Thread:HerobrineOverlord/@comment-7326455-20141127050825/@comment-24577221-20141127210049

The largest part of the legal issue is:

1. Ideas and plots can't be copyright protected; only the actual stories / games / etc. that are used to express them. "Little non-human guy accidentally finds the magic gizmo that is the key to the super-powerful evil guy's power, and must undergo a dangerous journey to destroy it" can't be copyrighted (else Terry Brooks's The Sword of Shannara would be... mostly not there). The Lord of the Rings is very, very copyright protected.

2. Too many people don't understand point 1. There are too many instances of "You used my idea!  You owe me lots of money!" Also, it's impossible for authors, artists, publishers, etc. to prove that they might have had that idea independently of whoever suggested it. Creative people have lots of ideas... usually more ideas than they have the time and energy to work with.

3. Authors, artists, publishers, etc. are painfully aware of the frivolous lawsuits that have been launched by people attempting to "recover" their "fair share" of the proceeds of a creative work. They don't want to deal with the hassle. It's expensive, time-consuming, and energy-draining. It costs them, far too much in so many ways, and detracts from their ability to get on with creating.

Add in the mess of differences between different countries' copyright laws, and most people who are doing creative work stay as far as they can away from people who want to offer them ideas.