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Schwarzenegger's Anti-Video Game Law Terminated by Appeals Court

Sylvie Lang
On Friday, February 20, 2009 a U.S. Federal Appeals Court ruled that a California law aimed at restricting the sale of violent video games to minors was unconstitutional. The ruling came in the Video Software Dealers Association v. Schwarzenegger, where the video game industry sought to block the anti-vide game law that was signed by Governor Schwarzenegger in 2005. The Appeals Court upheld the decision of the District Court which found that video games are a form of expression protected by the 1st Amendment and that minors are entitled to benefit to a large extent from the guarantee to freedom of speech.
The Court agreed with the Video Software Dealers Association's argument that there are other less restrictive means than censorship of protecting children from violent video games, such as retailer ratings enforcement, ratings education and parental supervision of children's video game playing. The Court also found that in order to justify the restriction on freedom of speech, the government had a burden to prove that the law would directly alleviate a real harm to minors, which it failed to do.
To date there is no indication as to whether the Attorney-General will be back and appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, although the Senator who drafted the law has stated that he would like to have the decision reviewed.
coverage atGameDaily.com

Console manufacturers: time to update your warning notices

An article in the British Journal of Dermatology has identified a new skin disorder, affectionately called "PlayStation palmar hidradenitis". It was discovered by researchers when a 12 year-old girl was admitted to a hospital, complaining of painful sores on her palms. Turned out she played a lot of PlayStation while gripping the controller tightly and sweating a lot. (Note: that's SWEATING a lot; not SWEARING a lot. To our knowledge, only the former activity is medically relevant).

Her playing sytle combined with her underlying skin disorder caused the sores. The doctors ordered her to stop playing the console for 10 days, and bingo: she made a full recovery.

Console manufacturers will no doubt want to add this potential condition to their warning notices in the future.

Also, we wonder how long it will take for Sony to object to the condition's name. This naming problem is similar to a case in 2005 where researchers named a cancer causing gene "POK Erythroid Myeloid Ontogenic", or POKEMON for short. It didn't take Nintendo's lawyers long to send out the demand letter, after which the gene was renamed "Zbtb7".

PlayStation story here (BBC)

POKEMON story here (Gamasutra)

Arnold's law still terminated

In January 2008, we reported that the State of California had become the site of an ongoing battleground between free speech advocates and legislators seeking to limit access to violent video games.

In 2005 the State Legislature passed a law that would impose fines and other sanctions on people who sold certain video games to minors. That law was down by the U.S. district court in 2007. Shortly afterwards, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced that the State of California had filed an appeal of the district court decision with the U.S. Court of Appeals.

The Court of Appeals recently issued its ruling, concluding that the law is unconstitutional. The ESA described the ruling as a "win" for California citizens. Not surprisingly, the government of California doesn't see it that way, especially in light of the order to pay almost $300K to the ESA for its attorneys' fees.

Gamasutra coverage here.

HARMONIX AND VIACOM V. KONAMI

Harmonix and Viacom have instituted proceedings against Konami. The Plaintiffs who developed Rock Band are claiming that the peripheral for Konami's Rock Revolution violates a patent that they hold for controllers that simulate musical instruments.

This is not the first lawsuit to involve these parties. In an earlier lawsuit, Konami had sued Harmonix. It claimed that Rock Band infringed its patent rights.

Coverage at: GameDaily.com

Why play when you can glide? Because...

In 2006, MDY Industries sought a declaration that its "Glider" program that plays World of Warcraft doesn't violate Blizzard's and Vivendi's copyrights. The Arizona District Court ruled in favour of Blizzard and Vivendi, for tortuous interference with contract, contributory copyright infringement, and vicarious copyright infringement. The parties then agreed that the court should hold a bench trial regarding three outstanding issues.

On January 30th, the court released its ruling, concluding that:

1. MDY was trafficking in anti-circumvention technology;

2. the president of MDY should be personally liable because he knew that MDY was infringing Blizzard's and Vivendi's rights, and he supervised the infringing activities, and he profited from them personally; and

3. Blizzard and Vivendi are entitled to a permanent injunction against MDY.

A copy of the order is available here.

An offer he couldn't refuse...

Last year we reported that the estate of Mario Puzo (the author of the original Godfather books) sued Paramount Pictures and Electronic Arts for royalties in connection with the video game.

Anthony Puzo, Mario's son, initiated the lawsuit for at least $1 million in damages. He claimed that his father and Paramount reached an agreement in 1992 in which Paramount promised his father a "significant share" of revenue from any product incorporating elements of the Godfather saga.

Now it appears the parties have settled on--you guessed it--undisclosed terms.

Coverage at AFP here.

Ubi Vancouver

Ubisoft has recently acquired Vancouver developer Action Pants Inc., one of Vancouver's top game developers. Congrats to Simon, Nik, Omar and their team who created an incredibly successful studio in a short three years, becoming one of BC's top 50 employers in 2008 and 2009.

Ubi press release is here.