Blizzard Prepares to Sue Over Illegal StarCraft TV Broadcasts

[asinann]

To be fair, Blizzard know better than most what happens when you don't protect your IP.

Also, this discussion is somewhat pointless. The question raised is whether Starcraft can be considered public domain *UNDER SOUTH KOREAN LAW*.

Would any of you happen to be South Korean lawyers?

South Korea signed onto the international copyright treaties, so it gets tried under international copyright law. If Blizzard were a South Korean company, and since these TV stations are in South Korea THEN it would be tried under South Korea copyright law (and since Asian copyright law is a joke and completely unenforced) and Blizzard would be screwed.

 

[asinann]

No, this is what the game publishers would LIKE to happen but when I look at my SNES games, I know I own them.

What has happened is that as the industry has grown they have convinced you (and many others) that they are not selling games, but rather licenses to play a game. It may be true to you if you believe it but a trip to Gamestop or a look at your retro games should show you a different reality.

So you're saying that you do not believe Intellectual Property Rights?

Because that's established by Law. That companies who makes something, be it the software of a videogame, the brand of clothing, type of Television set, etc.

Gamestop sells the physical copies. That's what retailers do. They sell the physical copies of games containing the Developer's software. Software that is legally theirs. By law. And by law, we are not allowed to copy that coded software and sell/alter/use it in any means that will deny the company their profits.

That is Capitalism.

Here's the trick, the whole licensing crap that companies are pulling right now is being challenged in court and until now the courts have been siding with the consumer. Software companies have been continually appealing and in a couple more years it will either be heard by the Supreme court or declined by them and it will be over. As of right now, it's only legal to do this because the changes are on hold until the appeals process is still in progress.

 

[Staskala]

Remember when companies were glad to get free publicity and didnt't sue over even the most minor "copyright infringement" you can imagine?
Good times.

Seriously, how can anyone argue that this hurts Blizzard? Like at all?
Protecting the IP? From what? Free advertising? God help us all.
It just the usual "other people make money and we want a share" crap.

Yeah yeah, it's Blizzard's IP so they are well in their right to sue, but really, it's not like Blizzard had any participation in this. They made the game sure, but others made it big and, as usual, instead of being thankful they run to court. MBC and ongamenet are the biggest game channels in South Korea, they and the KeSPA are the very people that made the game a commercial success in the first place.
They got axed as soon as Blizzard didn't need them anymore, as soon as someone at Blizzard realized that they were so big in SK they could start demanding royalties, royalties the KeSPA refused to pay.
Before that, Blizzard and the KeSPA only had an agreement with no money involved.
Blizzard got the money from game sales, the KeSPA from managing the leagues and the channels from advertising slots.
Everyone was happy, everyone made money. Then they saw that there was more money to be made, so the KeSPA sold broadcasting rights they never had and Blizzard started demanding license fees.
The entire story is just one gigantic mess of the very worst IPRs can do.

Some people say the atom bomb is the worst thing humanity has ever invented.
I say it's copyright law.

 

[Fearzone]

Blizzard is gone. It's Activision now.

Also, it's a game, not a sport.

You can say football is just a game, not a sport, too.

A sport is nothing more than a game with a following. Starcraft is a sport.

Chess has a following. It's a game, not a sport.

The International Olympic Comittee recognizes chess as a sport.

Fair enough.

My last word on the matter is: words have meaning because of their precision--becuase they are exclusive, not inclusive. The more we allow the definition of words to expand, and I'm speaking generally, the more imprecise language becomes.

 

[Shjade]

When you buy the game, it is yours and if you want to show the whole world YOU playing the game then you can do that.

Sure, you can do that...as long as you aren't trying to profit from the showing. When money gets involved, that's when things get tricky.

Consider movies. You buy a movie, you play it on a huge TV or a projection screen for your enjoyment and that of the many friends you invited over for a little movie theater party. That's all cool and fine.

But try charging admission to see that movie? Now you've crossed a legal line.

It's rarely the showing that's the actual issue, it's the commercial aspects of the showing.

 

[Shjade]

Bleh, I hate when it pretends to eat a post and pops it up later. -.-

 

[teebeeohh]

this just sucks. Blizz made a great game with starcraft and KeSPA made it a huge commercial success. Now we have two greedy corporations trying to make as much money out of SC2 as possible.

I get why blizz wanted a piece of the korean esports cake but this just sucks and has Bobby K written all over it(KeSPA is no better in any way, didn't they try to get SC2 a 18+ rating in Korea so it couldn't be broadcast on TV or something).

 

[starhaven]

at first i thought blizzard you greedy basterds but after reading it i support blizzard it seem they are more than willing to allow t.v right aslong as they get their due and that seems fair

 

[King_Serpent]

Go for it, Blizzard. I dislike Korea anyways. You know, for clogging up all the other important news. If they want to have a war and vent over it, be my guest.

This is totally irrelevant, Korea, just pay up the damn royalities!

It is not the country itself doing this. It is a corporation.

Maybe it has some government funding, but it is a free enterprise without government interference.

Just saying no insult intended.

 

[SimuLord]

Guys blizzard is in the right here. It is a group selling their product for money with out any gain for Blizzard. If a TV station started bring in their own cameras to NFL games and they released the videos on their own stations they would get the living hell sued out of them.

And lo, everything I could think to say has been covered. Well-played, ninja!

Seriously, how do you say "this is a copyrighted telecast intended for the private use of our audience. Any rebroadcast, retransmission, or other use of the pictures, descriptions, or accounts of this game without the express written consent of Major League Baseball is prohibited" in Korean?

 

[Lancer723]

On one hand, KeSPA are idiots for trying this. They used to own the rights, then they misused them and ended up losing it to GOM. Now they are basically pouting about losing the rights and banking on the fact that Blizzard/GOMTV wouldn't take this to litigation. The cost for broadcasting is even cheaper than it used to be under KeSPA for gods sake.

On the other hand, Blizzard gets waaay too uptight about controlling every aspect of their games. I understand protecting your IP, but you shouldn't make tournament organizers jump through hoops.

Also, anyone who thinks this case about money is an idiot. A yearly license costs less than 100,000 USD. That's less than the prize money for GomTV's Starcraft II tournies, and I guarantee you GOM is still making buttloads of money after buying the license AND paying the prize money.

The license stuff is chump change to blizzard, they could care less, but setting a legal precedent for control of broadcasting their game in a country outside the US? That's fully worth the large sums of money they are going to spend in legal fees.

 

[Altorin]

Starcraft is public domain in Korea?

I guess it's sort of unprecedented. No other sport (and in Korea, it certainly is counted as a sport) is proprietary. Teams can be, but the sport itself? If a small network wants to show a football show, all it has to do is take a camera outside and play some football. It might not have the rights to show NFL football (as that's pretty tightly in Rupert Murdoch's pockets), but football itself? Yeah, play, have a ball, if people want to watch, they'll watch.

But Starcraft is clearly an intellectual property.

are they suing in korea? or america? because that will make a huge difference.. I really don't know what even I'd say the answer is. clearly blizzard deserves some money for their product being used, and it's NOT public domain, at least not yet. Maybe in 10 years or so, but not now.

A korean judge will probably rule against blizzard, an american would rule with them.

Set's an interesting precedent in anycase, no matter where it's tried.

 

[mattttherman3]

Ok, so this is weird man. Why would you want to watch people play starcraft on tv???? I knew there was some crazy shit over there but jeez.

Goddamn people raged at you for no good reason, bringing up watching sports when you didnt say anything at all about it in your post....LOL.

Lol your telling me, besides, sports are actually interesting usually, teams represent cities, states, provinces, and countries, gaming hasn't really gotten to that point and for gaming it's more about the individuals progress.

OH and then theres the fact that you would be watching people collect resourses for a half hour before any fighting actually starts. I would compare watching videogames to watching Nascar, which is the "sport" that is the least like a sport, if you catch my meaning.

 

[metalhead467]

Somehow I doubt there would be this much RAEG if it involved unauthorized broadcasts, of, say, MLB games. No one would be calling the MLB names if they decided to sue a company that was illegally broadcasting their games.

 

[SenseOfTumour]

In the end, I think more than the fees, it's about control, I imagine when signing a contract you don't get to ***** about Blizzard or explain how another game is better, or how they should have patched something because it's wrong etc.

Unlicensed shows about stuff can pretty much do what they like I imagine so long as it's not libellous, whereas Blizzard have control over the current licensed TV.

I just hope they don't charge much considering it's basically just hours of an advert for SC.

It's certainly not public domain, however, if one of these TV shows wants to create their own RTS, and film people playing that, and not put any copyright on their OWN game, then sure, that's public domain, but they won't do that because they'd be idiots. Blizzard may be many things, but they're not dumb.

 

[Exort]

If they just asked nicely, I'm sure the TV people would in turn return the favour and ask permission.

Actually they did. before Starcraft 2 was even released.

 

[Parnage]

So to stick to topic, Blizzard and Kespa has been going at negotiations for months and months before SC2 was even released.

As someone who actually follows this stuff more then I'd like to think about the issue here is KESPA is in charge and is used to very tight control over both the Leagues(OGN and MBC's) and the players and teams. To a point that many view KESPA with distaste to outright anger. These are the guys who nearly forced the Top Zerg who just won a major tournament to retire because of Free Agent screw ups.

Blizzard doesn't like the job Kespa's been doing and has decided to take more firm control on it's rights. The Fee is actually quite small to start a league(don't quote me but it's about a dollar) while the broadcasting fee is high enough to make sure you don't see some poorly run tournament to hurt the players and the community/ip.

From a pure fanboy of the Pro SC scene(both bw and sc2) I side with blizzard because they haven't done anything to actually hurt the community other then ask for ip rights and a small fee to make sure good shows are put on. They could of issued an injunction of the leagues via the courts but they didn't because they really don't want to stop or shut down the leagues even though they could do so at least for a short time with an injunction.

Kespa to be honest lost my respect when they decided to wipe NaDa's records and bad mouth him because he made a switch to SC2. To put that in perspective that'd be akin to the NBA erasing Championship wins of Michael Jordan because he went to play Golf or something and then calling him a traitor for doing it.

 

[Exort]

Blizzard is gone. It's Activision now.

Also, it's a game, not a sport.

Football is a ball not a sport.

 

[thiosk]

suing... korea... for loving starcraft... seems wrong.

Sure, they deserve SOME of the pie, but probably not all of it.