legal
December 1st, 2009 at 12:00am
Under Xbox 360
Erik Estavillo — otherwise referred to as a “professional plantiff” by
GamePolitics for his laundry list of legal claims — has subpoenaed Microsoft’s Bill Gates in his suit targeting the company for his run in with the
Red Ring of Death. According to court documents filed in a U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, the subpoena demands Gates hand over paperwork that reveal the “true and relative number of actual Xbox 360 units that have been fixed by Microsoft over the past 3 years.” Estavillo also seeks data pertaining to the number of broken Xbox 360 consoles and the amount of people banned from Xbox Live for “piracy” between November 28, 2008 and 2009.
While Estavillo is looking for answers to questions every journalist has been seeking, his track record of legal battles places him in eccentric territory. Estavillo is also suing Activision Blizzard claiming characters in World of Warcraft walk at an intentionally slow pace in order to bilk customers of more monthly fees. In the claim, he subpoenaed actress Winona Ryder and Depeche Mode member Martin Gore. Estavillo has also filed suit against Sony for being banned from online play, stemming from comments he supposedly made during matches of Resistance: Fall of Man; and Nintendo, for issuing firmware updates that disabled his Homebrew Channel.
‘Pro plantiff’ Erik Estavillo subpoenas Bill Gates in RROD suit originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Continue Reading ‘Pro plantiff’ Erik Estavillo subpoenas Bill Gates in RROD suit
Tags: bill-gates, business, erik-estavillo, lawsuit, legal, microsoft, red-ring-of-death, rrod
By Mister-X
Continue Reading ‘Pro plantiff’ Erik Estavillo subpoenas Bill Gates in RROD suit
November 30th, 2009 at 12:30am
Under Wii / Nintendo
Nintendo’s says it will investigate possible copyright infringement in Nokia’s N900 smartphone after a Nokia blog post showcased the device playing retro games through the use of an emulator application. According to Edge, the video (which is no longer available) featured someone playing Super Mario World and Super Mario Bros. 3, and also showed off buttons that supposedly opened emulators for Nintendo’s Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, NES and SNES.
Nintendo UK PR manager Robert Saunders told Edge the company was unaware of the smartphone’s emulation feature and stated that Nintendo would take “rigorous steps” to protect its intellectual property. “Our legal team will examine this to determine if any infringement has taken place,” Saunders added. Even if the feature ends up on the cutting room floor, we imagine some crafty hackers are already taking steps to get emulation software working on the Nokia device. Just like they do with everything else.
Nintendo investigating possible copyright infringement in new Nokia smartphone originally appeared on Joystiq on Sun, 29 Nov 2009 23:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: business, copyright, copyright-infringement, emulation, intellectual-property, legal, nintendo, nokia, roms, Wii / Nintendo
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Nintendo investigating possible copyright infringement in new Nokia smartphone
November 22nd, 2009 at 06:00pm
Under Xbox 360
In response to a possible class action lawsuit resulting from a recent round of Xbox Live bans, Microsoft has now asserted the legality of its position. A spokesperson has told the Financial Post that piracy is a violation of the company’s terms of use and that Microsoft is “well within its legal rights” to ban users from its Xbox Live.
It was reported earlier this month that the law firm AlbingtonIP is “investigating” the possibility of a class action lawsuit against Microsoft over the bans. The firm argues that timing of the bans — shortly after the release of Halo 3: ODST and just prior to the launch of Modern Warfare 2 — was designed to get as much money from Xbox Live subscriptions as possible. In other words, the firm believes that Microsoft personally waited for a time when many people — modders in this case — would be purchasing Live subscriptions for popular games — money that probably wouldn’t be refunded after a ban.
Joystiq’s Law of the Game columnist, Mark Methenitis, classified the suit as a likely “cash grab,” explaining that anyone savvy enough to mod an Xbox would know to stay well away from Xbox Live. We might add that major releases, like ODST and Modern Warfare 2, are the biggest targets for piracy, and likely correspond with rises in illegal downloads. And that just might have something to do with the timing of the bans in question.
[Via Kotaku]
Microsoft says it’s ‘well within legal rights’ to ban consoles originally appeared on Joystiq on Sun, 22 Nov 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: ban, halo-3-odst, lawsuit, legal, microsoft, modding, modern-warfare-2, piracy, xbox-live
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Microsoft says it’s ‘well within legal rights’ to ban consoles
July 27th, 2009 at 08:15pm
Under Xbox 360
After Peter Jackson told us last week, “That Halo project isn’t happening,” with regards to his not quite a game, not quite a movie, erm, thing, Halo Chronicles, we were still waiting for confirmation from Microsoft that the entire project is officially kaputz. And, well, we still don’t know that. Speaking with Peter Jackson’s manager, Ken Kamins, the Company Town blog further confirmed that on his side of the Pacific, the collaboration between Jackson and Microsoft (at the least) is over.
“They were scaling back everything, including the number of Halo games, and it just made sense at that point,” Kamins said, allegedly referencing the January layoffs at Microsoft. Furthermore, according to Jackson’s manager, “Peter [Jackson] has people in Wingnut Interactive working on original intellectual property.” Wingnut Interactive is the studio born out of a partnership between Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh (his business partner), and Microsoft Game Studios. It seems as though Mr. Jackson might be working on some games of his own for now — with or without Microsoft and, as it would seem, the Master Chief. Microsoft has yet to make any statement regarding, well, any of this.
Halo Chronicles reconfirmed as canceled, Microsoft still not speaking originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 27 Jul 2009 19:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: business, company-town, fran-walsh, halo, Halo-Chronicles, ken-kamins, legal, microsoft-game-studios, Peter-Jackson, Wingnut-Interactive
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Halo Chronicles reconfirmed as canceled, Microsoft still not speaking
July 22nd, 2009 at 03:30pm
Under PC+ Xbox 360
In the midst of all the confusion of E3 this year, ex-Brütal Legend publisher, Activision, decided to sue the game’s developer, Double Fine, in order to “stop the release” of the game this October. But before all the exciting litigation can start on July 30, Double Fine has legally responded, filing a countersuit against Activision and claiming Activision’s lawsuit is intended to hurt Double Fine and Brütal Legend itself.
“Double Fine’s countersuit is a demonstration of our intention to fight for this game – Activision will not kill Brütal Legend,” DF’s Caroline Esmurdoc said in a statement released to Joystiq this afternoon. With this countersuit, the developer is seeking an official judge’s ruling that it was free from its contract with Activision and thus allowed to sell the rights to Brütal Legend to the game’s current publisher, EA.
Interestingly, Double Fine claims that Brütal Legend was dropped in the Vivendi/Activision merger after “an effort to convert the game into a Guitar Hero sequel failed.” What?! Now that is a piece of information we didn’t expect to get out of this.
[Thanks, Stix_Remix!]
Double Fine countersues, says ‘Activision will not kill Brutal Legend’ originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 22 Jul 2009 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: activision, brutal-legend, business, double-fine, ea, ea-partners, lawsuit, legal
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Double Fine countersues, says ‘Activision will not kill Brutal Legend’
