[mestevo]

Quote: Originally Posted by Big FN Deal

I don't agree with this at all considering it's the products EA has exclusive rights to where these likeness issues seem to keep arising. I haven't looked much into this, yet it seems this "target" on EA seems to stem, in one form or another, from EA's exclusive market share in NCAA and NFL video games. I would think if there were more parity among these markets, like there once was, these issues would get resolved differently, for whatever reason. Whether that would be due to there being a more uniform way of handling likeness, it not being as financially beneficial to sue multiple companies with divided market share, there being a more artistic perception/precedent when it's done in various game by various companies or whatever. However the way it stands now, if there is an issue with likeness for those type of games, the exclusives make EA the sole target. Heavy is the head that wears/bought the crown.

Yeah, no. The lawsuit is over past use, and as far as anyone's identified this was well before exclusivity. Shoving the exclusivity agenda into this is just another way to be able to go off about the devil that EA is in the eyes of some and about how the company is responsible for all that's wrong in your world. This has nothing to do with a lack of options to litigate.

Quote: Originally Posted by ODogg

Not true, Microsoft was sued in the early days of Microsoft Word for people using their product to plagiarize and courts sides with MS that simply making something open and editable doesn't hold a company liable for user created content. In other words if they made an open NCAA game with just random rosters and a user here on OS named Bob made up the Ohio state exactly how they are and distributed it then the ncaa nor it's players could sue EA, they'd have to sue Bob. And if Bob wasn't profiting from his work it'd be a tough lawsuit seeing as how anyone can watch TV and figure out who plays on what team and their generation attributes after publicly known..

A word processor is a much broader tool than a video game allowing you to create others intellectual property only in that video game that is generating a revenue in part because of those features. A comparable example would be Marvel v City of Heroes. http://www.joystiq.com/2005/12/14/ma...wsuit-settled/

The complaint spawned from the ability to create characters in City of Heroes that closely resembled characters from the Marvel Universe.

Use some common sense here guys, if EA themselves aren't allowed to create players in their own game without licensing, why do you think it's legal for you to? They absolutely could send a C&D to Bob and to EA for any violations. Will/would they? Remains to be seen. Companies don't tend to invest in things that are going to encourage legal challenges because they enjoy making money.