Analysis
Animation Frames Patents Spotlight
Animation Frames Patents Spotlight Earlier this week we covered the tight inbetweening patent, U.S. Patent No. 8,451,277 (the ‘277 patent). This patent involved the computer-generation of inbetween frames in animation, inbetweens being…
28th Anniversary of Magic: The Gathering – A discussion of IP Considerations – Part Three
28th Anniversary of Magic: The Gathering – A discussion of IP Considerations – Part Three By Sandy Rokhlin* This is the third and final post in our MTG Intellectual Property series, click…
28th Anniversary of Magic: The Gathering – A discussion of IP Considerations – Part Two
28th Anniversary of Magic: The Gathering – A discussion of IP Considerations – Part Two By Sandy Rokhlin* This is the second post in our MTG Intellectual Property series, please click here…
28th Anniversary of Magic: The Gathering – A discussion of IP Considerations – Part One
28th Anniversary of Magic: The Gathering – A discussion of IP Considerations – Part One By Sandy Rokhlin* Magic: The Gathering (“MTG”) has been around for nearly 30 years, with a new…
Determining the Article of Manufacture in Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality Design Patents
There’s a super interesting article just published in the AIPLA quarterly journal by one our (Banner Witcoff’s) law clerks, Sonia Okolie, on design patents within augmented and virtual reality. She does a…
NBA 2K Avoids Tattoo Copyright Infringement in Three Ways
Solid Oak Sketches, LLC v. 2K Games, Inc. and Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc.Case Number 16-CV-724-LTS-SDAUnited States Court for the Southern District of New York Since Solid Oak Sketches, LLC (“Solid Oak”) filed…
Different Days for Different Places – Determining Timing in Agreements
In re: Supercell OyUnited States Court of Appeals for the Federal CircuitCase No. 2020-113Filed March 17, 2020 In a case that highlights the sometimes important race to the courtroom and nuances of…
Dynamic and Nonliteral Elements Win Protection in Blizzard Copyright Suit
Dynamic and Nonliteral Elements Win Protection in Blizzard Copyright Suit MDY Industries, LLC v. Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. and Vivendi Games, Inc. 629 F.3d 928 (9th Cir. 2010) For those who followed our…
Law Review: A History of US Video Game Litigation
We’re proud to announce that the Patent Arcade’s own, Ross Dannenberg & Josh Davenport, have published a new law review article on the history of US video game litigation, including analysis of…
Tattoos in Video Games – A New Right of Publicity?
Yesterday, the New York Times published an article on the use of athlete’s tattoos in video games. While the article regurgitates the usual commentary on the existing current state of the law…
NEW BOOK: Computer Games and Immersive Entertainment (a video game legal treatise)
We are proud to announce the publication of Computer Games and Immersive Entertainment: Next Frontiers in Intellectual Property Law (2nd ed., Jan. 2019), edited by Christina Scelsi, J.D., LL.M. and Ross Dannenberg. This…
Game Companies Using Inter Partes Reviews (IPRs) As Part of Litigation Strategy
We’ve previously written with updates about inter partes reviews (“IPRs”), where an accused infringer files a petition with the US Patent and Trademark Office arguing that the asserted patent should’ve never been…
Supreme Court Not A Fan Of Trademark Ban – A Reasoned Analysis of Matal v. Tam
SUPREME COURT NOT A FAN OF TRADEMARK BAN By R. Gregory Israelsen On Monday, June 19, 2017, the Supreme Court held in Matal v. Tam[i] that the disparagement clause of the Lanham Act violates the…
Software Patent Update: Why McRO matters.
We posted Tuesday about the McRO case, and here is some more commentary for consideration, which we posted on our firm’s web site, too. One very notable point is that different from…
Guest Post: EU Games Law Special – Keyselling
From Konstantin Ewald & Felix Hilgert of Osborne Clarke: Another year, another gamescom… This time, one of the hot topics we discussed a lot in individual meetings and at the VGBA European Summit…
U.S. Copyright Office Fair Use Index
The U.S. Copyright Office maintains an index of fair use lawsuits. They recently sent out a reminder about the index, reproduced below. Definitely worth checking out. One year ago, the U.S. Register…
Patent Lawsuits Decline – Patent Lawsuits to Become Harder to File
For the first time since 2009, new patent lawsuit filings declined in 2014 from the previous year. Lawsuits dropped by 13 percent, a significant shift from the numbers of cases over the…
What NOT to name your product…
We get asked… often… what sorts of names are best for your video game. This post isn’t a treatise on how to name your video game. This post is a poster child…
U.S. Copyright Office Fair Use Index
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been asked by a client or potential client whether they can include Element X from someone else’s game in their own game. It’s a…
Commentary: Alice v. CLS Bank
Patent Law Update June 20, 2014 Computer-Implemented Inventions: Ideas That Are Fundamental Truths And Generically Implemented Are Not Patent EligibleIn a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Thomas on June 19, 2014, the Court…