Lawsuits
Case: Micro Star v. Formgen (9th Cir. 1998) [C]
Micro Star v. FormGen Inc. 154 F.3d 1107 (9th Cir. 1998) Judge Kosinski opens his opinion by positing the most poignant of questions: “Duke Nukem routinely vanquishes Octabrain and the Protozoid Slimer.…
Case: KSR Int’l v Teleflex (S.Ct. 2007) [P]
KSR International Co. v. Teleflex, Inc. U.S. Supreme Court, April 30, 2007 While technically not a video game case, this landmark Supreme Court case just (expectedly) rocked the patent world. The technology:…
News: 2002 IP case statistics
From the April 2007 ABA Journal, citing the U.S. Department of Justice special report: Of the 7,445 vicil intellectual property lawsuits filed in 2002: 140 (1.9%) made it through trial and received…
Case Update: Immersion v. Sony
As everyone knows by now, Sony settled with Immersion for about $150M. So while the primary issues have been decided, there is still a little cleaning up to do. Namely, there was…
Case Update: Perfect 10 v. CCBill
While not directly related to video games, this case may have some applicability to the game world, given the convergence of service providers and MMOs (think Linden Labs). In a solid win…
News: Midway sued for Psi-Ops
As reported on Gamespot: Nearly three years ago, Midway released Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy, a third-person stealth-action game and–alongside The Suffering and Roadkill–one of a handful of then-recent original intellectual properties the…
Case Update: Immersion v. Sony SETTLED!
Alas, Sony has agreed to fork over $150M to Immersion to settle their ongoing patent dispute. The deal ends a five year battle including allegations of fraud and misconduct after a jury…
Case: Bragg v. Linden Labs
Bragg v. Linden Lab, E.D. Pa. (Pending) Well I had some initial reservation about including this case on our tracking list, given that it wasn’t a “pure” IP case. However, in today’s…
Case Update: Immersion v. Sony Oral Argument
The Federal Circuit heard oral arguments yesterday in the Immersion v. Sony appeal. As previously reported, the sole issue on appeal is Sony’s allegation of misconduct by Immersion. Sony’s arguments at the…
Case Update: Fenner v. Microsoft [P]
It appears that Sony’s game controller woes just continue to grow. Fenner Investments Ltd. has sued Microsoft (Xbox 360), Sony (PS2), and Nintendo (Gamecube) for allegedly infringing U.S. Patent No. 6,297,751, which…
Case: Planet Bingo v. Gametech Int’l [P]
Planet Bingo v. Gametech International __ F.3d __ (Fed. Cir. 2006) Planet Bingo is the exclusive licensee of both the ‘289 and ‘786 patents. The patents claim alternative methods of playing bingo…
News: Immserion v. Sony Appeal
Sorry we took a bit of a hiatus over the holidays. We’re back at work, which includes blogging… So for those following the Immersion v. Sony case regarding haptic (vibration) feedback patents…
Case Update: CBC v. MLB
CBC v. MLB, E.D.Mo. (Aug. 8, 2006) For those that have been following this case, the District Court on Tuesday, August 8, 2006, ruled in favor of CBC fantasy sports, and completely…
Case: Davidson Assoc. v. Internet Gateway (8th Cir. 2006) [C]
Davidson & Associates, Inc. v. Internet Gateway __ F.3d. __ (8th Cir. 2006) Better known as Blizzard v. bnetd, this case curbs the development of new computer programs that interoperate with existing…
Case: Marvel Ent. v. NCSoft Corp. (Settled 2005)
Why Wolverine should never scratch his nose… Marvel Enterprises, Inc. et al. v. NCSoft Corporation, et al. (Headnote: subsequent to our previous posting on this case, the parties have settled…) Amid the…
Case Update: Lucent v. Microsoft (MS fires back!)
We previously reported that Lucent sued Microsoft, alleging that the Xbox 360 infringes one of Lucent’s patents. Earlier this week Microsoft filed a counterclaim, accusing Lucent of infringing various Microsoft patents, as…
Case: Ebay v. Mercexchange (2006) – Patents
Ebay Inc. v. Mercexchange LLC United States Supreme Court May 15, 2006 (Not exactly a video game case, but worth noting nonetheless, as it will apply to video game lawsuits.) Today the…
Case Update: Allison v. Crave Online Media
A case with an interesting copyright twist has settled, thus scuttling our chance to see how a court would rule regarding copyright in cheat codes. In Allison v. Crave Online Media, David…
Case Update: Lucent v. Microsoft
In a newly filed lawsuit, Lucent claims that the Xbox 360 infringes its patent on MPEG-2 decoding. At the center of the dispute is Patent No. 5,227,878, “Adaptive Coding and Decoding of…
Case Update: AVG v. Atari et al.
“Major U.S. game publisher and developer Atari has released the paperwork surrounding its latest financials, and embedded within the document is significant news on the firm’s $300,000 settlement of the American Video…