Activision Responds to Gibson Lawsuit
By Jonathan on Thursday, March 20th, 2008 at 2:45 PM PST In Activision, Game Companies, Game Related Laws, Gamer Life, Games, Games Industry
Remember awhile back when Activision tried to halt a lawsuit by Gibson claiming that their Guitar Hero franchise infringed on a patent for a music simulator that Gibson had filed? Well, I guess that didn’t work, because Gibson is still going ahead with the lawsuit. Activision has released this statement on the matter:
Gibson’s lawsuit is a transparent end run around an impartial court that Activision asked on March 11 to rule on patent assertions that Gibson knows have no merit. Our Guitar Hero retailing partners have done nothing wrong. We will confront this and any other efforts by Gibson to wrongfully interfere with Activision’s relationship with its customers and its consumers.
As Activision noted in its filing, Gibson waited three years to make its patent allegations, and only did so after it became clear that Activision was not interested in renewing its marketing and support agreement with Gibson. Activision continues to believe that Gibson’s claims are disingenuous and lack any justification.
Aw, it’s like watching a bad break-up in slow motion.
Via Business Wire
So let me get this right….. Gibson is sueing Activision because Activision said they no longer need them, And ended the contract ? (like a revenge sueing ?)
From what I read before it was because activision said they were giving gibson something rediculous like 50% of GH profits which they obviously haven’t done.
Now it appears that Gibson tried to patent for a Guitar Hero like music simulator and is claiming Activision ripped them off or something.
I wonder if Activisions choice to merge with Blizzard has anything to do with this. Maybe they knew they were going to do something bad and needed someone big to get away with it.