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Attorney of Ubisoft-Suing Novelist Responds to Gamers’ Rage

By Brian P Rubin | 10 May 2012 | 4 Comments   

swiper ubisoft

Kelley Keller, the attorney for novelist John Beiswenger who’s suing Ubisoft over allegations that the Assassin’s Creed franchise ripped off his book, has offered statements to Eurogamer in reaction to angry gamers. Apparently, when they learned that Beiswenger’s $5.25 million seeking lawsuit could delay Assassin’s Creed III’s release, they went ahead and review-bombed his self-published book, Link.

As of this writing, the book has ten five star reviews, one four star review, seven three star reviews, five two star reviews, and TWO-HUNDRED ONE STAR REVIEWS. Gee, I wonder where those came from?

Here’s Keller’s response:

“We understand that many gamers are upset about the litigation and potential for delay in the release of the next Assassin’s Creed video game, and as a result of that anger have been posting negative comments on Amazon—and other forums—about our client and his novel Link.

“However, copyright laws exist to protect authors and creators from others who copy or create works that are, under the law, substantially similar; failure to enforce copyright laws renders them meaningless.

“The Amazon ‘bombing,’ storm of negative comments, and threats to our client have no bearing on the appropriateness, merits, or outcome of this suit. They have no material effect on the legal claims.”

Personally, I’m very curious to see how this all shakes out. Will Beiswenger get the smackdown? Will Ubisoft settle out of court, thereby tacitly admitting they’ve swiped this guy’s ideas? WILL NOTCH OFFER TO SETTLE THE THING WITH A GAME OF QUAKE? What’s gonna happen?!

Via Eurogamer

 

4 Comments

  1. Posted by Mugenite on 10 May 12 at 12:18pm

    “All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again.”
    -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  2. Posted by KABOOS365 on 10 May 12 at 12:36pm

    I find it funny how the lawsuit is just now being filed after the franchise has been out for some time.

    • Posted by Slice of Kris on 10 May 12 at 5:43pm

      he was obviously under a rock the past 10 years

  3. Posted by soulprovider on 10 May 12 at 7:26pm

    There is a lot of gray area regarding copyright laws For instance a company like kinkos cannot reproduce a professional photograph for the relative of the family in the pic because the photographer owns the rights to reproduce the image, But if all hints that it was professionaly were removed the agent is blind to the issue and could fall into it, Copyright laws dictate that the person must be bound by all of them however can make personal copies and can review games under fair use laws, When that person begins to potentially profit from the copyright infringment then it becomes a case instead of a cease and desist. On the other hand the copy right law dictates that the company creating the logo/art work or the agent hired to do so must fully be aware of all possible copyright claims, a copyright can last up to 75 years post 1973 per copyritten item and 50 years for profesional photograph regardless of whether or not the copyright owner is alive or in business, if dead the copyright defaults to their estate or the federal government.

    On a side note if the plaintiff is stating now after almost a decade that he noticed that copyright infringement has taken place then he is within his rights and should be doing what hes doing, and if he is not a gamer then its perfectly acceptable that he didn’t notice the copyright infringement until someone pointed it out to him, possible a fan of his books or something like that. Point being that we cannot demonize someone because he is enforcing his legal right, it costs a decent amount of money to go through the copyright process and there is a lot of paperwork involved depending on how you want to protect your item.

    This could also be a scam, provided by someone who wrote a simple book just hoping that one day someone would infringe on it, I highly doubt that though for this case, but there are people like that out there, just like there are a bunch of stupid people who will bash something without understanding what is actually going on.

    Also note for anyone who is curious, law dictates that a copyright or trademark owner does not need to make it known that an item is copyritten, it is the person who wishes to use the artwork/music/ so on for their own creation that is required to find out if such items are protected under law.

    Ok kiddies enough mumbo jumbo for today.

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