Assassin's Creed Lawsuit Update

H

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
While I don't have a link to this one just yet, we do have the press release stating that Beiswenger has "settled" with GameTrailers and voluntarily dismissed his action against Ubisoft regarding the Assassin’s Creed copyright infringement. I'll post more info when I get it, here is a link to the original story.

On April 17, 2012, American author and research engineer, John L. Beiswenger, filed a lawsuit against Ubisoft Entertainment S.A. and its subsidiary companies, and Gametrailers, Inc., alleging that the storyline behind the popular Assassin's Creed franchise features many similarities to one of his novels, LINK. On May 18, 2012, Gametrailers reached a confidential settlement with Beiswenger under undisclosed terms. On May 29, 2012, Beiswenger exercised his right as a federal litigant to voluntarily dismiss the action against the Ubisoft defendants, without prejudice. There has not been any adjudication on the merits of Beiswenger’s infringement claims.

Kelley Clements Keller, Esq., legal representative for Beiswenger, said, “My client’s decision to exercise his right to voluntarily dismiss the action, without prejudice, in no way diminishes his stalwart conviction in the merit of his claims against Ubisoft. He is unwavering in his belief that many key components of the Assassin’s Creed video game franchise infringe on many key components of his novel, LINK. We believe Ubisoft has engaged in egregious acts of copyright infringement and, should he choose to seek redress through the courts in the future, we remain confident that a trier of fact would agree.”
Click to expand...
 
I wonder if John L. Beiswenger's LINK books were translated to French. Copyright law allows for happenstance where an individual comes up with a similar idea, but never had any influence or knowledge of the first case it was used. Considering a lot of Ubisoft's project managers are francophones, I find it highly unlikely that they were drawing any inspiration from that author.
 
I just love seeing one of the big drm mongers getting hit with copyright claims. It makes my heart sing.
 
^True... but for me, only if it's a real copyright infringement. If it isn't, it's just another money grab, and I hope the author goes bankrupt for trying it, and his lawyer too if he knows full well it was a money grab.
 
And since it's all undisclosed and NDAed and whatever else.......no one will ever know what met the "copyright infringement" bar.

And I think that's the point. If they can hold these things secret and use it later to show that they paid someone off on copyright infringement when it met "Level A" to the tune of X million. Then when it meets "Level C" it should be at least three times the damages they paid for "Level A".

The less actual judgements they have, the more chance they have of establishing the low bar they want to get all of their lawsuits in before someone wises up and realizes the insanity of possibly very vague ties meeting that bar.
 
I always roll my eyes at these sorts of things. Most of the major concepts have been robbed many times over. If you dig far enough you'll find out that pretty much every concept has been done to death. The success is not in the "original" story concept itself but in the execution of that story concept.
 
Most of the major concepts have been robbed many times over. If you dig far enough you'll find out that pretty much every concept has been done to death. The success is not in the "original" story concept itself but in the execution of that story concept.
Click to expand...

I have to agree completely here. The concept behind AC is not something we haven't bumped into over the years - especially if you're a science fiction buff. It's the implementation of the story that was truly brilliant.

My fear would be that Ubi would settle with the author of LINK and then be sued by another author with the same claim. There are probably many books/stories with the same basic underlying concept. That would seem ludicrous to me as it would then undermine the validity of the first claim.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top