A question about a book...

[Mattiah]

If you write it so that it influences SOMA but isn't strictly declared as the same thing, I don't think anyone can prosecute you for it. By leaving out the details that explicitly connects your story to theirs, it could always be something completely unrelated (lore-wise) and just happens to be 2 similar ideas. Easter eggs seem to travel through different companies and products freely.

I once read that no one can copyright an idea.

Hm. The point is, I used ARK and its story (that is, ARK's launch to space, life in the ARK after a human dies, and all the things you find out by completing the game) for speaking about that mysterious guy's project. This project, named by me as Z390-AJ7, is a little orange-white robot able to travel space. My idea was that ARK crashed on Sun, but this guy thinks that it might be situated on the moon, and wanted to use Z390-AJ7 to do some research for ARK. But people didn't want to support this guy, and so the robot never saw light.

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I am not a lawyer, but I am pretty sure you'll be okay. It wouldn't be the first time someone has written a sci-fi story inspired by someone elses work. As for the ARK? I don't know the answer to that - again, not a lawyer. But, I would strongly encourage you to write a story based on what your imagination comes up with. There are a whole number of influences on SOMA for instance. Philip K Dick, Asimov.

I think legal problems only arise when you start making and selling "The wonderful adventures of Catherine Chun and Simon, through PATHOS 2".

Romulators advice here about continuity (given Lindwall etc) is probably the best. Rather than limiting yourself to the SOMA universe, putting a note that your universe is inspired by so and so... that will probably help you target the right readers?

Just my 2 cents... again... not a lawyer!! If you are really worried about such things, please seek professional legal advice!

Big problems I've got... Ah, well, at least I'm not selling that book with SOMA's characters. And hey, the book is still WIP. I'm only writing page 141 for now. And I'm not selling it to anyone til is perfectly salable without falling into the copyright dark abyss.

I think I will need to change some things about the story, but first I want to know at best what I need to do.