with credit and a link is always welcome and needs no permission.

Plain truth, not a threat. This page asserts what’s honestly assertable — automatic copyright in original work, and ™ for marks in actual use — and is careful not to claim a registration that doesn’t exist or ownership of things in the commons. It is not legal advice, and registration (®) would be a separate step the author can take if and when he chooses. Per the house rule, the blank for that step is left for the curator’s own hand.